3DMark2001 SE measures video card performance simulating DirectX 8.1 games. It is very effective software for evaluating the performance from previous-generation games, programmed using DirectX 8. In this software we run six tests. We run the software in three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32, first without antialiasing and with no frame buffer, then we put the antialiasing at 4 samples and the frame buffer at triple-buffering. This improves the video quality but lowers the performance. We were willing to see how much performance we lost by putting the VGA to run at the maximum possible image quality. It is important to note that ATI chips can run at 6x antialiasing. Since NVIDIA chips cannot run at this configuration, we had to use 4x antialiasing to use a configuration that is valid to all video cards included in our bechmarks, allowing direct comparison between them.
You may be asking yourself why we added an old program in a review of a latest generation video card. To us, it is as important to know the performance of a video card with the latest games as it is to know its performance in an older game. That’s why we kept this software in our methodology.
At a resolution of 1024x768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X700 was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition, which was 51.13% faster, ATI Radeon X800 XT Platinum Edition, which was 49.37% faster, Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro, which was 41.95% faster, XFX GeForce 6800 Ultra, which was 39.22% faster, ATI Radeon 9800 XT, which was 27.71% faster, Gigabyte GeForce FX 5950 Ultra, which was 11.90% faster and Leadtek GeForce 6600 GT AGP, which was 11.85% faster.
At a resolution of 1280x1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X700 was beaten by ATI Radeon X800 XT Platinum Edition, which was 66.36% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition, which was 65.54% faster, XFX GeForce 6800 Ultra, which was 56.33% faster, Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro, which was 53.94% faster, ATI Radeon 9800 XT, which was 31.56% faster, Leadtek GeForce 6600 GT AGP, which was 17.12% faster and Gigabyte GeForce FX 5950 Ultra, which was 16.66% faster.
At a resolution of 1600x1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X700 was beaten by ATI Radeon X800 XT Platinum Edition, which was 94.34% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition, which was 91.99% faster, XFX GeForce 6800 Ultra, which was 85.62% faster, Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro, which was 74.48% faster, ATI Radeon 9800 XT, which was 39.54% faster, Leadtek GeForce 6600 GT AGP, which was 29.69% faster and Gigabyte GeForce FX 5950 Ultra, which was 28.37% faster.
At a resolution of 1024x768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X700 was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition, which was 73.36% faster, ATI Radeon X800 XT Platinum Edition, which was 67.12% faster, XFX GeForce 6800 Ultra, which was 58.18% faster, Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro, which was 56.53% faster, ATI Radeon 9800 XT, which was 28.21% faster, Gigabyte GeForce FX 5950 Ultra, which was 24.39% faster and Leadtek GeForce 6600 GT AGP, which was 8.08% faster.
At a resolution of 1280x1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X700 was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition, which was 105.41% faster, ATI Radeon X800 XT Platinum Edition, which was 93.65% faster, XFX GeForce 6800 Ultra, which was 86.38% faster, Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro, which was 77.39% faster, ATI Radeon 9800 XT, which was 35.36% faster, Gigabyte GeForce FX 5950 Ultra, which was 32.75% faster and Leadtek GeForce 6600 GT AGP, which was 9.13% faster.
At a resolution of 1600x1200 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X700 was 10.75% faster than Leadtek GeForce 6600 GT AGP, and it was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition, which was 141.99% faster, ATI Radeon X800 XT Platinum Edition, which was 118.26% faster, Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro, which was 98.34% faster, XFX GeForce 6800 Ultra, which was 93.96% faster, ATI Radeon 9800 XT, which was 38.18% faster and Gigabyte GeForce FX 5950 Ultra, which was 31.27% faster.
