PC vs Console Gaming. What's Wrong With the Industry. IMO.

Note: This article actually took me about a week to write. It's something I have pretty strong feelings about, and each time I would sit down to write this, it kept getting longer and longer and slowly turned into a novel. Something I did not want, a long ramble, but a straight forward post, something I still probably failed at. I re-wrote it and condensed it as much as I thought I could, but still express my viewpoint on the subject.

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This is a subject that gets brought up a lot among myself, friends, and many other gamers on both sides of the fence. Which one is "better"? What are the pros and cons? Why is there such a divide between the two? Do you even know why there is a divide between the two camps? 

I am going to give you my humble opinions on this subject, based upon my own observations over the years I have been a "gamer", having been a part of the industry, worked and played in it. I don't expect everyone to agree with me, this is simply my take on where the industry is today and where I think it's headed. 

So I guess we will start off with the "which one is better" question. This is completely subjective and a matter of personal opinion. Technologically PC gaming is superior in every respect. However that's about the only point you can get most people to agree on. When it comes to just about every other aspect of the debate, you often have widely varying opinions.

What is my opinion? I make absolutely no effort to hide the fact I am a PC gamer and that I hate what modern consoles have done to the gaming industry from that perspective. So I obviously think PC gaming is better, but I also don't hate console gaming, even though most of my console gaming is old school retro and I do little to no "modern" gaming on consoles.

I guess while we are cutting to the heart of the matter, I might as well explain why I hate what modern consoles have done to the industry. Why I think they have held back technological advancement and hindered the industry from innovating and evolving the way it used too. To offer us new, bigger and better, gaming experiences on the scale that it should be. 

The very core of the issue for me is the huge technological divide between PC and console gaming. PC hardware technology is vastly superior to consoles in every way, and can offer up experiences not possible on consoles. However, it rarely happens, why? Because most all games made today, are made with limited out-dated console hardware in mind, and PC's are often stuck with inferior poor quality console ports of the games. 

The current generation consoles, the XBox 360 and PlayStation 3 are roughly 8 plus years behind what modern gaming PC's care capable of handling. They were outdated at the time they were released from a PC perspective. The same is even true of the next gen consoles due out this year, they will a tremendous step above the current generation that's for sure, but still behind PC capability. Granted, not by such a huge margin as the 360 and PS3, but that gap will only grow as time goes on. Because PC's can be upgraded, the technology advances while the consoles just sit there and run in place getting further and further behind. You have to remember, consoles are made with an expected life of roughly 10 years!

So what does this mean for the games? Think about it, if you are playing a modern game on your console, you just paid $50 or more for  an outdated piece of software that was possible on PC many years ago, and you probably had no reservations about it at all. You have been conditioned to accept this as normal since it's what your console can handle, you are used to it. I have a serious problem with that.

Developers and publishers design games to fit inside the console box, and it's rare they step out of that box and give PC gamers a product that can actually take advantage of the power available to PC gamers. It does happen, but not nearly as often as it should. 

Multi-platform development should be commonplace, and porting should be rare, but it's the complete opposite. It's a hell of a lot cheaper to develop for an outdated console and port to PC than it is to develop cross platform or innovate with a new technology. Why spend that extra money when you have a huge customer base willing to pay top dollar for the console game since, lets be honest, consoles control far more of the market than PC's when it comes to gaming today.

What ends up happening is you foster an industry of developers that start to stagnate, they have no reason to innovate, to push the envelope of gaming technology since the hardware they are developing far keeps them tightly sealed in a very limited box, all nice and cozy collecting top dollar for stale products. All the while technology marches on, and with the exception of a few games, the software sits and waits for that console to finally be replaced.

What gets me about this is that we seem to be OK with that. I am going to use "The Last of Us" for the PS3 as an example. The game truly does look fun, and pretty darn good graphically. Then I read reviews that talk about how amazing it looks. I think to myself, amazing for a PS3 sure, but that game could have been made for PC years ago.

Lets pause for a second and hypothesize, use our imaginations, and ponder where modern gaming could be IF there was no console limitations and it advanced along the same lines as the hardware world. If the industry followed PC technology instead. Could you imagine the level of graphic detail, simulation, physics, and interactiveness of it? It would be at a considerably higher level than it is today. For the simple fact that you would have an entire industry innovating, not just a few developers.

This is what drives the core of my hatred for what consoles have done to the gaming industry. What keeps me a PC gamer and really grasping at those few games that come out that actually take advantage of my PC's raw power. Avoiding many of the direct poorly optimized console ports that seem to flood the market.

None of this means I think all games have to be technologically advanced, graphically eye popping, or otherwise marvels of modern design. In fact, there are a host of games that I play, and love, that are just the opposite. I just wish the games that are trying to be "modern", actually were.

So I guess that sums it up for me, why I think consoles have been a hindrance to the advancement of the gaming industry, while on the flip side of the same coin, being it's bread and butter. As time goes on, I think the line between PC and console's will begin to blur. With the advancement of APU technology (Accelerated Processing Units - CPU and GPU on a single die.), and even further down the line with different forms of computing just over the hill. For today however, and the foreseeable future, I think that consoles are going to continue to hold back the gaming industry. At least until the day comes when you can upgrade your console the same way you can your PC.

Black Ops 2 - Yet Another CoD Disappointment.

Call of Duty Black Ops II, why do I keep giving these CoD games a chance, perhaps I am just a dreamer hoping that one day Activision will finally bring the franchise into the current decade. Of course, we all know that's not likely to happen anytime soon.

Guess I should start with the single player campaign, as with Black Ops, it was good. I really have nothing negative to say about the campaign. I am not going to give any spoilers, but I think the story is good, the missions are fun to play, and it really is an overall good experience.

The thing is, how many people buy a Call of Duty game for the campaign? Sure it's good, but only in the context of Call of Duty or other FPS games where the multiplayer is the real selling point. The campaign is no where near $60 good, you want that level of value, you need a title like Bioshock Infinite.

That being said, I guess we should cut right to the chase, the multiplayer. Let me start off by saying that I only have a total of 7 hours invested in the multiplayer aspect of Blops 2 (at the time of this review), mostly all TDM, and I was able to reach level 40 in that time frame with a KDR of 2.18. So like all the other modern CoD titles, it's no where near difficult to master. Makes sense since they don't change much at all.

I don't want people to read this review and think "you only hate the game because you suck at it". Since we all know that's the generic response to most reviews like this. If you call a game out, rip it apart, you must suck at it and you're just MAD BRO! Sorry, but no, if you have that mentality then right here might be a good spot to stop reading.

Still interested? Then by all means, read on. =]

I know everyone who hates on CoD says this, even me, but damn if it's not hard to keep repeating becasue it so blatantly screams at you as you play. Modern Warfare 2, MW3, BO, and now BO2, if you have played one, you have played them all. 

Why do I say that? Simple, the game mechanics are identical in almost every detail, the gameplay never changes, and all you really get with each new addition is new maps, weapons, and skins. In the rest of the gaming industry they call that DLC, Activision calls it a new $60 console port with an outdated engine, graphics, and physics.

So is this bad? Well, that's all a matter of perspective. From a console point of view, no, becasue console hardware is so far behind the times it's almost laughable. Lets be honest, Call of Duty is now an almost pure console market, PC is an afterthought that gets no love and a just a port.

What about from a business perspective, also not a bad thing, since most multiplayer and competitive console gamers HATE change of any kind. Think about it, they get used to what their consoles can deliver, they fall into a pattern, and if a game tries to step out of it's box, it's often criticized. So staying in that box nets you a guaranteed greatest hit record breaker. Like it or not, Call of Duty defined the Xbox generation.

So if it's all good, why you hating on it Strider? Because I am not a sheeple gamer, I am not a console gamer, I am a PC gamer who likes change, likes a new challenge, who embraces advancement, and hates the fact that companies like Activision have held back titles like Call of Duty from taking advantage of modern hardware or changing the game to blow some fresh air up it's skirt.

People rip on EA Games for their DRM and issues they have, they even got voted one of the worst compaines last year. I don't hate on EA at all, why? Because they are not pulling an Activision with Battlefield. They are pushing the envelope of technology, they are advancing their game with each new incarnation, they are delivering a changing and evolving gameplay experience with new challenges.

Before we get too far off topic, lets hop back on Blops 2, and the fact it's still the same old crap in a new box yet again. So why do I keep buying the games if I hate them so much, or playing them? Well, I only buy Blops for the zombies, I can't help it, I am a sucker for zombies in just about any form. The one and only aspect of the Black Ops games MP that I really do enjoy is the zombies.

Second, sometimes people gift me copies of the game just to try and get me to play, and lastly becasue even if I hate a franchise, I still like to give it a chance. Besides, I very well can't review something I have never played. On top of all that, I am a gamer to the core and like Pokemon of old, I got to have them all!

Yes, Black Ops 2 is yet another disappointment for me, this is true, but at least it's not as bad as the Medal of Honor Warfighter multiplayer. On the PC it really is a joke, tons of kids mic spamming, other people radio spamming or acting like burnt fools, forcing mute all the time. Players who think they are king shit and rage constantly. It's just an overall highly immature community, at least that's the impression one gets after playing for a while. Sure you have that in many games, but it's a true horror in Call of Duty.

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A few other HUGE flaws for Blops 2 multiplayer are as follows:

1. There is a lot of "closet" hack users. These are the players who live the lie as if it was fact. They will sit there and boast how much you suck and they are just better then you and everyone else.

I am sorry, but if you're that good, and all you do is play pub matches, there is a serious problem. Also, most legit players who have truly mastered the game, are not that egotistically cocky. This is a fact of the competitive gaming world. Sure they spout off just like the rest of us, but they don't act like a 12 year old who thinks they are gods gift to gaming.

Think I am lying about the level of hack use on Blops 2 PC? Google it. You will find a lot of "undetectable" VIP and pub hacks for Blops 2. Check out those hack site forums. Do a bit of research. You can see it all for yourself.


2. A vast majority of every match is a cornucopia of dolphin diving and hopping like a rabbit on steroids. Something I refuse to do. That "tactic" is hated in most all FPS games, and also not possible in most FPS games. CoD is one of the few franchises that actually encourages it. It's just silly seeing people jump and dive like idiots everywhere. For the love of Pete, stand up and play like a real gamer.


3. Camping. Something I find very amusing since most all CoD "fanboys" all claim that's one of the main reasons they don't like Battlefield. Seriously? There is FAR more camping in Blops 2 than I have ever seen in Battlefiled, ever. It's understandable and expected to defend an objective, but in modes where there is no such objective such as TDM, most CoD players still do it far more often than not.


4. Like MoH Warfighter, some of the worst hit detection I have ever seen. Where tanking 10-15 rounds and living one time, then dying in 2-3 hits the next. From the same player using the same weapons. Where headshots are all but meaningless since they can also be "tanked" like a boss. You can tell the game is coded for consoles.


5. Lastly is the lag. I am not talking about frame lag, even though the fact that mouse operation is directly tied to FPS, something you see in no other game I have ever played. The game runs at 200 FPS easy on most high end systems.

I am not even talking about the horrible hit detection. I am talking about how your game experience is directly effected by other players, their internet connections, and their hardware. Remember, the game is a console port, it's not designed to handle varying performance.

Another player who's running on a system or connection that is not up to par, even if they have a decent ping, can still have a negative impact on your gameplay. They can warp, rubber band, tank hits, and even appear to fly at times. All becasue the games console net-code has no idea how to compensate for it.

6. Lastly, and probably the most important, since it can be related to many of the issues PC gamers have with Call of Duty. The maturity of it's community at large, as I mentioned before. I am not saying all CoD players are immature prepubescent kids (or at least act like it), I have met a lot of "mature" CoD players, but sadly they are a very small minority.

This is a huge blemish on CoD in general in my opinion. Yes, some of the players I am referring too are indeed young kids, that probably have no business playing a game like CoD anyway, but the sad part is that many of the players acting like immature idiots are old enough to know better. That's simply inexcusable in my opinion. If you can't conduct yourself in a respectable mature manner, you don't need to be playing, that's pretty much how I see it.

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I can sit here and go on and on about all the flaws and problems this game has on PC, but I am sure you get the idea. I am sure if you are a CoD player, or fan of the series, and you have read this far you probably already hate me, but that's OK. I only speak the truth and combine it with my own opinions, I don't expect it to jive with everyone. What fun would that be?

In my opinion, Black Ops II is a good single player experience, but the same old multiplayer one. However, I still rate it a 4.5 out of 10 since many people do like the fact the game never changes, and even though I do not, I am not here to hate on those players. Why 4.5 and not 4? Because I rated MoH WF a 4 out of 10, and BO2's MP is marginally better.

Worth $60? Hell no, $20 tops in my opinion, but we are talking about Activision here. People hate on EA calling them greedy. Really? BF3 has been on sale many times, for as low as $5. With BF4 just around the corner, the retail price has dropped a lot, averaging $30 or less. Go look at Modern Warfare 3, or Black Ops. Both are still $40 and rarely go on sale. Activision is the very definition of greed.

Anyway, that's my thoughts. Remember to have fun and game on!

Medal Of Honor Warfighter - Good Campaign - Worst Multiplayer in Years

Medal of Honor Warfighter, where do I begin...

Why oh why did you have to screw up a perfectly good franchise. You were on the right track with MoH 2010, but no, you had to go and try to appeal to the Call of Duty kids and ruin the game for the rest of us. It still backfired on you, and Warfighter has done horribly.

Medal of Honor was always a favorite series of mine, so when MoH 2010 came out, I was thrilled to see a modern reboot of the series. I loved the campaign, the story, and thought the multiplayer was an absolute breath of fresh air. Why? Because if was one of the first mainstream FPS games where the multiplayer mechanics made the game a true test of "skill". There was no forgiveness, pretty much all AR's could kill you at range with 1-3 hits, and a sniper rifle would drop you in 1 or 2 hits, period. It was pure kill or be killed action. Not for the average player or faint of heart. It was great fun in my book, since it was the only game at the time like that. Here is some gameplay footage of me playing Medal of Honor 2010 so you can get a rough idea of the game mechanics.

However, many gamers did not care for those mechanics. They are far more used to the Call of Duty style gameplay mechanics and could not hold their own in MoH well at all, thus they got frustrated and quit. So the games multiplayer died of far faster than it should have IMO, but I know why and accept it.

Now fast forward a couple years. We get MoH:Warfighter. The single player was fantastic and epic in my opinion. I simply loved it. Yet another good campaign, good story, but that's where it ends and goes into an unrecoverable nose dive into the ninth level of horrible mechanics hell.

I swear it was coded by a room full of semi-retarded monkeys, and that's more of an insult to the monkeys than the programmers at Danger Close. To be perfectly honest, Call of Duty has better gameplay mechanics than Warfighter. That's the worst possible insult I can throw at a game considering how much I hate Call of Duty BO and MW since I am constantly getting kicked, banned, and accused of cheating.

So Strider, why all the hate man? I am glad you asked. Let me break it down for you. =]

1. If I am shooting someone, hitting them round after round after round, all hitting their mark. They should take damage and die. Pretty simple request. In Warfighter, short of a one hit sniper or shotgun, almost all of the other weapons take a good 5-10 rounds to kill, even at point blank range. So your sitting there dumping mags instead of controlled bursts, becasue you have no idea when the other player is going to drop.

2. One shot to the head with ANYTHING should drop you like a rock, period, no exception. That's not the case in Warfighter. Head-shots are random and take a few hits to register. Even if ALL you can see if a players ugly mug, no other part of their body, chances are you will not get a headshot. It's quite laughable actually.

3. I am not sure where the guys at Danger Close got the idea that most of the weapons represented in the game spread lead when fired like butter on bread, but that's how the game works. Basically, most all of the AR's in the game fire like a real world UZI, all over the damn place, with very few exceptions. They are more like lawn sprinklers than assault rifles.

4. Everyone is wearing the best magic armor money can buy. They can stand there and absorb damage like a super shammy. Except you that is. Heh

These four things make Warfighter's multiplayer one of the worst I have ever seen in a mainstream FPS, and I am not the only one. Just go look at how many players there are online at any given time. How many active servers. Little to none.

Sadly, I really don't have much in the way of positive remarks about Medal of Honor Warfighter outside of the campaign. It has honestly turned out to be one of the biggest disappointments of recent memory. So much so that I hope Danger Close NEVER tries multiplayer again. Leave it to DICE.

So is Warfighter worth buying? Sure, if it's on sale for $10 or $15 maybe, just for the single player campaign, but not for it's multiplayer. If you want solid mulitplayer action, you're far better off sticking with Battlefield 3, it's a far superior multiplayer experience across the board. Heck, you might even be better off with MoH 2010 if you really to play MoH.

Sadly, this is the lowest score I have ever given a game from a series that I have loved for so long. But Medal of Honor Warfighter is all but killed by it's multiplayer shortcomings, and only gets a 4 out of 10 from me. Those 4 points are entirely for the single player campaign. On it's own I would give it an easy 8/10, but that horrible multiplayer pulls it all the way back down to 4/10.

Sorry Danger Close, but you screwed the pooch on this one. =[

AMD Radeon Graphics & Nvidia PhysX

When it comes to the stand-alone discrete GPU market, it's pretty much split right down the middle, between AMD and Nvidia. Everyone has their reasons, even me, on who they choose and why. This article is not about that though, it's about one thing, and that's PhysX. 

So what is PhysX? I think a lot of people out there really have no idea what PhysX really is, at least not based on countless questions and comments I get and see all over the web. There are so many misconceptions and misinformation out there that it's actually quite disturbing. So before we get into the heart of what this post is all about, lets start off with some facts about PhysX, what it is, and what it is not.

1. PhysX and physics are not the same thing. PhysX is the brand name of a proprietary physics engine that was originally created by Ageia and later purchased by Nvidia.

2. PhysX is not the only physics engine on the market, however it is the most popular and well known proprietary engine, meaning developers have to have either pay Nvidia to use it, or have to advertize the fact they use it. Hardware developers also would have to pay to allow it to run on their non-Nvidia hardware. The most popular non-proprietary physics engine is Havoc, meaning game developers do not have to pay to use it and it can be made to run on any hardware, no matter the branding. 

3. PhysX is actually less used than Havoc and game engine specific physics (where a developer incorporates their own physics engine into their game engine, such as with Battlefield 3). In fact, most games do not use PhysX, they either use Havoc, their own engine, or none at all.

4. Why is #3 true? It's simple economics. Nvidia will not allow their engine to run on non-Nvidia GPU's unless a fee is paid, hence why it's proprietary. However Nvidia only controls roughly half of the marketplace, the other half is controlled by AMD. Most game developers do not like to alienate what might consist of half of their potential customer base. This is also why you see so few games, and even fewer as time progresses, that use PhysX.

5. The PhysX engine can run on ANY GPU, not just Nvidia. The ONLY reason it can't is becasue Nvidia blocks it from doing so at the driver level. It has nothing to do with Nvidia hardware vs AMD hardware. 

PhysX is a fantastic engine, but a common consensus is that Nvidia is hurting its potential by only allowing it to run on their own hardware. This is why you only see it on games here and there. This is also why why its possible to use a cheap Nvidia card as a dedicated PhysX processor if you still wish to run an AMD main GPU. Now we are at the heart of the post.

This is possible becasue people have developed hacked/tweaked drivers that get around Nvidia's lock out that prevents a second Nvidia card to operate in the presence of a non-Nvidia GPU, such as AMD. You can then use this separate Nvidia card for dedicated PhysX. 

So the the logical, and most common question is, what Nvidia cards are the best for this hybrid setup?

Believe it or not, the PhysX engine does not use much GPU power at all. One of the best and most common cards used in these hybrid setups is the 9800 GT. They have far more than enough power to use as a dedicated PhysX card and they are very inexpensive. Some can still be found new on sites like Newegg for under $70, or used from highly reputable sellers on eBay for under $50, all at the time of this posting. 

Of course, any Nvidia GPU with PhysX support can be used, however a minimum of 96 Cuda Cores is recommended, 112+ is better. With a GPU clock of 500MHz or higher.

For the sake of this article, I will be using an EVGA 9800 GT (512-P3-N982-B2), installed in my AMD XFX Radeon Double D R7950 3GB Black Edition powered main gaming system. Here are all the relevant hardware specs. 

EVGA 9800 GT (512-P3-N982-B2): ($42 on eBay)

• Core Clock: 600MHz
• Shader Clock: 1500MHZ
• CUDA Cores: 112
• Effective Memory Clock: 1800MHz
• Memory Size: 512MB
• Memory Interface: 256-bit
• Memory Type: GDDR3
• RAMDAC: 400 MHz

Test System: 

• AMD Phenom II X6 1090T BE Hexa-Core @ 4.1GHz CPU
• XFX Double D Radeon HD 7950 3GB Black Edition
• ASUS Sabertooth 990FX Motherboard
• 16GB A-Data DDR3 XPG Gaming Series RAM
• Corsair HX850W Professional Series Modular PSU
• Cooler Master HAF 932 Black Steel Case

I know some people might say, "If you want to use PhysX, why not just run an Nvidia based system instead of AMD and be done with it?". Simple, I prefer AMD over Nvidia when it comes to my high end video cards, I have my own reasons, as I am sure many others do. I am also not going to switch to Nvidia just for PhysX when so few games actually use it, and even in the games that do use it, its all about eye candy and effects, the games still play great with it disabled.

So why do I do this then? I may not like what Nvidia is doing with PhysX, but I still think it's a great engine, and really do wish it was open like Havoc, but I also know Nvidia will not allow that in the foreseeable future. So this way, I can play with PhysX when I choose too, and I don't have to invest in Nvidia when I prefer not to. So I really am getting the best of both worlds in my own opinion.

The other reasons are, I have done this before, back in September of 2010 when I showed how you could use an old Ageia PhysX Processing Card to play games like Mirrors Edge and Cryostasis in an AMD/ATI GPU powered system, and no Nvidia GPU.

In fact you can even run PhysX in games like Batman Arkham Asylum (this being the most "advanced" game that can still use the old PPU's), City of Villains,  Crazy Machines 2, Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 1 and 2, and Unreal Tournament 3. Though some of these games push the Ageia PPU to its limit.

http://strider1974.blogspot.com/2010/09/ageia-physx-not-dead-just-yet-bfg.html

Since that article I have setup many systems running a hybrid AMD main and Nvidia for dedicated PhysX, using the 9800 GT Akimbo, since the card can handle a GREAT deal of overclocking and they are cheap and readily available.


That Ageia card is simply too old and out of date to handle anything newer than those games listed, not to mention they are not recognized under a 64-bit OS like Windows 7 Ultimate 64. You need a discrete Nvidia video card that has current support for PhysX to play newer games that have PhysX support. Granted, there are not many games that use PhysX, and even fewer popular money maker titles titles that use it. However on that tiny list of games, there are a few I do play, the big names being Batman Arkham Asylum, Batman Arkham City, Metro 2033, and the upcoming Borderlands 2. No, you don't need PhysX enabled to enjoy these games by any means, but they give me the perfect excuse to show how easy it can be to run PhysX in these modern games with an inexpensive Nvidia GPU setup as a dedicated PhysX processor in your AMD GPU based system.

So there you have it. The goal behind this post will be to show how well a setup like this works in modern games that use the PhysX engine. The games I will be using are:

• Batman Arkham Asylum
• Batman Arkham City
• Borderlands 2 (as soon as it's released)
• Metro 2033
• Alice: Madness Returns 
• The Darkness II

Perhaps Mafia II as well, though that game has horrible PhysX implementation, so probably not.

Once I have completed this post, it will contain a full list of links, instructions, examples, and performance numbers to show exactly how well an inexpensive 9800 GT will work as a dedicated PhysX card in an AMD system. I should have all the testing complete on or around August 25th 2012. So be sure to check back then!

Update: 8/31/2012

I was a bit late getting my testing done, and videos will be a bit later, I am not happy with my current "HD Camcorder" and how it looks when I attempt to record footage. So I am going to have to resort to Fraps to just show off the fact PhysX works, and list all the numbers separately. 

So far, the current 1.05ff mod listed in this article works great with the following games.

Batman Arkham Asylum (Settings screenshot)

• Benchmark: 78FPS Average (Screenshot)
• Gameplay:

Batman Arkham City (Settings screenshot)

• Benchmark: 60FPS Average (Screenshot)
• Gameplay:

Metro 2033 (Settings screenshots)

• Gameplay:

Alice: Madness Returns (Settings screenshots, FPS cap set at 60)

• Gameplay: 60FPS

The Darkness II

• Gameplay:

XFX Radeon R7950 Double D Black Edition Mini Review

Thanks to the wonders of expedited shipping, I had my hands on one of these beauties just 2 days after release. Now that I have had a little over a month to really play with it and see how it holds up, I feel as though I can give an honest set of opinions and facts on the card and how it performs. So why don't we start with the unboxing and what it replaced.

Now that we got that out of the way, we can get down to business.

This card is a beast, pure and simple. Other than the normal day 1 driver issues you often get with a few games here and there with buying a next gen video card so early on, my card has surprised me time and time again with how much performance is under it's hood.

First off, if you are new to my blog or are here looking for synthetic benchmarks, you won't find them so you may want to look elsewhere. I am a gamer, I play video games, I don't play benchmarks, so I could care less about synthetic numbers. Benchmarking software has it's place, but it's not here. Here, it's all about real use and gaming. That being said, here are the specs of my gaming system as a basis for comparison, since this is the system the card is being used in.

• AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Hexa-Core @ 4.1GHz
• Thermaltake Frio CPU Cooler
• 16 GB A-Data XPG Gaming Series DDR3
• XFX Radeon R7950 Double D Black Edition
• Corsair HX850W Professional Series PSU
• ASUS Sabertooth 990FX

For the testing, I ran the card at it's factory settings, however I actually run the card with 3 profiles. Idle and general use, and one for gaming. The idle configuration has the card dialed all the way back to 300MHz on the core and 150MHz on the memory and 20% fan speed. The general use configuration is stock non-overclocked numbers at 25% fan speed. The gaming profile is 1100MHz on the core and 1575MHz on the memory at 50% fan speed. I have found these settings work great for me.

For all the numbers you see here however, I ran at factory settings except the fan speed, that I had locked at 50%. The core is at 900MHz and the memory is at 1375MHz. The game settings in every case were the highest available at 1920x1080. FPS ranges determined using Fraps.

I do a lot of gaming, but I wanted to keep the games I was going to list in this post to ones that were either DirectX 11 or newer games that I own. So I apologize if a game you are looking for is not listed here. I will also come back and update this post as I test other games.

So lets take a look at some of my numbers and then talk about the results.

• Crysis 2 DX11 High-Res: 55-85 FPS (Road Rage Mission)
• Need For Speed The Run: 95-130 FPS
• Battlefiled 3: 75-100 FPS (Caspian Border)
• Saints Row The Third: 55-60 FPS
• Dead Island: 85-160 FPS
• F.E.A.R. 3: 60-90 FPS
• Serious Sam 3: TBD
• S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Call of Pripyat: TBD
• Skyrim: TBD
• Metro 2033: TBD

There are a few games I need to go back and get real numbers for, and a few more games I may add to the list. However you can get a good idea on how well the card performs in my system based on what I have listed so far.

Driver support for the new 7000 series Radeon cards is much better now than it was on day 1 obviously. Many of the issues with a few games at release have been addressed. As it is right now, I have no problems with any of the games I play.

This card will handle anything you throw at it, and it wont skip a beat. What will make it an even greater deal will be when the price drops under $500. Yes, these cards are worth every penny, but now that the 600 series from Nvidia has come out with the 680 sitting at the $500 mark, I suspect the prices on the 7950's will drop a bit. Sure, the 7950 can hold it's own vs the 680, especailly overclocked, and even more so in multi-screen gaming since the 7900 series Radeon cards have 3GB of RAM vs the 680's 2GB. The direct competitor to the 680 is the 7970, and it has no problems holding the 680 off. There is no real reason for the price of the 7950 to not drop. We will have to wait and see.

In closing, can I suggest an XFX R7950? Hell yes I can. It's a beastly card, have huge overclocking headroom, and it just rips apart anything you throw at it. The down side is, its $500, at that price point you can get a GTX 680. So I guess it just comes down to personal preference. Who do you like?

Do you need that extra GB of RAM the 7950 has over the 600 series Nvidia cards or not? I do, but that's me.

Do you want the non-reference cooling offered on this and other AMD 7000 series cards at the time of this post? They are much more effective than reference designs.

Is heat a concern for you? The 7900 series Radeon cards run cooler then the GTX 680 cards, even with reference coolers.

How about power consumption? The 7900 series draws a bit more power then the GTX 680 cards do.

So there you have it. To say I am thrilled with the XFX Radeon R7950 Double D Black Edition would be an understatement. It beats the 6000 generation Radeon cards, does damn well vs the next gen GTX 680, is an overclocking beast, and it just games great! So I have to give this card an easy 10 out of 10 and would highly suggest it to anyone looking to upgrade.