Test Environment & Equipment

Test Environment & Equipment

Here is where we begin the benchmark portion of this article, but first let me show you our test system plus the software we used. 

Note: We are slowly moving towards a new test platform; ergo, we'll use two of them, newer benchmarks run on the new test platform and so on. 

Mainboard

ASUS Crosshair X670E HERO - Review

Processor

Ryzen 9 7950X3D (16x/32t)  @ defaults - Review

Graphics Cards

• Radeon RX 7800 XT 16GB (PowerColor HellHound Spectral White) 

32 GB (2x 16GB) DDR5 6000 MHz

Power Supply Unit

850 Watts Platinum

Monitor

4K UHD Monitor at resolutions 1920x1080, 2560x1440 and 3840x2160

OS related software

Windows 11 Pro
DirectX 9/10/11/12 End-User Runtime (Download)
AMD Radeon Software Driver Latest available  (Download)
NVIDIA GeForce Driver Latest available (Download)

• If a graphics card barely manages less than 30 FPS, then the game is not very playable, we want to avoid that at all cost.
• With 30 FPS up-to roughly 40 FPS you'll be very able to play the game with perhaps a tiny stutter at certain graphically intensive parts. Overall a very enjoyable experience. Match the best possible resolution to this result and you'll have the best possible rendering quality versus resolution, hey you want both of them to be as high as possible.
• When a graphics card is doing 60 FPS on average or higher then you can rest assured that the game will likely play extremely smoothly at every point in the game, and turn on every possible in-game IQ setting.
• Over 100 FPS? You either have a MONSTER graphics card or a very old game.

Monitor Setup

Before playing games, we are setting up your monitor's contrast & brightness levels is an essential thing to do. I realized recently that a lot of you guys have set up your monitor improperly. How do we know this? Because we receive a couple of emails every now and then telling us that a reader can't distinguish between the benchmark charts (colors) in our reviews. We realized, if that happens, your monitor is not properly set up. 

What Are You Looking For?

• Top bar - This simple test pattern is evenly spaced from 0 to 255 brightness levels, with no profile embedded. If your monitor is correctly set up, you should be able to distinguish each step, and each step should be visually distinct from its neighbors by the same amount. Also, the dark-end step differences should be about the same as the light-end step differences. Finally, the first step should be completely black.
• The three lower blocks - The far left box is a black box within the middle a little box a tint lighter than black. The middle box is a lined square with a central grey square. The far-right white box has a smaller "grey" box that should barely be visible.

You should be able to distinguish all small differences, only then is your monitor set up properly contrast and saturation wise.