During our benchmarking sessions, we used the configuration listed below. Between our benchmarking sessions the only variable was the video card being tested.

Hardware Configuration

• Motherboard: Biostar K8VHA Pro (VIA K8T800, July 12th 2004 BIOS)
• CPU: Athlon 64 3200+
• Memory: Two 256 MB DDR400/PC3200 memory modules from TwinMOS
• Hard Drive: Maxtor DiamondMax 9 Plus (40 GB, ATA-133)
• Screen resolution: 1024x768x32@85 Hz

Software Configuration

• Windows XP Professional installed using NTFS
• Service Pack 1A
• Direct X 9.0c
• ATI video driver version: 4.8
• ATI video driver version: 6.4 (Radeon X700, Radeon X1600 Pro)
• NVIDIA video driver version: 61.77
• VIA Hyperion driver version: 4.53

Used Software

• 3DMark2001 SE
• 3DMark03 Business 3.40
• Aquamark 3
• Doom III
• Far Cry 1.1

We adopted a 3% error margin; thus, differences below 3% cannot be considered relevant. In other words, products with a performance difference below 3% should be considered as having similar performance.