by Rob Williams on September 24, 2014 in Graphics & Displays
With the help of Maxwell, NVIDIA has hit a definite home run with its GeForce GTX 900 GPUs. In our look at the GTX 980 last week, we were left thoroughly impressed, but little did we realize at the time, the GTX 970 – and ASUS’ Strix edition in particular – was about to impress us even more. Simply put, you need to check this card out.
With the results seen on the previous page, we learned that all three of the cards included can handle today’s games at the resolution of 2560×1440 without much issue. In most cases, the detail levels in each game can be cranked right up, and I think it’s safe to say that you’ll probably get liveable framerates by doing that with any modern game (let’s ignore Crysis 3 at Very High detail for a moment).
As great a resolution as 1440p is, though, it’s only 3.68 megapixels. Contrast that to our multi-monitor resolution of 5760×1080, which is 6.22 megapixels. Clearly, that will require even more GPU horsepower to tear through, so let’s see how all of these cards fare.
|
Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag |
|
Minimum |
Average |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 |
52 |
60 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti |
48 |
59 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
ASUS GeForce GTX 970 Strix |
53 |
61 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
Almost all of the settings here had to be dropped a bit to hit 60 FPS – the only notable setting not touched was AA. Still, as you can see from the screenshot, you’re not exactly killing the detail to get great framerates on the GTX 970.
|
Battlefield 4 |
|
Minimum |
Average |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 |
51 |
63 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti |
43 |
55 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
ASUS GeForce GTX 970 Strix |
45 |
56 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
All three cards are playable using the same settings, although I admit I sacrificed a 4 FPS in order to retain all of these settings. Those needing 60 FPS will be able to hit it by dropping HBAO to SSAO. Disabling AO entirely will allow you to increase some of the other details back up to Ultra.
|
Crysis 3 |
|
Minimum |
Average |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 |
40 |
58 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti |
42 |
57 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
ASUS GeForce GTX 970 Strix |
45 |
57 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
With both the standard Crysis 3 testing as well as the best playable 1440p result on the previous page, we saw that the GTX 780 Ti somehow made an exception to the rule and performed better than the GTX 970. That carried on straight through to our multi-monitor testing. While the 780 Ti here could retain medium detail levels all around, the 970 had to sacrifice some detail levels – especially shading and post-processing – to give us a great framerate.
|
GRID 2 |
|
Minimum |
Average |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 |
55 |
61 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti |
57 |
63 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
ASUS GeForce GTX 970 Strix |
47 |
58 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
Not much had to be changed here to attain 60 FPS (or at least seriously close) on the GTX 970 – the ambient occlusion just had to be dropped from Ultra to High. To surpass 60 FPS, I’d recommend disabling global illumination for a quick boost of at least 5 FPS.
|
Sleeping Dogs |
|
Minimum |
Average |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 |
70 |
85 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti |
51 |
78 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
ASUS GeForce GTX 970 Strix |
60 |
77 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
With the High anti-aliasing setting, framerates were not ideal, but dropping it to Normal fixed everything – hitting 60 FPS on the minimum is just what I like to see.
|
Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Blacklist |
|
Minimum |
Average |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 |
56 |
72 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 Ti |
53 |
71 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
ASUS GeForce GTX 970 Strix |
52 |
66 |
Graphics Settings
& Ingame Screenshot
Resolution: 5760×1080 |
Like the other two cards, ASUS’ Strix had to see the AO dropped down to the standard Field AO setting to hit 60 FPS. As you might suspect, this is a difference that would require side-by-side screenshots to spot, so it’s a minor loss.