Already at 1680x1050 we see that turning AA on helps the Radeon HD 5970 increase its lead over the GeForce GTX 480. Whereas it was just 3% faster with AA disabled, turning it on extended this performance margin to 27%. The Radeon HD 5970 still managed to average an impressive 89fps while the GeForce GTX 480 dropped to 70fps. The Radeon HD 5870 is now just 9% slower than the GeForce GTX 480 with 64fps. The GeForce GTX 470 lead the Radeon HD 5850 by 3fps. The next fastest graphics card was the GeForce GTX 285 with 46fps, making it just 1fps faster than the GeForce GTX 460. The GeForce GTX 275 averaged 43fps while the Radeon HD 5830 was slightly slower with 41fps. Down towards the bottom of the graph we have the Radeon HD 4870 which was the slowest card tested that was able to deliver playable performance with an average of 30fps. Despite testing at a relatively low resolution the GeForce 9800 GT and Radeon HD 4850 graphics cards were unable to deliver solid playable performance with anti-aliasing enabled. Now at 1920x1200 which is becoming a commonly used resolution amongst gamers, we see that the more affordable mid-range graphics cards start to suffer. The GeForce GTX 260 sits above half a dozen graphics cards on our graph yet it only averaged 30fps, making it borderline playable. This means that at this resolution and AA enabled we do not recommend using graphics cards such as the Radeon HD 5770, 4890 or GeForce 9800 GT. Current generation affordable hardware such as the Radeon HD 5830 or GeForce GTX 460 were able to provide acceptable performance with 34 and 35fps, respectively. Those that invested in previous generation Nvidia hardware such as the GeForce GTX 285/275 will be happy to know that they can expect to receive playable performance using these settings. The 2560x1600 resolution is all about the high-end graphics cards. The Radeon HD 5970 is still seen doing exceptionally well delivering 32% more performance than the GeForce GTX 480, though it does cost anywhere from 30% to 40% more. The Radeon HD 5850 and GeForce GTX 470 managed just 27fps each while the GeForce GTX 285 rendered just 23fps. Most of the mid-range cards averaged about 20fps or less.
