Page 3: Testing, Conclusion
Testing:
All testing on ASE Labs is done with the current version of Ubuntu (8.04 at the time of this writing). The Toxic was testing with the Catalyst 8.4 drivers (latest as of this review) from the Ubuntu repositories and then the Catalyst Control Center was installed. Testing was done on an Asus P5B Deluxe with a Core 2 Duo E6420. 2GB of PC2-8500 Ballistix Tracer and an 80GB Maxtor hard drive were used. Unfortunately, the card I was testing the Toxic against didn't want to function correctly in Linux. The MSI Geforce 8600GTS refused to use Direct Rendering which made it slow and painful. I've noticed huge problems with that series of card and it is a shame that it doesn't work correctly in Linux. Thankfully the Sapphire card works easily in Linux by installing the drivers told in the driver manager. Really, Linux is getting easier and easier all the time.
The AMD Catalyst Control Center for Linux is really lacking compared to the Nvidia settings manager. I'm sure that will change as newer and better drivers are released. Remember that I'm using the FGLRX driver so this is a non-free binary blob. If you want a truly free and open driver, the radeonhd driver should be completed sooner or later. It is being written by the Novell team and once it is fully ready, it will probably take the center stage over fglrx. For now, you are stuck with a binary blob for 3D support.
Once the fglrx driver was installed, I quickly enabled Compiz Fusion which enabled without a hitch. Getting desktop effects on Linux is very easy and most cards are now support. There is no reason not to try it out for yourself. 2D rendering on the card is superb as it has always been with ATI graphics cards. Unfortunately, you won't get the benefit of the UVD until the driver for Linux gets updated. The fglrx driver does not support Crossfire, yet.
How about some gaming? I quickly fire up Nexuiz 2.4 and proceeded to testing it out. Using the highest settings possible, the game looks absolutely great. It is totally free and open game.
As you can see, the game supports all the latest graphics technologies and even with this card, performance at 1920x1200 at full details settings chopped during game play at certain points. In my benchmarks, the card averaged about 45FPS. If you drop to normal settings, the card screams though at 110FPS. Nexuiz is proof that an open game can be fun and look good.
Now how about some retail gaming? I used Enemy Territory: Quake Wars and did some testing on it as well. Using the highest details settings at 1920x1200, the game was pushing 48FPS which is very impressive for all the particle explosions and such. At low settings the game played at 90FPS at the same resolution.
If I played with the 8600GTS, it would be about twice as slow due to the indirect rendering so I didn't bother doing formal benchmarks. Unfortunately, I don't have any other card comparable to the 3870 Toxic, so this will be the new baseline for all graphics reviews from this day. Performance of the 3870 Toxic should be around the 8800GT 512MB edition and a bit faster than the 9600GT as well.
Conclusion:
The Sapphire Radeon HD 3870 512MB Toxic edition is a truly fast card that includes a very impressive bundles. The going price for the card is around $190 from Newegg. At this price it is right around where the competition is (the 8800GT). The difference is that the Sapphire bundle includes much more software and even a great gaming package. Linux support is easy and included with no extra charge. Why wouldn't you buy the Sapphire Radeon HD 3870 Toxic if you are looking for a new graphics card? You wouldn't... This card is my new favorite.
I'd like to thank Don from Sapphire for supplying this card for review.
All testing on ASE Labs is done with the current version of Ubuntu (8.04 at the time of this writing). The Toxic was testing with the Catalyst 8.4 drivers (latest as of this review) from the Ubuntu repositories and then the Catalyst Control Center was installed. Testing was done on an Asus P5B Deluxe with a Core 2 Duo E6420. 2GB of PC2-8500 Ballistix Tracer and an 80GB Maxtor hard drive were used. Unfortunately, the card I was testing the Toxic against didn't want to function correctly in Linux. The MSI Geforce 8600GTS refused to use Direct Rendering which made it slow and painful. I've noticed huge problems with that series of card and it is a shame that it doesn't work correctly in Linux. Thankfully the Sapphire card works easily in Linux by installing the drivers told in the driver manager. Really, Linux is getting easier and easier all the time.
The AMD Catalyst Control Center for Linux is really lacking compared to the Nvidia settings manager. I'm sure that will change as newer and better drivers are released. Remember that I'm using the FGLRX driver so this is a non-free binary blob. If you want a truly free and open driver, the radeonhd driver should be completed sooner or later. It is being written by the Novell team and once it is fully ready, it will probably take the center stage over fglrx. For now, you are stuck with a binary blob for 3D support.
Once the fglrx driver was installed, I quickly enabled Compiz Fusion which enabled without a hitch. Getting desktop effects on Linux is very easy and most cards are now support. There is no reason not to try it out for yourself. 2D rendering on the card is superb as it has always been with ATI graphics cards. Unfortunately, you won't get the benefit of the UVD until the driver for Linux gets updated. The fglrx driver does not support Crossfire, yet.
How about some gaming? I quickly fire up Nexuiz 2.4 and proceeded to testing it out. Using the highest settings possible, the game looks absolutely great. It is totally free and open game.
As you can see, the game supports all the latest graphics technologies and even with this card, performance at 1920x1200 at full details settings chopped during game play at certain points. In my benchmarks, the card averaged about 45FPS. If you drop to normal settings, the card screams though at 110FPS. Nexuiz is proof that an open game can be fun and look good.
Now how about some retail gaming? I used Enemy Territory: Quake Wars and did some testing on it as well. Using the highest details settings at 1920x1200, the game was pushing 48FPS which is very impressive for all the particle explosions and such. At low settings the game played at 90FPS at the same resolution.
If I played with the 8600GTS, it would be about twice as slow due to the indirect rendering so I didn't bother doing formal benchmarks. Unfortunately, I don't have any other card comparable to the 3870 Toxic, so this will be the new baseline for all graphics reviews from this day. Performance of the 3870 Toxic should be around the 8800GT 512MB edition and a bit faster than the 9600GT as well.
Conclusion:
The Sapphire Radeon HD 3870 512MB Toxic edition is a truly fast card that includes a very impressive bundles. The going price for the card is around $190 from Newegg. At this price it is right around where the competition is (the 8800GT). The difference is that the Sapphire bundle includes much more software and even a great gaming package. Linux support is easy and included with no extra charge. Why wouldn't you buy the Sapphire Radeon HD 3870 Toxic if you are looking for a new graphics card? You wouldn't... This card is my new favorite.
I'd like to thank Don from Sapphire for supplying this card for review.