Radeon HD 7970 CPU scaling performance review

DX11: 3DMark 11

3DMark 11 is the latest version of what probably is the most popular graphics card benchmark series. Designed to measure your PC’s gaming performance 3DMark 11 makes extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading. Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 is the best way to consistently and reliably test DirectX 11 under game-like loads.

These will be the requirements:

• 3DMark 11 requires DirectX 11, a DirectX 11 compatible video card, and Windows Vista or Windows 7.
• OS: Microsoft Windows Vista or Windows 7
• Processor: 1.8 GHz dual-core Intel or AMD CPU
• Memory: 1 GB of system memory
• Graphics: DirectX 11 compatible graphics card
• Hard drive space 1.5 GB
• Audio Windows Vista / Windows 7 compatible sound card

Graphics Test 1

• Based on the Deep Sea scene
• No tessellation
• Heavy lighting with several shadow casting lights

Graphics Test 2

• Based on the Deep Sea scene
• Medium tessellation
• Medium lighting with few shadow casting lights

Graphics Test 3

• Based on the High Temple scene
• Medium tessellation
• One shadow casting light

Graphics Test 4

• Based on the High Temple scene
• Heavy tessellation
• Many shadow casting lights

Physics Test

• Rigid body physics simulation with a large number of objects
• This test runs at a fixed resolution regardless of the chosen preset

We test 3DMark 11 in performance mode which will give is a good indication of graphics card performance in the low, mid-range and high end graphics card segment. The application is DirectX 11, meaning only so many cards are compatible.

Again I'm surprised that a modern GPU benchmark so stringent on the graphics card shows performance differentials with different processors in this magnitude.

You want to be above 7000 points alright, so the starting processor is the AMD FX series and obviously Sandy Bridge proving itself again.