PhysX batman bechmark with 2nd card

weird_dave · 22 Oct 2009 at 18:47

OK, so after finally getting my old 8800 GTS to work as a 2nd card for PhysX (GTX 260 main), I figured I'd test it with Batman.
With hardware PhysX set to normal, I got 46. At high I got 41. With it off I got 60 FPS.
Do these numbers make sense to anyone? I'm trying to ascertain if the 8800 is actually helping or not.

Rroff · 22 Oct 2009 at 18:48

You'd have to test high physx settings with and without the extra card...

It deffinatly can help - a 260GTX on high settings doing both physx and rendering will average around 45fps whereas with a 64+ SP 8 or 9 series card alongside for physics it can stay at 60fps most of the time.

straxusii · 22 Oct 2009 at 19:04

I'm not knocking Nvidia for the sake of it but it seems crazy you get a drop in frame rate at all with Physx?

Surely an 8800GTS dedicated to Physx must be up to the task?

weird_dave · 22 Oct 2009 at 19:14

Ah, just changed it to the 260 only and the framerate dropped a fair bit, thanks

weird_dave · 22 Oct 2009 at 19:16

I'm only on a core 2 duo @3GHz which may account for the framerate drop

Rroff · 22 Oct 2009 at 19:30

straxusii said:
I'm not knocking Nvidia for the sake of it but it seems crazy you get a drop in frame rate at all with Physx?

Surely an 8800GTS dedicated to Physx must be up to the task?

Extra physics effects usually come with extra rendering effects - and some physics effects can be quite computationally intensive... tho theres nothing in batman that really should tax an 8800 card.

mrk · 22 Oct 2009 at 20:14

Yeah I get 30fps with Physics enabled on my GTX260 and a quad at 3.7ghz

How much are 8800GTs these days? and will one work in my crossfire mobo!

weird_dave · 22 Oct 2009 at 20:49

Not sure if you can get 8800's anymore. It should work fine, it doesn't rely on SLi so any old mobo should do it

I got 29fps with physx on high in 260 only mode, seems cpu wasn't the limiting factor in that scenario. Was at 1600*1200 everything maxxed out.

geekyEd · 22 Oct 2009 at 20:52

should I keep my 8800GTS why I get my new GTX260 then? :/ PhysX is far too demanding if what the OP is posting is true.

And mrk I expect he's not running as high res as you are on the Hazro (is it a 24" or 30" you ended up with?).

mrk · 22 Oct 2009 at 21:07

1920x1200 4xAA I play batman at, any less is unacceptable

I'll see about buying a cheap 8800GT on eBay I think, a 9600GT will eb good too yep?

Rroff · 22 Oct 2009 at 21:30

Those numbers seem a bit low - 2048x res with all settings maxed ingame and 4x AA 16x AF - my 260GTX in SLI mostly hit 60fps constant - disable one and do rendering and physics on the one card and it still manages 45-50fps most of the time... very rarely below 40. I do have a decent overclock on the cards tho.

mrk · 22 Oct 2009 at 21:39

It will drop below 40fps when actual Physics areas show up (smoke filled room floors etc) - even my GTX is OCd but still manages 30fps at 1920 and my CPU is a fair bit above your Q6600 but you alos have an 8800GT in there so...

entireweb · 22 Oct 2009 at 21:40

I have a gtx295 and 8800gt for Physx and get 75fps with everything on high, including Physx. Thats at 1920x1200 with AA at 4x.

Physx is highly computational, dont believe anyone who says its light, its not. The calculations are suited to parallel processing and hence the number processing cores available. The 8800gt has 112 processor cores. The 9600 has 64 Processing Cores, JUNK for Physx. The 9800 has 128 cores. So get a 9800 IMO or a 8800gt. But DONT get a 9600.

When I throw physx onto my i7 860 (3.8ghz) which 8 virtual cores the fps drops to 40fps compared with the 8800gt! So that shows how important the number of cores are.

If I turn off Physx I get over 100fps.

Also my 8800gt gets quite hot when running Physx. So I have ordered an after market cooler.

A second hand 8800gt and aftermarket cooler (I ordered the Xigmatek Bifrost VD1065 VGA-Cooler - Blackline Edition) should be 75% the cost of a 9800. So a good deal IMO

mrk · 22 Oct 2009 at 22:02

8800GT, awesome

Also, I think all those old cards need no extra power connector ?

My Lian Li is quite cool so temps should not be an issue in the few games that I play that use PhysX

straxusii · 22 Oct 2009 at 22:32

Sorry it's a joke, a dedicated piece of hardware the power of a 8800GT for this and you still get a 30% drop in framerate.

Rroff · 22 Oct 2009 at 22:42

mrk said:
It will drop below 40fps when actual Physics areas show up (smoke filled room floors etc) - even my GTX is OCd but still manages 30fps at 1920 and my CPU is a fair bit above your Q6600 but you alos have an 8800GT in there so...

Only 2x 260GTX in my gaming PC - the 8800GT is in my normal desktop PC I use for programming, etc.

With everything maxed out including physx during actual gameplay it doesn't really drop below 60fps much at all... even in the rooms with lots of smoke and cobwebs, etc. Deffinatly doesn't drop below 40 except maybe when theres a lot of enemy onscreen but I don't recall it dropping below that then even - tho I was somewhat pre-occupied fighting in those parts.

entireweb · 22 Oct 2009 at 22:58

straxusii said:
Sorry it's a joke, a dedicated piece of hardware the power of a 8800GT for this and you still get a 30% drop in framerate.

Why is it a joke? The physx does the calculations but the GPU still needs to do the on screen display of the effects etc. I am running benchmarking from batman which shows a lot more Physx per second than in game. So its bound to use more GPU as well. Actually in game the FPS is off the chart with Physx enabled, much more than the benchmark.

I was lucky as I had two 8800gts left over from the last build I did. BTW the 8800gt is hardly of Power!! Its two years old now. The gts 295 sh&ts all over my old 8800gt SLI combo.

But any how, my gtx295 and overclocked CPU is OTT for the game itself.

I would suggest a gtx275 and second hand 8800gt would be more than enough to get fantastic FPS throughout the game. This Combo is not OTT for a game as good a quality as Batman IMO.

coupe69 · 23 Oct 2009 at 01:18

It's funny this thread has come up, i've recently been experimenting with physX.

Here are my findings running the batman benchmark.

PhysX on high using just my GTX 280:

Min FPS 24
Max FPS 60
Average FPS 44

PhysX on high using GTX 280 and a 9800GT for the PhysX

Min FPS 34
Max FPS 60
Average 54

This is at 1920x1200
4xAA
everything elso on max.

So basically it has given me 10fps more, which imo is just about worth it if you can pick up an old 8800/9800GT for 30-40 quid, or have a spare one lying about somewhere. You can certainly tell the difference in game with the dedicated PhysX card.

LoadsaMoney · 23 Oct 2009 at 01:29

straxusii said:
I'm not knocking Nvidia for the sake of it but it seems crazy you get a drop in frame rate at all with Physx?

Surely an 8800GTS dedicated to Physx must be up to the task?

Yeah was all that talk when Nvidia had just taken it over, everyone saying, oh you wont need a second card, not much hit, your single card can handle it fine etc... lol, yeah course it can, you get a 30 to 40 frame hit, so every game that uses it, is going to have to run at 100+ when its not on, so they still playabe when you slap it on, and take the 30-40 frame hit.

VortexA1 · 23 Oct 2009 at 02:27

LoadsaMoney said:
Yeah was all that talk when Nvidia had just taken it over, everyone saying, oh you wont need a second card, not much hit, your single card can handle it fine etc... lol, yeah course it can, you get a 30 to 40 frame hit, so every game that uses it, is going to have to run at 100+ when its not on, so they still playabe when you slap it on, and take the 30-40 frame hit.

lol! Thank you for keeping me entertained Loadsa.