AM2 Motherboards-Part 4: ATI Crossfire Xpress 3200

Gaming Performance

We tested with our recently revised group of game tests, which includes Call of Duty 2, Serious Sam 2, Half Life 2: Lost Coast, F.E.A.R, Far Cry, and Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory. All boards were tested with the NVIDIA 7900 GTX using NVIDIA 91.31 drivers. The ATI chipset boards were additionally tested with a single ATI X1900 XTX using the Catalyst 6.7 drivers. We are experimenting with a new benchmark for Prey to see if it is useful for motherboard comparisons. Results of the MSI K9A and ECS KA3 running the Prey Benchmark 1.1 are included in the game benchmarks.

Beginning with this review, we have upgraded our Serious Sam 2 benchmarks to more repeatable and consistent benchmarking by using the HOC Serious Sam 2 benchmark. Results with this test are not directly comparable to older SS2 test results, so we used this opportunity to upgrade our test setup to HDR. HDR is more demanding of graphics capabilities and generally yields lower FPS performance than standard SS2 tests. Since results are not comparable to earlier test results, SS2 HDR results are only reported for the MSI K9A and ECS KA3. We also have comparative results in SS2 without HDR.









Our benchmark comparisons throughout this four-part AM2 review series have used the NVIDIA 7900 GTX for comparison. We have also included results on the ATI chipset motherboards for the single ATI X1900 XTX. These ATI results are for REFERENCE ONLY and are color coded in pale gold for easy reference. With the NVIDIA 7900 GTX the MSI K9A Platinum results are in red and ECS KA3 results are in purple (to match the board).

The MSI placed at or near the top of the performance charts in all games, whether comparing 7900 GTX or 1900 XTX performance. The ECS was an average to above average performer. In Standard gaming benchmarks the MSI K9A, ASUS M2N32-SLI and Epox MF570SLI were normally always in the top half in performance. From a broader perspective, it is interesting to see that the ATI 1900 XTX and NVIDIA 7900 GTX are fairly well matched in overall performance. Each GPU has certain games in which it is best, but overall the wins and losses are well balanced on each side at standard 1280x1024 resolution with eye candy turned off.

SLI/CrossFire Gaming Performance

ATI and NVIDIA both have flagship Dual X16 solutions. SLI and CrossFire are about gaming, so dual video tests were confined to gaming benchmarks, and the test suite is heavily slanted to recent and popular titles where SLI and CrossFire make the biggest difference. All dual video testing was at 1600x1200, 4xAA/8xAF. Tests were also run with a single X1900 XTX at this same resolution. The single video high-res results on the ATI AM2 are in pale gold and the CrossFire results are in red for MSI, purple for ECS, and bright gold for ATI Reference.








You might think you are looking at results from different video cards in CrossFire/SLI performance. Here leads are larger and positions are often switched from results at standard resolution without the eye candy. Among ATI Xpress 3200 boards the MSI stood out as a top performer. For NVIDIA nForce 500 based motherboards, the ASUS and Epox were normally at or near the top of the SLI performance charts.