3DMark Vantage is the latest addition to the 3DMark series, measuring Shader 4.0 (i.e., DirectX 10) performance and supporting PhysX, a programming interface developed by Ageia (now part of NVIDIA) to transfer physics calculations from the system CPU to the video card GPU in order to increase performance. Mechanical physics is the basis for calculations about the interaction of objects. For example, if you shoot, what exactly will happen to the object when the bullet hits it? Will it break? Will it move? Will the bullet bounce back? Notice that we didn’t upgrade the PhysX to the latest version, which would make the physics calculations for CPU Test 2 to be made by the GPU instead of the CPU on NVIDIA video cards (since we aren't considering CPU or 3DMark scores this change wouldn't produce any increase in our results anyway).

We ran this program at three 16:10 widescreen resolutions, 1680x1050, 1920x1200, and 2560x1600. First we used the “Performance” profile, and then we used the “Extreme” profile (basically enabling anti-aliasing at 4x, anisotropic filtering at 16x, and putting all detail settings at their maximum or “extreme” value. The combination of 2560x1600 resolution with extreme settings didn’t produce reliable results according to the program, so we aren’t going to add them here. The results being compared are the “GPU Scores” achieved by each video card.

3DMark Vantage Professional 1.0.1 - 1680x1050 - Performance	Score	Difference
GeForce GTX 280	7695	24.25%
GeForce 9800 GX2	6990	12.87%
XFX GeForce GTX 260 640M XXX (OC)	6808	9.93%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4870	6193
GeForce GTX 260	5898	5.00%
Sapphire Atomic Radeon HD 3870 X2	5651	9.59%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4850	4797	29.10%
GeForce 9800 GTX	3805	62.76%
Radeon HD 3870	2977	108.03%

3DMark Vantage Professional 1.0.1 - 1920x1200 - Performance	Score	Difference
GeForce GTX 280	6106	25.12%
GeForce 9800 GX2	5379	10.23%
XFX GeForce GTX 260 640M XXX (OC)	5315	8.91%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4870	4880
GeForce GTX 260	4582	6.50%
Sapphire Atomic Radeon HD 3870 X2	4336	12.55%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4850	3725	31.01%
GeForce 9800 GTX	2891	68.80%
Radeon HD 3870	2269	115.07%

3DMark Vantage Professional 1.0.1 - 2560x1600 - Performance	Score	Difference
GeForce GTX 280	3549	30.10%
XFX GeForce GTX 260 640M XXX (OC)	3068	12.46%
GeForce 9800 GX2	2910	6.67%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4870	2728
GeForce GTX 260	2640	3.33%
Sapphire Atomic Radeon HD 3870 X2	2382	14.53%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4850	2050	33.07%
GeForce 9800 GTX	1557	75.21%
Radeon HD 3870	1244	119.29%

3DMark Vantage Professional 1.0.1 - 1680x1050 - Extreme	Score	Difference
GeForce GTX 280	6005	37.73%
XFX GeForce GTX 260 640M XXX (OC)	5319	22.00%
GeForce 9800 GX2	4858	11.42%
GeForce GTX 260	4531	3.92%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4870	4360
Sapphire Atomic Radeon HD 3870 X2	3567	22.23%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4850	3445	26.56%
GeForce 9800 GTX	2703	61.30%
Radeon HD 3870	1855	135.04%

3DMark Vantage Professional 1.0.1 - 1920x1200 - Extreme	Score	Difference
GeForce GTX 280	4732	35.59%
XFX GeForce GTX 260 640M XXX (OC)	4188	20.00%
GeForce GTX 260	3576	2.46%
GeForce 9800 GX2	3508	0.52%
Sapphire Radeon HD 4870	3490
Sapphire Radeon HD 4850	2753	26.77%
Sapphire Atomic Radeon HD 3870 X2	2669	30.76%
GeForce 9800 GTX	2038	71.25%
Radeon HD 3870	1439	142.53%