GeForce GTX 260 with 177.39 Drivers and PhysX on Vantage

[Apoptosis]

I was just playing with an XFX GeForce GTX 260 graphics card and tried out the new Forceware 177.39 drivers with PhysX on 3DMark Vantage.

I installed 3DMark Vantage and the XFX GeFOrce GTX 260 and ran the benchmark without changing any settings...

gtx260_physx.jpg (87.04 KiB) Viewed 3193 times

The overall score was 9800 3dmarks with a GPU score of 7900 and a CPU score of 35,800... This high overall score and CPU score is why NVIDIA hasbeen called out for cheating... If you disable the PPU in the settings you can run the test without offloading the workload to the GPU from the CPU.

physx_settings.jpg (62.62 KiB) Viewed 3191 times

On the lower right corner of the settings menu we checked the box to disable the PPU.

gtx260_nophysx.jpg (104.89 KiB) Viewed 3191 times

With PhysX disabled and the CPU doing the phyics on the CPU tests the overall score dropped by just over 1000 points to 8800 3dmarks. The GPU score remained at 7900 3dmarks and the CPU score dropped down to just 13000.

This is what AMD and Intel are so worried about PhysX, it inflates the overall score and CPU score. Is it really cheating though? We ran a story on this here, so be sure to read it if you are interested in this subject.

[smack323]

i am not sure why it would be cheating?? if Ford is able to come up with some new moter that has 2 cylinders and gets 100mpg but is still putting out 400hp- would other auto makers say Ford is now cheatin because the engine is not like normal engines?

[vicaphit]

I agree. Just because Nvidia aquired PhysX doesn't mean it is cheating.