NVIDIA GTX 590 Dual GF110
Category : NVIDIA
Published by Marc Büchel on 24.03.11
A few days after AMD launched their insane dual GPU card Radeon HD 6990, it's NVIDIAs turn to show up their dual GPU monster. This one awaits customers, who do have plenty of pocket money, with two fully-fledged GF110 GPUs which have been underclocked by 165 MHz each. This had to be done in order to keep the dissipation power within a reasonable envelope. Never the less, we're very curious if this thing is able to outperform the HD 6990. 
On the following pages we will show you the strenghts and weaknesses of the NVIDIA GTX 590.
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[pagebreak]
Technical data / specifications
Regarding the GTX 590 NVIDIA uses two GF 110 GPUs which feature lowered clock speeds. With 165 MHz less on each GPU, compared to a standard GTX 580 single GPU card, this really is a significant change. Such a reduction of clock speeds comes with most dual GPU cards. Manufacturers do this to keep the maximum TDP within a reasonable envelope. A rough calculation shows that decreasing the clock speeds of both GPUs by 165 MHz let's NVIDIA save about 100 Watts of thermal dissipation power. A positive consequence of this measure is that they were able to put a single axial fan onto the card which operates at a resonable noise level. Furthermore NVIDIA put one massive cooling block onto each GPU which provides an efficient heat transport. Unfortunately the axial fan isn't able to blow all the air out of the case which will cause the temperature within your enclosure to rise. Therefore you really should be aware that the card can produce up to 365 Watts of thermal dissipation power and this will heat your case quite significantly. In 2D mode and placed in a closed computer case the cards noise cannot be separated from other coolers within your system but as soon as there is heavy 3D load you'll hear it quite well.
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | NVIDIA GTX 580 | AMD Radeon HD 6990 | AMD Radeon HD 6970 | |
| Chip | GF110 | GF110 | 2x Cayman XT | Cayman XT |
| Process | 40 nm | 40 nm | 40 nm | 40 nm |
| Transistors | 6.0 billion | 3.0billion | 5.28 billion | 2.64 billion |
| GPU clock | 607 MHz | 772 MHz | 830 MHz | 880 MHz |
| Shader clock | 1'215 MHz | 1'544 MHz | 830 MHz | 880 MHz |
| Memory | 2 x 1'536 MB GDDR4 | 1'536 MB GDDR5 | 2x 2'048 MB GDDR5 | 2'048 MB GDDR5 |
| Memory clock | 3'414 MHz | 1'000 MHz | 5'000 MHz | 5'500 MHz |
| Memory interface | 384 Bit | 384 Bit | 256 Bit | 256 Bit |
| Memory bandwidth | 2 x 163'872 MB/s | 192'400 MB/s | 2 x 160'000 MB/s | 176'000 MB/s |
| TMUs | 2 x 64 | 64 | 2 x 96 | 96 |
| TAUs | 2 x 64 | 64 | 2 x 96 | 96 |
| Shader Cores | 2 x 512 (1D) | 512 (1D) | 2 x 384 (4D) | 384 (4D) |
| ROPs | 2 x 48 ROP | 48 ROP | 2 x 32 ROP | 32 ROP |
| Shader model | SM 5 | SM 5 | SM 5 | SM 5 |
| Maximum board power | 365 Watt | 244 Watt | 350 / 450 Watt | 250 Watt |
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[pagebreak]
Overclocking
For our overclocking test we used MSI Afterburner. This tool allows you to adjust GPU as well as memory frequencies. Therefore we were able to drive the GPU with 681 MHz and the memory with 3'620 MHz.
Futuremark Overclocking
| 3DMark 11 Total | Score | Percent |
| Asus EAH6990 (980 MHz / 5'756 MHz) | 9'201 | 170.92 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 8'625 | 160.22 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 (681 MHz / 3'620 MHz) | 8'564 | 159.09 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 8'123 | 150.90 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII (GPU 952 MHz / Mem 4'568 MHz) | 6'512 | 120.97 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 (GPU 966 MHz / Mem 2'332 MHz) | 6'212 | 115.40 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II (GPU 939 MHz / Mem 4'056 MHz) | 6'199 | 115.16 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 5'988 | 111.24 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII (974 MHz / Mem 5'872 MHz) | 5'656 | 105.07 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 5'383 | 100.00 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 (GPU 1'001 MHz / Mem 3'008 MHz) | 5'365 | 99.67 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 5'273 | 97.96 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top (GPU 1'009 MHz / Mem 4'708 MHz) | 5'003 | 92.94 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 (GPU 986 MHz / Mem 5'764 MHz) | 4'733 | 87.92 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 | 4'606 | 85.57 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 4'551 | 84.54 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock (GPU 951 MHz / Mem 4'300 MHz) | 4'125 | 76.63 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 3'754 | 69.74 % |
| more is better | ||
| 3DMark 11 GPU | Score | Percent |
| Asus EAH6990 (980 MHz / 5'756 MHz) | 11'047 | 193.91 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 9'977 | 175.13 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 (681 MHz / 3'620 MHz) | 9'786 | 171.77 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 8'914 | 156.47 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 (GPU 966MHz / MEM 2'332 MHz) | 6'679 | 117.24 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII (GPU 952 MHz / Mem 4'568 MHz) | 6'731 | 118.15 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II (GPU 939 MHz / Mem 4'056 MHz) | 6'151 | 107.97 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 5'872 | 103.53 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 5'697 | 100.00 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII (974 MHz / Mem 5'872 MHz) | 5'510 | 96.72 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 (GPU 1'001 MHz / Mem 3'008 MHz) | 5'191 | 91.12 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 5'082 | 89.20 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top (GPU 1'009 MHz / Mem 4'708 MHz) | 4'837 | 84.90 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 (GPU 986 MHz / Mem 5'764 MHz) | 4'641 | 81.46 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 4'341 | 76.20 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 | 4'108 | 72.11 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock (GPU 951 MHz / Mem 4'300 MHz) | 4'022 | 70.60 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 3'562 | 62.52 % |
| more is better | ||
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[pagebreak]
Test conditions
Hardware
| OS and Drivers |
|
| Mainboard |
|
| CPUs |
|
| Memory |
|
| Graphic Cards |
|
| HDD |
|
| PSU |
|
Software
Futuremark
- 3DMark 11
- Performance
- 3DMark Vantage
- Performance
Unigine Heaven Benchmark
| High | |
| API | DX11 |
| Stereo 3D | Disabled |
| Shaders | High |
| Tessellation | Extreme |
| Anisotropy | 16 |
| Anti-aliasing | 8x |
| Full Screen | Yes |
| Resolution | 1920x1080 |
Stone Giant
| High | |
| Resolution | 1920 x 1080 |
| Aspect | Auto |
| Tessellation | High |
| Window Mode | No |
World in Conflict
| High | |
| Resolution | 1920 x 1080 |
| Graphic Detail | very high |
| Antialiasing | 8x |
| Anisotropic Texture Filtering | 16x |
Resident Evil 5 DX10
| High | |
| Resolution | 1920 x 1080 |
| Display Mode | Full Screen |
| Refresh Rate | 60 Hz |
| V-Sync | No |
| [de]Bildwiederholrate[/de]Frame Rate | Full Screen |
| Antialiasing | 8x |
| Anisotropic Texture Filtering | 16x |
| Motion Blur | Yes |
| Shadow Detail | High |
| Texture Detail | High |
| Overall Quality | High |
Call of Juarez
| High | |
| Resolution | 1920 x 1080 |
| Display Mode | yes |
| Quality | High |
| Shadowmap size | 2048x2048 |
| Shadows quality | High |
| Antialiasing | 4x SSAA |
| Audio | disabled |
Far Cry 2 DX10
| High | |
| Resolution | 1920 x 1080 |
| Antialiasing | 8x |
| Direct3D | 10 |
| Fire | very high |
| Physics | very high |
| Real Trees | very high |
| Overall Quality | custom |
| Vegetation | very high |
| Shading | ultra high |
| Terrain | ultra high |
| Geometry | ultra high |
| Post FX | high |
| Texture | ultra high |
| Ambient | high |
| HDR | yes |
| Shadow | ultra high |
| Bloom | yes |
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[pagebreak]
3DMark 11
3DMark 11 is Futuremarks latest benchmark for the entire graphical subsystem. The benchmark uses DirectX 11 and it supports all recent features which can possibly generate high load on a GPU. Therefore you find tessellation, compute shader calculations, divers lighting effects and different depth of filed animations. Following we publish values regarding the performance preset of 3DMark 11.
| 3DMark 11 Total | Score | Percent |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 8'772 | 245.23 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 8'625 | 241.12 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 8'370 | 233.99 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 8'123 | 227.09 % |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI (3DMark11 wasn't supported in SLI by nVidia Drivers) | 5'841 | 163.29 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 5'988 | 167.40 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 | 5'803 | 162.23 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 5'335 | 149.15 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 5'273 | 147.14 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 5'175 | 144.67 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI (3DMark11 wasn't supported in SLI by nVidia Drivers) | 5'046 | 141.07 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 4'922 | 137.60 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 4'606 | 128.77 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 4'551 | 127.23 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 3'754 | 104.95 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 | 3'577 | 100.00 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 3'404 | 95.16 % |
| more is better | ||
| 3DMark 11 GPU | Score | Percent |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 10'189 | 305.52 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 9'977 | 299.16 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 9'571 | 286.98 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 8'914 | 267.29 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 5'872 | 176.07 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 | 5'812 | 174.27 % |
| Palit ENGTX 580 SLI (3DMark11 wasn't supported in SLI by nVidia Drivers) | 5'697 | 170.82 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 5'132 | 153.88 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 5'082 | 152.38 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 4'949 | 148.40 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI (3DMark11 wasn't supported in SLI by nVidia Drivers) | 4'870 | 146.03 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 4'802 | 143.99 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 4'341 | 130.16 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 4'108 | 123.18 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 3'562 | 106.81 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 | 3'335 | 100.00 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 3'148 | 94.39 % |
| more is better | ||
3DMark Vantage
3DMark Vantage is able to squeeze nearly everything out of a recent system. Therefore the feature liste is also pretty long: DirectX10, FP16-HDR, motion blur, parallax occlusion mapping, GPU-physics simulation and different shader effects are being used to even make recent high-end systems struggle.
| 3DMark Vantage | Score | Percent |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 36'482 | 262.50 % |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 25'076 | 180.43 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 SLI | 24'638 | 177.28 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 24'520 | 176.43 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 24'353 | 175.22 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 24'309 | 174.91 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 23'588 | 169.72 % |
| ASUS ARES 5870X2 2DIS 4GD5 | 22'496 | 161.86 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 21'341 | 153.55 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 21'171 | 152.42 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 19'614 | 141.13 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 285 SLI | 19'441 | 139.88 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 19'165 | 137.90 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 275 1792MB SLI | 19'098 | 137.41 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 19'019 | 136.85 % |
| ASUS EAH5970 | 18'895 | 135.95 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 18'273 | 131.48 % |
| Gigabyte HD5870 Super Overclock | 18'244 | 131.27 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 17'859 | 128.50 % |
| MSI HD 5870 Lightning | 17'732 | 127.58 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 | 17'598 | 126.62 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 17'485 | 125.81 % |
| ASUS GTX 470 | 16'730 | 120.37 % |
| ASUS EAH5870 | 16'056 | 115.52 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 16'024 | 115.30 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 DirectCU | 15'301 | 110.09 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 14'606 | 105.09 % |
| ASUS EAH5850 | 13'898 | 100.00 % |
| ASUS GTX285 Matrix | 13'047 | 93.87 % |
| MSI GTX 275 Lightning | 12'323 | 88.09 % |
| ASUS EAH3870X2 | 9'508 | 68.41 % |
| ASUS ENGTS250 DK | 8'481 | 61.02 % |
| EVGA 8800 GT 512MB | 6'427 | 46.24 % |
| more is better | ||
| 3DMark Vantage GPU | Score | Percent |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 33'378 | 254.08 % |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 29'775 | 226.65 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 29'283 | 222.90 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 SLI | 29'128 | 221.72 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 28'525 | 217.13 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 28'397 | 216.16 % |
| ASUS ARES 5870X2 2DIS 4GD5 | 25'544 | 194.44 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 23'628 | 179.85 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 23'588 | 179.55 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 23'440 | 178.43 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 20'914 | 159.20 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 285 SLI | 20'715 | 157.68 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 20'039 | 152.54 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 275 1792MB SLI | 19'960 | 151.93 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 19'835 | 150.99 % |
| ASUS EAH5970 | 19'789 | 150.63 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 18'944 | 144.20 % |
| Gigabyte HD5870 Super Overclock | 18'745 | 142.68 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 18'345 | 139.64 % |
| MSI HD 5870 Lightning | 18'095 | 137.74 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 | 17'857 | 135.93 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 17'679 | 134.57 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 15'755 | 119.93 % |
| ASUS EAH5870 | 15'858 | 120.71 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 DirectCU | 14'866 | 113.16 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 14'002 | 106.58 % |
| ASUS GTX 470 | 13'753 | 104.68 % |
| ASUS EAH5850 | 13'137 | 100.00 % |
| ASUS GTX285 Matrix | 12'156 | 92.53 % |
| MSI GTX 275 Lightning | 11'337 | 86.29 % |
| ASUS EAH3870X2 | 8'292 | 63.12 % |
| ASUS ENGTS250 DK | 6'722 | 51.17 % |
| EVGA 8800 GT 512MB | 5'328 | 40.55 % |
| more is better | ||
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Unigine Heaven
| Unigine Heaven | Score | Percent |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 1'484 | 420.40 % |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 1'247 | 353.26 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 1'223 | 346.46 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 1'217 | 344.76 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 1'183 | 335.13 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 1'122 | 317.85 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 883 | 250.14 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 812 | 230.03 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 777 | 220.11 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE SLI | 690 | 195.47 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 677 | 191.78 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 637 | 180.45 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 635 | 179.89 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 593 | 167.99 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 583 | 165.16 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 520 | 147.31 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 447 | 126.63 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 | 353 | 100.00 % |
| more is better | ||
| Unigine Heaven | Average | Percent |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 58.9 fps | 420.71 % |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 49.5 fps | 353.57 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 48.6 fps | 347.14 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 48.3 fps | 345.00 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 47.0 fps | 335.71 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 44.5 fps | 317.86 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 35.3 fps | 252.14 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 32.2 fps | 230.00 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 30.9 fps | 220.71 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE SLI | 27.4 fps | 195.71 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 26.9 fps | 192.14 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 25.3 fps | 180.71 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 25.2 fps | 180.00 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 23.5 fps | 167.86 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 23.1 fps | 165.00 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 20.6 fps | 147.14 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 17.7 fps | 126.43 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 | 14.0 fps | 100.00 % |
| more is better | ||
Stone Giant
| Stone Giant | Average | Percent |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 159 fps | 512.90 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 123 fps | 396.77 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 119 fps | 383.87 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 107 fps | 345.16 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE SLI | 96 fps | 309.68 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 86 fps | 277.42 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 85 fps | 274.19 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 83 fps | 267.74 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 75 fps | 241.94 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 75 fps | 241.94 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 66 fps | 212.90 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 53 fps | 170.97 % |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 51 fps | 164.52 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 51 fps | 164.52 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 50 fps | 161.29 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 44 fps | 141.94 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 48 fps | 154.84 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 | 31 fps | 100.00 % |
| more is better | ||
Discuss this article in the forums
[pagebreak]
World in Conflict
| World in Conflict, 1920 x 1080, high details, 8xAA 16xAF | Average | Percent |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 110 fps | 164.18 % |
| ASUS ARES 5870X2 2DIS 4GD5 | 106 fps | 179.66 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 84 fps | 142.37 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 81 fps | 137.29 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 81 fps | 137.29 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 83 fps | 140.68 % |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 82 fps | 138.98 % |
| ASUS EAH5970 | 77 fps | 130.50 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 77 fps | 130.50 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 75 fps | 127.12 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 75 fps | 127.12 % |
| ASUS GTX 470 | 73 fps | 123.72 % |
| Gigabyte HD5870 Super Overclock | 72 fps | 122.03 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 72 fps | 122.03 % |
| MSI HD 5870 Lightning | 69 fps | 116.94 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 285 SLI | 69 fps | 116.94 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 68 fps | 115.25 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 68 fps | 115.25 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 67 fps | 113.56 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE SLI | 67 fps | 113.56 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 61 fps | 103.39 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 275 1792MB SLI | 59 fps | 100.00 % |
| ASUS EAH5870 | 59 fps | 100.00 % |
| ASUS EAH5850 | 59 fps | 100.00 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 DirectCU | 57 fps | 96.61 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 SLI | 57 fps | 96.61 % |
| ASUS GTX285 Matrix | 56 fps | 94.91 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 55 fps | 93.22 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 | 53 fps | 89.83 % |
| MSI GTX 275 Lightning | 50 fps | 84.74 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 41 fps | 69.49 % |
| ASUS EAH3870X2 | 26 fps | 44.06 % |
| ASUS ENGTS250 DK | 25 fps | 42.37 % |
| EVGA 8800 GT 512MB | 21 fps | 35.59 % |
| more is better | ||
Resident Evil 5
Resident Evil uses nearly every modern rendering technology: HDR, Hemisphere Lighting, Soft Shadows, Soft Particles, Field- und Motion-Blur oder auch Alpha to Coverage and static Ambient Occlusion. Furthermore Resident Evil 5 has been optimized for multicore architectures and already comes DirectX11 ready. By using the DirectX9 as well as the DirectX10 benchmark we can again show you CPU-scaling with low resolutions and the compared to the CPU overproportional influence of the graphics card at high resolutions.
| Resident Evil 5, 1920 x 1080, high details, 8xAA 16xAF | Average | Percent |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 162.50 fps | 169.62 % |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 140.10 fps | 146.24 % |
| ASUS ARES 5870X2 2DIS 4GD5 | 123.20 fps | 128.60 % |
| ASUS EAH5970 | 119.50 fps | 124.73 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 113.60 fps | 139.46 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 113.00 fps | 117.95 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 110.20 fps | 115.03 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 285 SLI | 108.60 fps | 113.36 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 275 1792MB SLI | 108.30 fps | 113.05 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 107.30 fps | 112.00 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 107.40 fps | 112.11 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 105.70 fps | 110.33 % |
| Gigabyte HD5870 Super Overclock | 105.00 fps | 109.60 % |
| MSI HD 5870 Lightning | 104.30 fps | 108.87 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 103.20 fps | 107.72 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 102.90 fps | 107.41 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE SLI | 101.80 fps | 106.26 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 | 100.50 fps | 104.90 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 101.70 fps | 106.16 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 99.50 fps | 103.86 % |
| ASUS EAH5870 | 97.20 fps | 101.46 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 96.50 fps | 100.73 % |
| ASUS EAH5850 | 95.80 fps | 100.00 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 SLI | 95.30 fps | 99.48 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 DirectCU | 93.30 fps | 97.39 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 92.20 fps | 78.50 % |
| ASUS GTX 470 | 90.30 fps | 94.25 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 88.10 fps | 91.96 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 78.60 fps | 82.04 % |
| ASUS GTX285 Matrix | 75.00 fps | 78.28 % |
| MSI GTX 275 Lightning | 62.40 fps | 65.13 % |
| ASUS EAH3870X2 | 51.60 fps | 53.86 % |
| ASUS ENGTS250 DK | 44.40 fps | 46.35 % |
| EVGA 8800 GT 512MB | 34.6 fps | 36.10 % |
| more is better | ||
Discuss this article in the forums
[pagebreak]
Call of Juarez
| Call of Juarez, 1920 x 1080, high details, 4xSSAA | Average | Percent |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 91.00 fps | 228.64 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 88.80 fps | 223.16 % |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 88.60 fps | 222.61 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 78.90 fps | 198.24 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 76.00 fps | 190.95 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 73.10 fps | 183.67 % |
| ASUS ARES 5870X2 2DIS 4GD5 | 72.80 fps | 182.91 % |
| ASUS EAH5970 | 53.60 fps | 134.67 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 52.40 fps | 131.65 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE SLI | 52.00 fps | 130.65 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 51.90 fps | 130.40 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 49.20 fps | 123.62 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 48.70 fps | 122.36 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 SLI | 47.60 fps | 119.59 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 46.20 fps | 116.08 % |
| Gigabyte HD5870 Super Overclock | 43.20 fps | 108.54 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 42.90 fps | 107.79 % |
| MSI HD 5870 Lightning | 42.50 fps | 106.78 % |
| ASUS EAH5870 | 41.90 fps | 105.27 % |
| ASUS EAH5850 | 39.80 fps | 100.00 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 39.50 fps | 99.25 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 285 SLI | 38.80 fps | 97.48 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 37.20 fps | 93.47 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 275 1792MB SLI | 38.00 fps | 95.47 % |
| ASUS GTX285 Matrix | 34.60 fps | 86.93 % |
| ASUS GTX 470 | 34.20 fps | 85.92 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 | 33.20 fps | 83.42 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 DirectCU | 32.10 fps | 80.65 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 32.10 fps | 80.65 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 30.70 fps | 77.14 % |
| MSI GTX 275 Lightning | 28.50 fps | 71.60 % |
| ASUS EAH3870X2 | 24.50 fps | 61.56 % |
| ASUS ENGTS250 DK | 13.90 fps | 34.92 % |
| EVGA 8800 GT 512MB | 11.50 fps | 28.89 % |
| more is better | ||
Far Cry 2
| Far Cry 2, 1920 x 1080, high details, 8xAA | Average | Percent |
| Palit GTX 580 SLI | 132.41 fps | 250.21 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (880 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 122.40 fps | 231.29 % |
| Asus EAH6990 (830 MHz / 5'000 MHz) | 120.76 fps | 228.19 % |
| Zotac GTX480 SLI | 118.04 fps | 223.05 % |
| NVIDIA GTX 590 | 113.17 fps | 213.85 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 SLI | 107.77 fps | 203.65 % |
| AMD Radeon HD6970 CrossFire | 98.50 fps | 186.13 % |
| ASUS ENGTX 580 | 98.36 fps | 185.86 % |
| ASUS GTX 580 DirectCUII | 95.27 fps | 180.03 % |
| ASUS ARES 5870X2 2DIS 4GD5 | 91.87 fps | 173.60 % |
| ASUS GTX 570 DirectCU II | 88.83 fps | 167.86 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 SLI | 86.87 fps | 164.15 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 285 SLI | 84.49 fps | 159.65 % |
| ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II Top | 84.00 fps | 158.73 % |
| ASUS EAH5970 | 80.35 fps | 153.48 % |
| ZOTAC GTX 275 1792MB SLI | 79.51 fps | 150.24 % |
| ASUS EAH6970 2GB | 79.21 fps | 149.68 % |
| ASUS HD6970 DirectCUII | 77.54 fps | 146.52 % |
| Gigabyte GTX460 Super Overclock | 74.37 fps | 140.53 % |
| ASUS EAH6950 2GB | 71.40 fps | 134.92 % |
| Zotac GTX 480 | 68.87 fps | 118.80 % |
| nVidia GTX 295 | 66.72 fps | 126.08 % |
| ASUS GTX 470 | 64.51 fps | 121.90 % |
| EVGA GTX 460 EE | 60.66 fps | 114.63 % |
| Gigabyte HD5870 Super Overclock | 59.21 fps | 111.88 % |
| MSI HD 5870 Lightning | 55.66 fps | 105.17 % |
| ASUS EAH5870 | 54.99 fps | 103.91 % |
| ASUS EAH6850 DirectCU | 54.14 fps | 102.30 % |
| ASUS EAH5850 | 52.92 fps | 100.00 % |
| ASUS GTX285 Matrix | 49.69 fps | 93.89 % |
| MSI GTX 275 Lightning | 42.31 fps | 79.95 % |
| ASUS ENGTS250 DK | 17.95 fps | 33.92 % |
| EVGA 8800 GT 512MB | 15.73 fps | 29.72 % |
| ASUS EAH3870X2 | 10.21 fps | 19.30 % |
| more is better | ||
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[pagebreak]
Conclusion
| General | + | - | |
| NVIDIAs latest dual GPU graphics card leaves us with mixed feelings. On one hand there is the cards resonable noise level (for a dual GPU solution) and on the other we see that it simply isn't able to keep up with AMDs Radeon HD 6990. The fact that the core clocks had to be reduced by a massive 165 MHz really compromises the performance and the dissipation power still is way above 350 Watts. Therefore it also isn't exactly what one might call energy efficient. Never the less this mix of performance and noise level results in an intereseting card. | - 2D silent - Not too lound in 3D mode | ||
| Performance | + | - | |
| Overall the NVIDIA GTX 590 isn't able to keep up with a Radeon HD 6990 but never the less the performance is on an impressingly high level. Therefore buying this card will be very future proof. NVIDIAs dual GPU card has only been able to outperform AMDs flagship in very few benchmarks. Generally its simply lacks behind because of the clock speeds which are too low. Reasons for buying this card over a HD 6990 are for example the support of 3D Vision Surround as well as PhysX. | - Performance in general | - Can't reach a HD 6990 | |
| Overclocking | + | - | |
| At this point we used the MSI Afterburner Software using which one can manipulate GPU, shader and memory clock speeds. Unfortunately it wasn't possible to adjust the core voltages. In general overclocking wasn't too much fun. We were able to push the GPUs to 681 MHz and the memory to 3'620 MHz. During 3DMark 11 we measured a maximum temperature of 92°C and the average increase in performance was about twelve percent. |
|
- small overclocking potential | |
| Recommendation | + | - | |
| If you should be looking for a single card which allows you to power a 3D vision surround setup the GTX 590 will definitely be the right choice. It will also be perfect for you if you want to own the fastest NVIDIA card around. Unfortunately this isn't the fastest card available at the moment. This time the performance crown goes to AMDs Radeon HD 6990. | - High-End Gaming | ||
| The ASUS GTX 590 can be bought at Digitec to a price of CHF 769.- (est. 549). | |||
Author: Marc Büchel, m.buechel@ocaholic.ch
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