Battlefield 1 CPU benchmark

[Techicolors]

Gamersnexus took a crack on benching a couple of Intel and AMD (!) CPUs on BF1 http://www.gamersnexus.net/game-bench/2673-battlefield-1-cpu-benchmark-dx11-vs-dx12-i5-i7-fx

 

 

Some notes before viewing the results

Spoiler

 

Partner cards were used where available and tested for out-of-box performance. Frequencies listed are advertised clock-rates. We tested both DirectX 11 and DirectX 12.

Please note that we use onPresent to measure framerate and frametimes. Reviewers must make a decision whether to use onPresent or onDisplay when testing with PresentMon. Neither is necessarily correct or incorrect, it just comes down to the type of data the reviewer wants to work with and analyze. For us, we look at frames on the Present. Some folks may use onDisplay, which would produce different results (particularly at the low-end). Make sure you understand what you're comparing results to if doing so, and also ensure that the same tools are used for analysis. A frame does not necessarily equal a frame between software packages. We trust PresentMon as the immediate future of benchmarking, particularly with its open source infrastructure built and maintained by Intel and Microsoft.

Also note that we are limited on our activations per game code. We can test 5 hardware components per code within a 24-hour period. We've got three codes, so we can test a total of 15 configurations per 24 hours.

Battlefield 1 has a few critical settings that require tuning for adequate benchmarking. Except where otherwise noted, we disabled GPU memory restrictions for testing; this setting triggers dynamic quality scaling, creating unequal tests. We also set resolution render scale to 100% to match render resolution to display resolution. Field of View was changed to 80-degrees vertical to more appropriately fit what a player would use, since the default 55-degree vertical FOV is a little bit silly for competitive FPS players. This impacts FPS and should also be accounted for if attempting to cross-compare results. V-Sync and adaptive sync are disabled. Presets are used for quality, as defined by chart titles. Game performance swings based on test location, map, and in-game events. We tested in the Italian Avanti Savoia campaign level for singleplayer, and we tested on Argonne Forest for multiplayer. You can view our test course in the above, separate video.

The campaign was used as primary test platform, but we tested multiplayer to determine the scaling between singleplayer and multiplayer. Multiplayer is not a reliable test platform when considering our lack of control (pre-launch) over servers, tick rate, and network interference with testing. Thankfully, the two are actually pretty comparable in performance. FPS depends heavily on the map, as always, but even on 64 player-count servers, assuming the usual map arrangement where you never see everyone at once, are not too abusive on the GPU.

Note that we used the console command gametime.maxvariablefps 0 to disable the framerate cap, in applicable test cases. This removes the Battlefield 1 limitation / FPS cap of 200FPS.

Tests were conducted using ultra settings at 1080p with two GPUs: One was a GTX 1080 FTW Hybrid, used to place emphasis on the CPU performance. Interestingly, the GTX 1080 is powerful enough that just running a lower resolution is enough to demonstrate CPU scaling, and we can leave the graphics options more realistically high. This is new with this generation of GPUs. The second tested card was an RX 480 8GB Gaming X, which gives more of a middle-of-the-road look at things.

The point of running a lower resolution is to show scaling performance. As you increase resolution, load will be placed more heavily on the pixel pipeline and the GPU's ability to draw and sample all of those pixels -- that shifts the load and obfuscates CPU performance. That said, there is something to be said for the real-world aspect of this: If running more demanding quality settings (with reduced settings for CPU-intensive options), it would be possible to run lower-end CPUs with reasonably high settings.

DirectX 12 performance was measured using the onPresent variable from PresentMon. We extract 1% low and 0.1% low metrics using a python script that GamersNexus created. Game graphics are configured to Ultra, 96* horizontal FOV, GPU memory restriction off, and VSync off.

Our other testing methodology, which leverages a 3-minute long test in the Through Mud & Blood map, is detailed in our second set of test results further down the page

 

*So really the following (except the explicitly stated 480 8gb) used the EVGA 1080 hybrid at 1080p

 

Dx11 results

Spoiler

 

Scaling

 

Dx12

Spoiler

Quick test with a 8370 and 480 8gb

Spoiler

Their conclusion

Spoiler

 

Battlefield 1's DirectX 12 performance remains spotty and sub-optimal, regardless of CPU used. The 1% low and 0.1% low performance metrics are poor even when conducting extended benchmark passes for several minutes, and show themselves in stuttering at times.

Regardless, the stack remains mostly the same in terms of hierarchy -- though the high-end i7 and i5 K-SKU devices do perform significantly better with Dx11. The i7-6700K ($330) posts a definitive performance gain over the i5-6600K ($237), at about 10-11% in averages. The i5-6600K runs about 15% faster than the i5-6400 non-K CPU, largely a result of the faster frequency in the 6600K. FX series CPUs and the i3-6300 are struggling to keep up with the graphics card in this scenario, though both are clearly still capable performers insofar as maintaining a high bottom-line performance for someone who may own an otherwise low-end system. The i3-6300 is generally outperforming the FX-8370 in these tests, though.

The X4 845 and X4 880K surrogate post performance that is pretty limited, dragging the GTX 1080 down with them to around 60-65FPS AVG, but would still be playable in Battlefield 1 if reducing settings and running a fittingly low-end GPU -- like an RX 460, GTX 1050, 1050 Ti, or similar. When the battles get intense, though, these devices will begin to choke considerably more than their FX-8000 and i3 counterparts.

Note that multiplayer is more abusive on the CPU, particularly when tracking the ammunition output of 64 players. For now, this is the most representative benchmark we could create given the obvious complexity with benchmarking a multiplayer game. You will want to account for that additional abuse when running multiplayer.

Of course, depending on your GPU, the CPU selection could be less significant. If you're running something like a GTX 1060 or RX 480, that extra 10% performance out of an i7 will become largely irrelevant in the face of a lower-end GPU's limitations. We're looking at memory next, as we suspect that may have more of an impact on Battlefield 1 than we see in some other games. But we'll see.

 

 

 

Honestly I wish there was a way to test in multiplayer, but considering the amount of variables it's clearly not a viable method. nevertheless i believe this is decent enough data to go by. and looking at the results, i feel i ought to upgrade to an i7 sometime in the future

[Prysin]

yes, as a BF1 owner the DX12 mode seems buggy and bolted on for shows.

[Coaxialgamer]

Wow.  Even in dx12 those fx chips cannot match an i3...  Guess it shows how old they are... 

[Doobeedoo]

Hmm those DX12 though... c'mon they don't implement it right, just rush it?

[VerticalDiscussions]

Moral of the story is, your fine with a Skylake I5 or a Skylake I7 when taking this game as reference!

 

And also that it seems to like extra logic threads and physical cores o-o.

[crystal6tak]

Any reason previous gen intels aren't in there? Quite the significant amount still use haswell and ivy K processors... Some sandy bridge would've been nice too.

[Kobz360]

Damm rip, this is very interesting to see considering Battlefront and all previous FB3 Battlefield games were able to deliver great CPU performance across the board (see below), most notably, to the FX CPUs. I wonder what has changed.

 

http://www.techspot.com/review/1096-star-wars-battlefront-benchmarks/page3.html

[goodtofufriday]

Unsurprisingly im left out of knowing how the 9590 performs =[

[Curufinwe_wins]

1 hour ago, Coaxialgamer said:

Wow.  Even in dx12 those fx chips cannot match an i3...  Guess it shows how old they are... 

Look at the abhorrently low dips in dx12. I wouldn't touch that with a 10ft pole.

 

With both a 480 and a 1080.

 

DX12 is clearly the worse option then for all gpus if the frame times are that crappy.

[patrickjp93]

2 hours ago, goodtofufriday said:

Unsurprisingly im left out of knowing how the 9590 performs =[

Add 15% to the 8370 score. Done.

[Prysin]

2 hours ago, patrickjp93 said:

Add 15% to the 8370 score. Done.

Then divide by zero 

[patrickjp93]

40 minutes ago, Prysin said:

Then divide by zero 

[vanished]

I guess it's good to have the data but what made them decide to test AMD CPUs?  

[Guest]

9 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

I guess it's good to have the data but what made them decide to test AMD CPUs?  

because very cpu lives matter

[Prysin]

1 hour ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

I guess it's good to have the data but what made them decide to test AMD CPUs?  

because if they didnt, they would be accused of being intel shills. Also there is the idea that DX12 will miraculously allow FX to gain massive performance because it can use more threads.

[ARikozuM]

8 hours ago, crystal6tak said:

Any reason previous gen intels aren't in there? Quite the significant amount still use haswell and ivy K processors... Some sandy bridge would've been nice too.

They ran out of activations for their Windows key, it seems.

[Simon771]

DX12 is as buggy as it can get

[patrickjp93]

1 hour ago, Simon771 said:

DX12 is as buggy as it can get

It's not the API that's the issue. Devs demanded low-level hardware access, and this is what they've been able to do with it in a short time. Every major new API had a growth/learning period of about 4 years before they got stable. It's just the nature of the beast.

[Dabombinable]

2 minutes ago, patrickjp93 said:

It's not the API that's the issue. Devs demanded low-level hardware access, and this is what they've been able to do with it in a short time. Every major new API had a growth/learning period of about 4 years before they got stable. It's just the nature of the beast.

If only Nvidia had a version of GLIDE-since they did buy 3DFX. I've been playing around with it, and the improvements in situations where you have a CPU bottleneck (pretty much using any CPU made up until the Pentium 4 hit around 3GHz) are significant over OpenGL and DirectX 6&7. Even with a Celeron 300A (I think the modern equivalent would be the Pentium G3258, due to the overclocking potential+price bracket).

[Prysin]

2 hours ago, ARikozuM said:

They ran out of activations for their Windows key, it seems.

you can change the system config as much as you want. Even with OEM licenses. The only downside is that you lose some features (that you do not need for benchmarking), and you often get issues installing drivers.

 

 

[Prysin]

48 minutes ago, patrickjp93 said:

It's not the API that's the issue. Devs demanded low-level hardware access, and this is what they've been able to do with it in a short time. Every major new API had a growth/learning period of about 4 years before they got stable. It's just the nature of the beast.

ALTHOUGH, and i know you will try dispute this. In which case i strongly suggest you read up on it before doing so.

 

Mantle, yes, that mantle, is the core code of DX12's multi-threaded design, although it is not "copy paste" but more of a abstraction of the OG mantle code, this has been stated by a few game devs that worked with Mantle code and later on built a DX12 game (Oxide games is one of these. They ported their whole mantle render pipeline to DX12).

Mantle is also an abstraction of sort, of DX11.3, aka "Xbox API". But also has elements of Sony's multi-threading code, although Mantle was made for desktop.

 

So in theory, devs have worked with a DX12 esque API for around 3-4 years at least, even more if you consider "Day one console HW release titles". DICE's own lead Frostbite engine developers were part of the crew that wrote Mantle (Before frostbite was made into its own company and bought by EA). So there is NO EXCUSE, for DICE, not to have excellent multi-threading. They proved they could do it with BF4 and Mantle. FX CPUs did see a small gain, but even Mantle wasnt nearly as low level as DX12 and Vulkan has become. Thus FX should have gained even a lil bit more. If nothing else it should have put it slightly above i3 levels, if the game engine was properly threaded.

 

 

[alexyy]

my 5820k might be actually useful in this game then. ha. 

[Prysin]

15 minutes ago, alexyy said:

my 5820k might be actually useful in this game then. ha. 

not much more then a normal desktop i7. 

Given that FX doesnt seem to get good multi-threaded scaling, one could assume that you might LOSE performance compared to a i7 6700k, because the 6700k has higher IPC and higher clocks.

[alexyy]

10 minutes ago, Prysin said:

not much more then a normal desktop i7. 

Given that FX doesnt seem to get good multi-threaded scaling, one could assume that you might LOSE performance compared to a i7 6700k, because the 6700k has higher IPC and higher clocks.

considering I paid less for my 5820k then a 6700k was at the time of release I think it's okay also not running stock.

[desertcomputer]

6 hours ago, Prysin said:

Then divide by zero 

Then power by 0, to be realistic