Holy FPS, Batman!
Toms posted a OC CPU-GPU review on May 15th that included FSX-SP2 and shows a whopping 83.1 FPS at 19x12 with no AA,trilinear and Ultra Quality, and a still excellent 72.7 FPS at 19x12 with AA, Anisotropic and Ultra Quality.
Wow, we are getting close to the timeframe where FSX starts to shine! Some key notes from the article:
"The results should clarify how much performance is obtained by upgrading the various components, as well as which combinations work best or are cheapest. It will also show us how high the basic performance level of the processor needs to be in order for the new G92 graphics chips from Nvidia to develop their full 3D speed potential."
"The test platform used is based on an X38 chipset with DDR3 memory and PCI Express 2.0 interface, and remains identical for all of the individual tests. Generally speaking, only the graphics and CPU performance is changed for each run. In order to ensure that the E2160 and Q6600 are able to keep up with the other processors, two additional test runs have been performed in which the Front Side Bus (FSB) was overclocked by 33-34%. The test results indicate whether simply overclocking the small cache budget CPU is able to compensate for its initial performance deficit, and how much performance the quad core is able to pull from its reserves as a result of the increased frequencies."
Key results:
With no AA and Trilinear: the 8800 GT 512 OC and the Q6600 OC won out regardless of screen resolution.
With AA and Anisotropic: at 1280x1024 the 8800 GTS 512 OC won out, at 1650x 1050 the 9800 GTX 512 won out, at 1920x1200 the 9600 1024 OC won out.
From my read, at 1920 with AA the combination of the extra memory and the OC is what gives the 9600 the edge, although elsewhere Toms' does state that the 9600 should be called the 9700 ( page 3 ) so that also explains how it wins out as it isn't a typical x600 part.
This article should really help the community understand the performance envelope and dispel the myth that good performance cannot be obtained today, as well as help people mix and match components. See it here.
Note that this comparo did not include the X48 mobo which enables 1600Mhz FSB support with no OC. See info about that here. While that may be of marginal benefit unless folk find their X38s' unstable under the OC to 1600, the X58 with Nehalem having the memory controller integrated into the CPU and due this fall looks much more interesting, see it here.
Could this fall finally be the ultimate performance break out time for FSX? Let's hope so.
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