17 - Multi GPU Overclocked Core i7 vs GPU performance (1)
Overclocking Core i7
Can the performance scores get any higher? Well we already mentioned this in the benchmarks... You have just been able to see that with 3-way SLI or Quadfire you actually can run into a CPU bound situation. Will overclocking the CPU help then?
Sure, of course... see what happens when we overclock a little. We use 3-way SLI GeForce GTX 280 cards for this test as they work and scale properly in all titles we have tested.
Since we are a little time constrained we keep our overclock simple, yet effective. We increase the processor multiplier at BIOS level with the CPU at roughly 3.74 GHz on all physical CPU cores.
We'll now look at 3-way SLI GeForce GTX 280 on the X58 platform at it's default 3.2 GHz clock frequency, and then overclocked at 3.74 GHz to examine if we see a performance increase.
Bear in mind that all image quality settings remain exactly the same as the previous benchmark sessions you have witnessed.
Brothers In Arms: Hell's Highway
So Brothers In Arms: Hell's Highway is actually a very CPU limited title, and even what can be considered as a small to moderate overclock immediately shows off a performance difference. The flat lines there tell me that the graphics cards wouldn't mind a 4+ GHz processor really.
But dude, get some LN2, go nuts... the sky is the limit here. ~115 FPS is good enough for me.
Call of Duty 4
No way. As I expected, you have plenty of CPU power with the Core i7 965, COD 4 does not benefit from an overclock at all as it's 3D engine is still dreaming about 3 GPUs for the title to work optimally with.