1 00:00:00,960 --> 00:00:09,280 Today I will be reviewing my NVIDIA pen. It declares that you should insist 2 00:00:06,799 --> 00:00:13,120 on NVIDIA and it also has some other pretty good stuff on it. First of all, 3 00:00:11,040 --> 00:00:16,960 NVIDIA is the number one choice in PCs and consumer electronics. Also, all 4 00:00:15,120 --> 00:00:20,800 GeForce GPUs are Vista certified. Shows you how old this pen is. And it is the 5 00:00:18,960 --> 00:00:26,119 number one choice for extreme gamers. And NVIDIA defined the GPU category, or 6 00:00:23,519 --> 00:00:30,000 at least they acquired whoever did. Neat. Actually, that's not what 7 00:00:28,800 --> 00:00:34,880 we're doing today. Today, we're going to be having a look at the GeForce GTX 590. 8 00:00:32,880 --> 00:00:39,360 This is going to be only one of my performance review videos of this 9 00:00:37,120 --> 00:00:44,879 particular card. I'm going to do a few. One of them is going to be all about 3D 10 00:00:42,719 --> 00:00:49,600 3D Vision. So, I'll only be comparing against other GeForce cards in that one. 11 00:00:47,200 --> 00:00:56,079 I am going to be doing one heavyweight showdown between the GTX 590 and the 12 00:00:52,719 --> 00:00:59,120 Radeon HD 6T990. And that will actually 13 00:00:56,079 --> 00:01:01,320 be at a different resolution. So, that 14 00:00:59,120 --> 00:01:07,680 one's going to be at 2560 x600 with this beast of a monitor right 15 00:01:04,920 --> 00:01:11,920 here. Okay. So, that's my my 30-in monitor. But this one right here that 16 00:01:10,000 --> 00:01:18,159 you're watching is going to be all about 1080p performance. Now, the GTX 590 and 17 00:01:15,280 --> 00:01:21,840 the 6T90 for that matter are both a little bit overpowered for 1080p. So, 18 00:01:20,240 --> 00:01:26,159 what you're going to see is that they will dominate the performance charts in 19 00:01:24,080 --> 00:01:29,840 all likelihood, but we're not going to see them really stretch their wings 20 00:01:27,600 --> 00:01:37,560 until you start to get into things like 3D, for example, as well as uh as well 21 00:01:33,439 --> 00:01:41,360 as um HD plus res resolutions like 2560 22 00:01:37,560 --> 00:01:42,960 x600, what that 30-in monitor uses. So, 23 00:01:41,360 --> 00:01:47,600 uh I'm going to talk a little bit about my testing methodology. For most of 24 00:01:44,960 --> 00:01:51,799 these games, I'm using 4x anti-aliasing at the max. I am running all of the 25 00:01:49,600 --> 00:01:56,320 games at extreme maximum settings except for Crisis. I turn motion blur to medium 26 00:01:54,799 --> 00:02:01,960 because it bothers me when it's any higher than that and I don't like playing the game that way. So, I just 27 00:01:59,680 --> 00:02:05,280 turn it off. Um, yeah, I think that's all there is to 28 00:02:04,159 --> 00:02:11,280 say. So, we're going to be looking at Hawk 2, Lost Planet 2, Metro 2033. So, 29 00:02:08,879 --> 00:02:15,440 that's uh Civilization 5. So, those are some DirectX11 titles for us. We've got 30 00:02:13,360 --> 00:02:19,920 Battlefield Bad Company 2, Far Cry 2, and Crisis to have a look at some DX10 31 00:02:18,000 --> 00:02:24,080 gaming. Any one of these GPUs is going to run any DirectX9 title. Great. So, I 32 00:02:22,959 --> 00:02:28,080 personally don't find it all that relevant. We're going to be looking at 33 00:02:26,160 --> 00:02:32,640 nextG features like tessellation more than anything else. All of those 34 00:02:29,840 --> 00:02:37,120 DirectX11 titles do support tessillation in some way, shape, or form. So, that's 35 00:02:34,640 --> 00:02:40,319 going to be a an emphasis of what we are doing today. So, in terms of the 36 00:02:38,640 --> 00:02:44,000 configurations we're looking at, this is going to be extreme performance stuff 37 00:02:42,319 --> 00:02:49,120 only. We're not going to be looking at any dinky stuff. So, we've got the 590, 38 00:02:46,640 --> 00:02:55,440 the Radeon 6990. These are the two flagship uh $700 MSRP cards from NVIDIA 39 00:02:53,440 --> 00:03:00,640 and AMD, respectively. We're also going to be looking at a GTX 580 SLI, which is 40 00:02:58,800 --> 00:03:06,000 another solution that gives you extreme performance on dual cards rather than on 41 00:03:02,959 --> 00:03:08,040 a single card because the two GTX 580s 42 00:03:06,000 --> 00:03:14,159 are clocked higher than the GPUs on the 590, but 43 00:03:11,840 --> 00:03:19,360 they have the drawback of consuming more power, kicking off more heat, and taking 44 00:03:17,040 --> 00:03:26,519 up four slots in your computer rather than only two. Okay, so there's that. 45 00:03:21,760 --> 00:03:30,239 Uh, and then we've also got uh a single 46 00:03:26,519 --> 00:03:34,000 6T970, a single GTX 580, and then I've 47 00:03:30,239 --> 00:03:35,680 also thrown in GTX 560Ti SLI. So, these 48 00:03:34,000 --> 00:03:40,239 two cards don't appear to match, but actually they do. And that is it's just 49 00:03:38,239 --> 00:03:45,280 an interesting configuration because it's a pretty good value for a high-end 50 00:03:42,720 --> 00:03:50,360 gaming system. and I just wanted to see how it stacks up against what is 51 00:03:47,680 --> 00:03:57,840 essentially a downclocked GF10 dual GPU solution versus a fully 52 00:03:54,000 --> 00:04:00,560 clocked uh GTX 560 Ti dual GPU solution. 53 00:03:57,840 --> 00:04:02,720 So uh stay tuned guys for charts and graphs. 54 00:04:37,040 --> 00:04:43,360 So, one of the things I did not mention in my introduction was my test bench. I 55 00:04:41,120 --> 00:04:50,160 should probably cover that. So, I've got a Core i7 2600 K Sandy Bridge processor 56 00:04:46,560 --> 00:04:53,600 at 4.7 GHz. I've got 8 gigs of Mushkin 57 00:04:50,160 --> 00:04:56,880 Redline DDR3600 RAM. I've got an ASRock 58 00:04:53,600 --> 00:05:00,960 Fatality motherboard. I've got an Intel 59 00:04:56,880 --> 00:05:02,400 um 510 series 120 gig SSD and that's 60 00:05:00,960 --> 00:05:07,600 pretty much it for the relevant performance related stuff. So, let's 61 00:05:05,680 --> 00:05:13,039 talk the overall results. So, I'll go through the games individually. Hawk 2 62 00:05:09,759 --> 00:05:15,600 scales great. Um the CPU is able to 63 00:05:13,039 --> 00:05:19,520 allow pretty much any of these cards to reach their full potential and shows us 64 00:05:17,759 --> 00:05:24,320 how they all perform relative to each other to an extent. The Radeon cards 65 00:05:21,919 --> 00:05:29,120 don't perform nearly as well in Hawks 2 as the GeForce cards. And that's an 66 00:05:27,120 --> 00:05:34,919 architectural thing. Could be driver related. Either way, they get left in 67 00:05:32,000 --> 00:05:43,039 the dust. They get creamed. Even the 6990 loses to GTX 560 SLI and a single 68 00:05:40,000 --> 00:05:44,400 GTX 580. So, that's uh that's kind of an 69 00:05:43,039 --> 00:05:48,400 interesting thing about that. But, it does allow us to show the relative 70 00:05:46,560 --> 00:05:52,479 performance of the GeForce solutions against each other at the very least. 71 00:05:50,240 --> 00:05:56,400 Lost Planet 2 is another one. It's a very demanding game. We are not CPU 72 00:05:54,560 --> 00:06:01,280 limited in any way in this particular title. So, each of the GPUs is able to 73 00:05:59,280 --> 00:06:06,560 really stretch their wings and show us what it is capable of. So, you see the 74 00:06:03,199 --> 00:06:09,600 590 come out ahead of the 6990 in this 75 00:06:06,560 --> 00:06:12,039 particular game as well. Metro 2033 is 76 00:06:09,600 --> 00:06:18,720 another example of a game that all of the GPUs are able to perform 77 00:06:15,120 --> 00:06:20,880 quite well in. So, the 580 SLI um 78 00:06:18,720 --> 00:06:26,880 actually performs about the same as the 6T990, which means that the GTX 590, 79 00:06:23,520 --> 00:06:29,520 which doesn't perform as well as 580 SLI 80 00:06:26,880 --> 00:06:34,880 due to the lower clock speed, actually falls behind a little bit in that title. 81 00:06:33,199 --> 00:06:39,280 That's the first one, so I can't say as well. Battlefield Bad Company 2 is 82 00:06:37,520 --> 00:06:44,560 another one where we actually see pretty good scaling. And we also see fairly 83 00:06:42,560 --> 00:06:51,039 close. I would say this is pretty much a tie. fairly close performance between 84 00:06:46,880 --> 00:06:53,120 the 590 and the 6T990. So, Civ 5, this 85 00:06:51,039 --> 00:06:57,199 one seems to be fairly CPU limited, although we do get a little bit of a 86 00:06:55,120 --> 00:07:02,800 performance increase with the 580. The anomaly here is 560 SLI, which performs 87 00:06:59,919 --> 00:07:06,560 just as well as 580 SLI. I got no idea why that is, but I ran it again and 88 00:07:04,639 --> 00:07:10,479 again and again. So, my for my Civ 5 benchmark, basically, I take a very very 89 00:07:08,560 --> 00:07:15,120 late game uh save game that I have uh from 90 00:07:12,800 --> 00:07:20,000 actually playing the game. And then I've got about 30 some odd cities on the 91 00:07:18,080 --> 00:07:24,639 screen. And then I zoom out all the way and I take a reading over a period of 92 00:07:22,319 --> 00:07:27,440 time and then average it out. So, pretty much we're just looking at the same 93 00:07:25,919 --> 00:07:31,599 static image. We're centered over one of the cities. So, each of the cards is 94 00:07:29,199 --> 00:07:35,759 rendering exactly the same thing, but that particular solution performs really 95 00:07:33,440 --> 00:07:39,599 well. could be a driver thing um that's preventing the single card solutions 96 00:07:37,919 --> 00:07:44,720 from performing as well as the dual card solutions. Not really sure what we're 97 00:07:41,840 --> 00:07:49,759 looking at there. For Far Cry 2, yeah, we're pretty much CPU limited at that 98 00:07:46,639 --> 00:07:51,360 point. We are not in any way GPU bound. 99 00:07:49,759 --> 00:07:57,280 Any one of these graphics cards is going to be able to give you a very good experience in Far Cry 2 if you actually 100 00:07:54,720 --> 00:08:01,599 still play that game. Crisis is another one. It looks like we are not going to 101 00:07:59,120 --> 00:08:05,919 be able to observe much in the way of scaling. The one that really falls 102 00:08:02,960 --> 00:08:11,039 behind in Far Cry 2 is the 6T970, but the 6T90 actually performs uh out it 103 00:08:09,199 --> 00:08:17,039 performs on top. It actually outperforms even the GTX 580s. So, at 1080p, it 104 00:08:14,479 --> 00:08:21,919 looks like for the most part, the 590 and the 6T90 are going to be trading 105 00:08:19,039 --> 00:08:28,240 blows. So, it's going to take our testing at 2560 106 00:08:24,840 --> 00:08:31,520 x600 to really separate the men from the 107 00:08:28,240 --> 00:08:34,479 boys in this case. Remember, 2560 x600 108 00:08:31,520 --> 00:08:38,959 is going to be an advantage for anyone who's got better multiGPU scaling, 109 00:08:36,560 --> 00:08:42,880 whether it's NVIDIA or AMD. It's also going to be an advantage for whoever has 110 00:08:40,800 --> 00:08:46,279 the most GPU power because you're going to be far less likely to run into CPU 111 00:08:44,880 --> 00:08:51,040 limitations at that kind of a resolution. But it should give AMD a 112 00:08:49,120 --> 00:08:55,519 distinct advantage because more resolution means you need more video 113 00:08:52,640 --> 00:09:01,920 RAM. And the 6T90 actually has 4 gigs of RAM, two per GPU, whereas the 590 has 3 114 00:08:58,640 --> 00:09:03,920 gigs of RAM, 1.5 gigs per GPU. So, that 115 00:09:01,920 --> 00:09:07,600 may be a bit of an advantage. The only way to know is to try out some titles at 116 00:09:05,920 --> 00:09:13,519 that res. So, thank you for checking out my video review of the GTX 590 at 1920x 117 00:09:11,279 --> 00:09:17,440 1080 1080p resolution. Don't forget to subscribe to Linus Tech Tips for more 118 00:09:14,959 --> 00:09:19,920 unboxings, reviews, and other computer videos.