Our testing methods
As ever, we did our best to deliver clean benchmark numbers. Tests were run at least three times, and the results were averaged.
Our test systems were configured like so:
| Processor | Athlon 64 X2 4800+ 2.4GHz | |
| System bus | 1GHz HyperTransport | |
| Motherboard | Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe | VIA K8T900 reference |
| BIOS revision | 1014 | beta |
| North bridge | nForce4 SLI | K8T900 |
| South bridge | VT8251 | |
| Chipset drivers | ForceWare 6.70 | Hyperion Pro 5.04a |
| Memory size | 2GB (2 DIMMs) | |
| Memory type | Crucial PC3200 DDR SDRAM at 400MHz | |
| CAS latency (CL) | 2.5 | |
| RAS to CAS delay (tRCD) | 3 | |
| RAS precharge (tRP) | 3 | |
| Cycle time (tRAS) | 8 | |
| Command rate | 1T | |
| Hard drive | Maxtor DiamondMax 10 250GB SATA 150 | |
| Audio | None | |
| Graphics | MSI GeForce 7800 GTX 256MB PCI-E with ForceWare 81.87 drivers | |
| OS | Windows XP Professional (32-bit) | |
| OS updates | Service Pack 2, DirectX 9.0c SDK update (October 2005) | |
Thanks to Crucial for providing us with memory for our testing. 2GB of RAM seems to be the new standard for most folks, and Crucial hooked us up with some of its 1GB DIMMs for testing. Although these particular modules are rated for CAS 3 at 400MHz, they ran perfectly for us at 2.5-3-3-8 with 2.85V.
Unless otherwise specified, the image quality settings for graphics cards were left at the control panel defaults.
The test systems' Windows desktops were set at 1280x1024 in 32-bit color at an 85Hz screen refresh rate. Vertical refresh sync (vsync) was disabled for all tests.
We used the following versions of our test applications:
- trdemo2 demo
- Futuremark 3DMark05 Build 120
- Cachemem 2.65MMX
- SiSoft Sandra Standard 2005 SR2a
- WorldBench 5.0
- TCD Labs HD Tach v3.01
- NTttcp
The tests and methods we employ are generally publicly available and reproducible. If you have questions about our methods, hit our forums to talk with us about them.
