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This time around, we used the following benchmarking setup:

• CPU: E6750 Intel Core 2 Duo at 3.0 GHZ (375 * 8) 
• Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-N680SLI-DQ6 for every card but the EAH3870X2 and the HD3850, which used a Crossfire motherboard, the Asus P5W DH Deluxe
• Memory: 4 gigabytes of Corsair Dominator DDR2 RAM (4 * 1024MB @ 900 MHz[4-4-4-12]) 
• Power Supply: OCZ 850W GXS
• Hard Drive: 250 GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 SATA, w/16 MB cache
• CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-U 12
• OS: Vista SP1

The EAH3850X2 isn't aimed to please soltaire playing grannies, so we assembled the following bunch of higher-endish cards to benchmark with: a XFX 9800 GX2, a Palit 9800GTX, a BFG 8800 GT OC, a pair of 8800 GT cards running in SLI (BFG 8800 GT OC and a XFX 8800 GT XXX), a Asus HD3870, a XFX 8800 GTS 512, and a Powercolor Xtreme PCS HD 3850 512MB card.

Driver-wise, I used NVIDIA's 174.74 Forceware drivers, and ATI's Catalyst 8.4 drivers.

On the software side of things, here is the list of programs used:

Bioshock: For this benchmark, all of the Detail settings were set to 'High'. All of the graphic option switches were set to 'On', with the exception of the following three settings: Vsync, Windowed mode, and Force Global Lighting. We used FRAPS to measure frame rate performance. The FRAPS run was 138 seconds, triggered from pulling the switch in the sub at game's beginning. The sub's dive involves many big models moving around, which should strain the GPU's and be a good measure of the game's engine.

Call of Juarez: We used the stand-alone Call of Juarez DX10 benchmarking program for these results. For our AA testing, we used a setting of 2x.

Crysis: These benchmarks were performed using 'fly-by' GPU test found within the single-player pre-release demo version of the game. All graphic settings were on High.' For AA, we used a setting of 4x. DX10 mode was used. The game has also been fully patched (1.1).

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars: We use this id FPS benchmark to test out higher resolutions. We used the highest possible detail settings. We tested the resolutions at 4x AA as well as at 8x AA. 16x AF was also used.  

Unreal Tournament 3: We tested the game using a fly-through of the vehicle capture-the-flag map 'Suspense.'ShangriLa (map) running for 90 seconds. Details were set to 'High', and a AF setting of 16x was used.

X3 Reunion: We decided to resurrect this benchmark. In Vista, this benchmarking-friendly demo only runs on 'medium' settings, so that was the setting we used, for both shader and texture quality. A setting of 16x AF was also used.

If you would like any further information about our benchmark settings, feel free to ask us in the forums.