Am I delusional? Will a single GTX480 run games good at 2560x1440?

coolhandm3

coolhandm3

Limp Gawd
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May 28, 2009
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So I am looking to get a 27 monitor with a res of 2560x1440. I have a i7 980x and a GTX480. I have not completed the build yet but I was hoping to game at say 2-4 AA and 16 AF at hopefully at least 30-60fps for the following games:

F1 2010
NFS Hot Pursuit
Bad Company 2
Dirt 2
Crysis

Is this a realistic expectation? I don't plan to run games max settings( I.E all on Ultra settings).

Disclaimer: I realize sli would be better, its not an option for me, also I know people will say get a 16:10 monitor but again I am not interested in that. :)

Basically can I run these games at the native resolution with ANY AA? Would it be reasonable to think alot of graphically settings will have to be turned off to accomplish this? I would love 60fps but I am going into to this knowing its not gonna happen :/
 
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Honestly you can run games just fine but you won't be able to turn up the eye candy big time. AA will end up being your biggest enemy since it chews through memory at the resolution. Running AA will be strictly based around the games you wanna play and based on your list (AA doesn't work in NFS Hot Pursuit currently so cross that one off the list) you could get away with it here and there just don't expect 60fps while doing it.

If you don't mind turning down settings here and there I think you'll be ok with the performance. Why can't you do SLI down the road? Do you have a small case or a lacking PSU? I would say as soon as you can afford another GTX 480 I would spring for it , right now the prices on them really aren't dropping much but if you can wait til summer time they should be starting to drop more.
 
With a resolution that high, I don't think high AA would matter much.
 
Smaller monitor+sli 480s (if possible)+max settings>>>>>Agressive Anti-Glare Coating, poor contrast and "ok," gaming performance.

I couldn't find anything concrete, I suggest trying Can I Run It, if you aren't getting super frame rates all ready then well.....

Try turning down the settings on your games now and see if you can tolerate it. I believe Coolhand has an F2380mx, so just imagine how bad one of the 27" panels is going to look contrast (4x more contrast then the U2711) and color wise with lower graphical settings as well. Not a pretty picture.

Browsing through various GTX 480 reviews may yeild some of the awnsers you seek.
 
NCX said:
Smaller monitor+sli 480s (if possible)+max settings>>>>>Agressive Anti-Glare Coating, poor contrast and "ok," gaming performance.

I couldn't find anything concrete, I suggest trying Can I Run It, if you aren't getting super frame rates all ready then well.....

Try turning down the settings on your games now and see if you can tolerate it. I believe Coolhand has an F2380mx, so just imagine how bad one of the 27" panels is going to look contrast (4x more contrast then the U2711) and color wise with lower graphical settings as well. Not a pretty picture.

Browsing through various GTX 480 reviews may yeild some of the awnsers you seek.
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Dude he didn't say anything about its picture quality or contrast or color. He just asked about gaming performance....

I mean come on NCX you don't have to interject your view point on monitor PQ in every single thread do you?
 
The OP owns a Pioneer Kuro and Samsung F2380MX, I think PQ is important to him.

Going for something thats big because its big and having to sacrifice frame rate, graphical quality and picture quality...long live America lets all go to McDonalds.
 
NCX said:
The OP owns a Pioneer Kuro and Samsung F2380MX, I think PQ is important to him.

Going for something thats big because its big and having to sacrifice frame rate, graphical quality and picture quality...long live America lets all go to McDonalds.
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Right , I must have missed him bringing up monitor picture quality in his original post , it was good of you to go ahead and manufacture it for him :rolleyes:

Long live bullheaded points of view.
 
Skillz said:
With a resolution that high, I don't think high AA would matter much.
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Even at that resolution it makes a surprising difference in some games. With third person games like Starcraft 2 or HoN it is generally no big deal, but first person shooters really benefit even from the lowest AA settings. Perhaps it is because there is so much forward movement with geometry moving towards and past you, but either way it helps even with the smaller dot pitch and high resolution of the newer 2560x1440 displays.
 
Godmachine said:
Right , I must have missed him bringing up monitor picture quality in his original post , it was good of you to go ahead and manufacture it for him :rolleyes:

Long live bullheaded points of view.
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I appreciate what your are saying but you can go easy on NCX, he has been very helpful on this forum and he is 100% right about me caring about picture quality :)

NCX- I realize the acd 27 will be a step down color and contrast wise to the f2380mx, but after playing around with the acd last night the clarity really impressed me! It really is nice, I can't imagine games at native res on that beast.

It (acd) seems to handle motion alot better then the sammy and I love the glass front.

Going back to the OP, native res at 2560x1440 and running those games mentioned at 60 fps would def be the goal and I am sure even at that res AA would def make the games look better.

I suppose I could mess with the game settings to make them run better on this setup, I just was hoping on insight with someone with this setup :)
 
All the games on your list will run above 30fps with AA on at that resolution, including Crysis Warhead with Gamer settings and 2x MSAA (most will run >= 60fps with 8XAA). Not sure about the original Crysis.
 
It runs all my games at 2560X1600 with all settings high no problem. Only thing it won't run smooth 100% of the time is Metro, Crysis, and all the hardware killers right now. Everything else is super smooth 60+fps.
 
I have a GTX260 + Q6600 and I run all my games at 2560x1440 (Left 4 Dead 2, GTA4, StarCraft 2, Dead Space, Dead Rising 2) and they work fine, no performance issues. I did have to lower the texture quality in GTA4, but its a fairly intensive game to begin with.
 
sethk said:
All the games on your list will run above 30fps with AA on at that resolution, including Crysis Warhead with Gamer settings and 2x MSAA (most will run >= 60fps with 8XAA). Not sure about the original Crysis.
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Thanks for the responses guys! Just what I wanted to hear, that it is possible to run native and have decent framerates, I figured Metro and crysis would be FPS killers, but it sounds like most console ports (which I will be playing the most) will run fine on it.

My main goal is to have better quality gaming then on the consoles, so having games at 2560x1440 with some eye candy one SHOULD be alot better looking then the consoles right?
 
Absolutely. I game with my PS3 on a projector and a VT25 Panny plasma, but when it comes to wow factor, the PC with it's relatively tiny monitor(s) can easily kick its ass in any game that's available on both platforms. I've even replayed some games I really enjoyed on the PC when they became available (Mass Effect 2, etc.) The PC requires a little more TLC to shine, in terms of finding the best settings, setting up the right refresh rates, forcing triple buffering in some games to avoid tearing, etc., but when it's setup right (usually in the first hour or so for me), it's unbeatable. Many Console games aren't even 720p, they are inferior resolutions like 540p and upscaled to 720p and 1080p. Many console games aren't even 60fps because of uneven performance, so they limit them to 30fps. Between the resolution, textures, shaders, fps and AA, the improvements are massive.

I still like playing on a 106" screen while kicking back on the couch, and there are still console exclusives and early availability, so the PS3 is in no danger of being untouched.
 
coolhandm3 said:
I appreciate what your are saying but you can go easy on NCX, he has been very helpful on this forum and he is 100% right about me caring about picture quality :)

NCX- I realize the acd 27 will be a step down color and contrast wise to the f2380mx, but after playing around with the acd last night the clarity really impressed me! It really is nice, I can't imagine games at native res on that beast.

It (acd) seems to handle motion alot better then the sammy and I love the glass front.

Going back to the OP, native res at 2560x1440 and running those games mentioned at 60 fps would def be the goal and I am sure even at that res AA would def make the games look better.

I suppose I could mess with the game settings to make them run better on this setup, I just was hoping on insight with someone with this setup :)
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Here's some personal reference.

I own a FD141 Elite Kuro, probably the best monitor Pioneer ever made. I also have an NEC 2490WUXi, one of the best IPS monitors out there. Also sitting in there is the 27" iMac which I also use as a display for my PC.

Unless the 27" ACD is somehow much worse than using the iMac as a display, you have nothing to worry about as far as picture quality goes or gaming. I have my PC outputting to all three displays, Kuro included, and the 27" is fantastic, I have no complaints. The very tight dot pitch may be an issue for some people as it results in smaller text and windows (try dragging a window back and forth between the 27" and 24", it's pretty crazy how huge it gets on the 24"), but for gaming it is awesome.

As I said before, FSAA may be the one thing that you have to cut back on, but in most cases you should be fine with the GTX 480 running at that resolution. My GTX 460 SLI setup is on average a little faster than the single GTX 480 (albeit with a lower minimum framerate), so you should be fine.
 
Serpico said:
Here's some personal reference.

I own a FD141 Elite Kuro, probably the best monitor Pioneer ever made. I also have an NEC 2490WUXi, one of the best IPS monitors out there. Also sitting in there is the 27" iMac which I also use as a display for my PC.

Unless the 27" ACD is somehow much worse than using the iMac as a display, you have nothing to worry about as far as picture quality goes or gaming. I have my PC outputting to all three displays, Kuro included, and the 27" is fantastic, I have no complaints. The very tight dot pitch may be an issue for some people as it results in smaller text and windows (try dragging a window back and forth between the 27" and 24", it's pretty crazy how huge it gets on the 24"), but for gaming it is awesome.

As I said before, FSAA may be the one thing that you have to cut back on, but in most cases you should be fine with the GTX 480 running at that resolution. My GTX 460 SLI setup is on average a little faster than the single GTX 480 (albeit with a lower minimum framerate), so you should be fine.
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Thank you for the information! I have a Pioneer Elite pro101 , so you know where I am coming from.

If i can get by playing games native res and maybe 2xAA( cant see much dif from 4x) then i should be good.

What games do you play on there and can you get away with little to no aa and it still look better then gaming on a 1080p display?
 
coolhandm3 said:
Thank you for the information! I have a Pioneer Elite pro101 , so you know where I am coming from.

If i can get by playing games native res and maybe 2xAA( cant see much dif from 4x) then i should be good.

What games do you play on there and can you get away with little to no aa and it still look better then gaming on a 1080p display?
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I mainly play Starcraft 2 and Team Fortress 2. Used to play Left 4 Dead 2 but I'm kind of over it. I have also been playing Lara Croft And The Guardian Of Light and Super Meat Boy as well (both very fun). I've played Crysis on my setup at 2560x1440 with high settings and 2x FSAA and it runs very well.

As I said earlier, I do feel that at least minimal FSAA should be used with first person shooters. The dot pitch is tiny, but even then the jaggies are still apparent in FPS because of the way you move towards, past, and around geometry. Third person games like SC2 and HoN don't need FSAA as much due to the fact that you have a third person view at a fixed distance. Jaggies are there but they aren't nearly as apparent since you are floating above the space instead of moving through the space.

Hope this helps!
 
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coolhandm3 said:
My main goal is to have better quality gaming then on the consoles, so having games at 2560x1440 with some eye candy one SHOULD be alot better looking then the consoles right?
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Imho, when it comes to gaming there's nothing more awesome than 2560x1440. I have a 360 for those few exclusives like Alan Wake, Halo: Reach, etc. but consoles are really showing their wear being locked at 1080p. For anything cross platform, all my gaming is on the Apple LED Cinema Display 27".
 
Ashok0 - On a desktop, I absolutely agree, 2560x1440 or bust.

That said, I recently ran HDMI through the walls from my PC to my home theater, and there's a lot to be said for sitting back on the couch with a gamepad playing games like Blur or Darksiders on my 60" plasma with full 5.1.

Full 1080p, no slowdown, cranked graphics settings, man, it's like an XBox 360 on crack. :D
 
Most console games aren't even 720p, the biggest budget games are the worst culprits (Reach/BO/Alan Wake/L4D2) aren't 720p and tend to have the worst visuals.

That said, when you guys say no frame rate issues do you have FRAPS opened? Or is this just a subjective impression?

I find this hard to beileive, especially with games like SCII and L4D2 where the Framerates are all over the place even with SLI 480's. Though they never render the games slow for me, I find the change from 35-60fps in SCII or inconsistent 60-90fps I get on L4D2 very noticeable/annoying. Black Ops is the worst culprit.

This is something I would worry about running a 1440p monitor with a single 480.
 
Had a 5870 (the 480 is a bit faster) and ran every game just at max or near-max settings (besides the obvious 2 or 3 games). AA is a toss up.

@NCX: SC2 is a CPU hog. I tested a 6950 in my roommates pc ([email protected], 1080p, max settings) and I get just over double the FPS playing at my native res (25x16) compared to him playing at 1080p! You may want to eye your GPU use.
 
rUmX said:
Had a 5870 (the 480 is a bit faster) and ran every game just at max or near-max settings (besides the obvious 2 or 3 games). AA is a toss up.

@NCX: SC2 is a CPU hog. I tested a 6950 in my roommates pc ([email protected], 1080p, max settings) and I get just over double the FPS playing at my native res (25x16) compared to him playing at 1080p! You may want to eye your GPU use.
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So when running games at 25x14 you could run them near maxxed, but what games could you get away with aa??

After what NCX has said, I am hesitant to play games with one gtx480 and i dont think a 580 would improve things much b/c the 480 is oc alot :/

Anyone else care to share their gaming experience with single gpu at 2560x1440??
 
Honestly, that 480 should be able to run pretty much everything out there with the options turned up and at least 2xAA and get good playable framerates (the exceptions being Crysis of course and Metro 2033).

An easy way to see for yourself is to look at the results of the GTX 570 @ 2560x1600 to get a good average. Just take whatever results you find and add a few frames to account for the difference in res.
 
coolhandm3 said:
So when running games at 25x14 you could run them near maxxed, but what games could you get away with aa??

After what NCX has said, I am hesitant to play games with one gtx480 and i dont think a 580 would improve things much b/c the 480 is oc alot :/

Anyone else care to share their gaming experience with single gpu at 2560x1440??
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You can get away with AA with most console ports. Examples are all the Call of Duty games, World of Warcraft, Just Cause 2, Street Fighter 4, Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit to name some, that I have played. Bad Company 2 you have a choice between AA or HBAO. You can't have both unfortunately. Then there are the usual suspects (Crysis and Metro 2033). Also 4xAA in Starcraft 2 will cut your FPS in half literally.
 
Curl said:
Honestly, that 480 should be able to run pretty much everything out there with the options turned up and at least 2xAA and get good playable framerates (the exceptions being Crysis of course and Metro 2033).

An easy way to see for yourself is to look at the results of the GTX 570 @ 2560x1600 to get a good average. Just take whatever results you find and add a few frames to account for the difference in res.
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What is your definition of playable framerates?
 
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