The Xbox 360 recall a year ago happened because "Microsoft wanted to avoid an ASIC vendor," said Lewis. Microsoft designed the graphic chip on its own, cut a traditional ASIC vendor out of the process and went straight to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd., he explained. But in the end, by going cheap--hoping to save tens of millions of dollars in ASIC design costs, Microsoft ended up paying more than $1 billion for its Xbox 360 recall. To fix the problem, Microsoft went back to an unnamed ASIC vendor based in the United States and redesigned the chip, Lewis added. (Based on a previous report, the ASIC vendor is most likely the former ATI Technologies, now part of AMD.)

2,4,8,16 cores ... right now it seems that after 2 cores it does not seem to matter that much how many cores you have in your PC when it comes to gaming. Our recent Intel Skultrail review (8 logical CPU cores) proved that already. The biggest bang for your buck is a faster Core 2 Duo dual-core processors preferably with a higher clock frequency. Next in line are the cheaper quad-core processors. But after four cores guys, I tell you, with the pending Intel Nehalem release going 6, 8 and maybe even more cores, we are bound to run into an issue. More transistors means more costly products. What really needs to go up is that processors frequency.

United Industry Effort Will Accelerate Innovation, Spur PC Gaming Development

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Global leaders of the PC gaming industry announced today the formation of the PC Gaming Alliance, a non-profit organization that unites hardware and software creators, game developers and publishers, and others committed to the PC gaming market with the common purpose of advancing the PC as a worldwide gaming platform.

Together, PCGA and its member companies will work to accelerate innovation, improve the gaming experience for consumers and serve as a collective source of market information and expertise on PC gaming. Members of PCGA are Acer Inc./Gateway Inc., Activision Publishing Inc., AMD, Dell/Alienware, Epic Games, Intel Corp., Microsoft Corp., NVIDIA Corp. and Razer USA Ltd.

The PC gaming market is a multi-billion dollar industry with hundreds of millions of gamers worldwide. Leading research firm DFC Intelligence calls PC gaming “one of the fastest-growing segments of the interactive entertainment market” and projects that the PC game business will grow more than 80 percent over the next five years, with major increases in the number of PC gamers, revenue from digital distribution, and PC hardware sales.

PCGA is the first and only industry organization devoted to the PC gaming industry. It will focus on driving coordinated marketing and promotion of PC gaming, consistent and accurate reporting of PC gaming market sizing and research, and creating forums for member companies to cooperate on solutions to challenges facing the PC gaming industry, such as hardware requirements, anti-piracy, and more. PCGA will develop and promote guidelines and recommendations and foster information sharing between members to accelerate the PC gaming industry.

“PCGA members believe that we are stronger and more effective together than any member company is alone, and that our shared vision and group effort will improve PC gaming worldwide,” said Randy Stude, director of the Gaming Program Office at Intel. “Industry forums have proven to foster competition and innovation among member companies and grow markets while improving user experiences.”

“Microsoft is a strong believer in the PC as a platform for gaming, and the formation of PCGA is a major step forward for our industry and for PC gamers,” said Kevin Unangst, senior global director of Games for Windows at Microsoft. “Working together, we have an exponentially greater opportunity to propel the PC gaming experience to new heights.”

Consumers will benefit from this cross-company cooperation and shared focus to deliver better gaming experiences on their PCs.

“This collaboration will provide developers and publishers with a champion for consistent demographics, hardware adoption, and revenue measurement and reporting,” said David Cole, an analyst with DFC Intelligence. “An authoritative source of information on the PC as a gaming platform will serve as an invaluable catalyst for growing the market and improving the consumers’ PC gaming experience.”

The members developed the PCGA charter and organized the consortium, which is open to any industry stakeholder interested in furthering the PCGA mission to advance the PC gaming platform worldwide.

For more information, or to become a PCGA member, visit www.pcgamingalliance.org.

About PCGA

The PC Gaming Alliance is a non-profit organization formed by the PC gaming industry to advance the PC as a worldwide gaming platform. The open and cross-company alliance includes hardware and software makers, game developers and publishers, and others committed to the success of the PC gaming market. The PCGA mission is to accelerate innovation, improve the gaming experience for consumers and act as the industry’s authoritative source of expertise, information and analysis for PC gaming. It is headquartered in San Ramon, Calif. For more information, see www.pcgamingalliance.org.

Product and service names mentioned herein are the trademarks of their respective owners.

Author:	Pricing Info Electronic Arts Half-Life 2: The Orange Box (PC) (Electronic Arts 014633098525) Lowest Price: $40.00 Stores Selling 5
Chris Tom Benchmarks: Jeff Tom
Date:
10/28/07
Developer
Crytek
Product:
Crysis

Updated with 1,2 and 4 core benchmarks:  It is hard to believe that it has been almost 4 years since our TXGF Winter Lan of February 2004 where AMD showed off Farcry at their booth at which was on of, if not the first showing of the game to the general gaming public. Then in 2005 we benchmarked the 64 bit version of the game first. Now finally after all of the hype Crytek is ready to reveal Crysis the spiritual if successor to Farcry. We first played the multiplayer demo weeks ago, but performance was bad. You could forget about playing on the GeForce 7 series as textures were missing, and it was a slideshow in many cases. The GeForce 8800 was the only way to play, and EA did not want any benchmarks published. Things have changed with the release of the single player demo, although performance is not what you would call good. Clearly there needs to be some optimization done, and you are only going to be mildly pleased with your performance if you have an 8800 at this point. As far as gameplay goes the single player action is enjoyable even if it is at low frame rates. Certainly at our gaming center Tek Republik people are liking the super power like features of the character, and they are liking the visuals. Anyway, enough about that. Lets see how this game performs with several graphics cards, and also with 1, 2 and 4 CPU cores at work.

The following video cards were used during our testing.

GeForce 8800GTS 640MB
GeForce 8800GTS 320MB
GeForce 8600GTS
GeForce 8600GT
GeForce 7900GTX
GeForce 7900GT
GeForce 7600GT
GeForce 6800GT
Radeon 2600XT
Radeon X1900XTX
Radeon 1950Pro
Radeon X1300SE

Here's our test system. We used the Windows XP Professional 32 bit with the beta Nvidia drivers version 169.01. For the Radeons we used the 7.10 drivers.

We tested several cards with the high settings, and slower cards at medium performance. We used the built in GPU benchmark that does a flyby throughout the island map. Windows XP was used so DX9 is at work. DX10 has not exactly inspired us. Maybe it will someday. We may add DX10 numbers later.

At merely 1280X1024 you can see that the GPUs are getting punished. Only the 8800s have acceptable performance levels for single player action at just under 30 frames per second. The Radeon 19s are a distant 3rd and 4th with the 7900s getting punished on the 10s along with the budget 8600GTS. Wow. Carnage. Imagine what would happen with AA enabled?

At 1600X1200 things don't look pretty. You actually see the benefit of 320MB of extra memory for the bigger 8800GTS, but even with that it manages only 20.1 FPS. The only other cards to manage double digits are the 1900XTX and the 7900GTX. Nothing else can break 10 frames per second. Ouch.

For medium settings we tested with some of the lower end cards. They were not worthy at high settings. Ok, so they are not worthy here either. The Radeon 2600XT had some odd graphical anomalies that we think may have given the card a small advantage in frames. It is tough to say, and we are not sure if AMD Cananada will give us any support as far their GPUs go so I'm not even wasting my time e-mailing them. When new drivers come out we will retest to see if there is a statistically significant change. Either way not busting 30 fps for the 2600 or for the 8600 does not bode well for the DX10 lightweights. If you have a 6800GT heating up your room, well, Crysis may as well be Crying.

If silicon could cry it might as well be now. Barely busting 20FPS the 2600XT kind of leads the pack. The 8600s are merely in the teens, and the poor old once proud, but still hot running 6800GT scores a touchdown.

One thing is certain. Crysis can look pretty. The only problem is you had better have a GeForce 8800, at least a dual core CPU, and patience for optimization in the game and for drivers. Dropping settings from high to medium does not make this game look pretty. In fact it made me long for Farcry. In fact it made me start up one of our gaming boxes with Crysis, and one with Farcry, and long for Farcry. Hopefully performance will improve, but it is currently dangerously close to Tresspasser. Thankfully unlike that tropical themed title this one is more fun.

Ok, now we move on to our tests with CPU scaling.  We used our Tek Republik gaming systems with Asus SLI Socket 939 motherboards, and compared single core and dual core scores at 2.2GHz running at medium graphic settings at 1024X768.  Then we used our 4X4 test rig with one FX74 and then two FX74s to determine whether or not Crysis would scale with each core running at high settings at 1280X1024.  Crysis includes a CPU and a video test.  Screenshots from each are below.

The CPU test is largely at one of the camps in game and blowing up everything in site seems to be the goal.  A lot of physics is going on here, and plenty of things are flying around.

The video test is merely a flyby around the island and is not as intensive as the CPU test.  Of course not as intensive in Crysis is still quite intensive.

As you can see here on the 7900GT going from one to two cores at the same clock speed has a dramatic effect on the scores.  The CPU score goes up over 10 frames per second, or over 50% while the video score goes up over 16 frames a second, and again over 50%.  That is quite impressive, and is reason enough for you Socket 939 owners to pick up a cheap Athlon 64 X2.  In fact the X2 4200+ here matches the speeds we tested with at 2.2GHz, and is only $63.50.  For a 50% increase in frame rate it is worth every penny.

Using our FX74 setup going from dual core to quad core did not impress us.  As you can see in each test the .1 frame increase would not be noticeable, and frankly falls in the margin of error.  We were hoping to see quad core support, but perhaps that is not the case in this demo.  It may be the full game that brings us that support.  We would love to test with 3 cores, but unless a chip from AMD drops in our lap that will just have to wait.

After having torn through every anticipated game of this unprecedented fall of PC gaming we don't have much to look forward to benchmarking except maybe Gears of War. If you have missed out on our other gaming performance numbers check them below.

Hellgate London Demo Performance
Unreal Tournament 3 Beta Performance
Call of Duty 4 Beta GPU Performance
Half Life 2 Episode 2 and Portal Performance
Team Fortress 2 Beta Performance
Bioshock DX9 and DX10 Performance
id Software's Marty Stratton Interview
Company of Heroes DX9/10 Image Quality Comparison
Enemy Territory Quake Wars Beta Performance
Company of Heroes DirectX 10 Performance Revealed
Lost Planet Benchmarks
Unreal 3 Engine Performance With Rainbow Six: Vegas
Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 Beta Performance
Company of Heroes Performance