Half-Life 2: Episode Two
Publisher: Valve
As one part of our
game of the year 2007,
Half-Life 2: Episode Two set a new high in narrative and gameplay for the series. Using Valve's widely used, albeit not overly hardware intensive, Source engine that also features as a part of legendary games like
Counter-Strike,
Team Fortress 2 and
Portal, we were keen to feature its performance here too.
The Source engine is the most scalable engine we test. While it still supports only DirectX 9.0, it features effects like dynamic lighting with HDR effects, motion blur, advanced Havok Physics and high model details.
Episode Two took
Half-Life out into large open environments for the first time and we test with Gordon running through a large open level that combines forest and houses with explosions and physics.
All in game detail settings are set to their highest levels, with HDR enabled and, for anti-aliasing, MSAA was used and controlled from inside the game.
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Core i7 920 OC (4x4GHz, 1,600MHz DDR3, 3.6GHz QPI)
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Core i7 965 (4x3.2GHz, 6.4GHz QPI, SMT disabled)
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Core i7 965 (4x3.2GHz, 6.4GHz QPI, SMT enabled)
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Core i7 965 (4x3.2GHz, Dual Channel, SMT enabled)
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Core i7 965 (4x3.2GHz, 4.8GHz QPI, SMT enabled)
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Core i7 940 (4x2.93GHz, 6.4GHz QPI, SMT enabled)
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Core i7 965 (4x3.2GHz, Single Channel, SMT enabled)
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Core i7 965 (4x3.2GHz, Turbo disabled, SMT enabled)
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Core 2 Extreme QX9770 (4x3.2GHz, 1,600MHz FSB, DDR2)
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Core i7 920 (4x2.66GHz, 6.4GHz QPI, SMT enabled)
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Core 2 Extreme QX9770 (4x3.2GHz, 1,600MHz FSB, DDR3)
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Core 2 Quad Q9650 (4x3.0GHz, 1,333MHz FSB, DDR2)
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Core 2 Quad Q9650 (4x3.0GHz, 1,333MHz FSB, DDR3)
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Core 2 Duo E8500 (2x3.16GHz, 1,333MHz FSB, DDR3)
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Core 2 Duo E8500 (2x3.16GHz, 1,333MHz FSB, DDR2)
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Core 2 Quad Q9550 (4x2.83GHz, 1,333MHz FSB, DDR3)
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Core 2 Quad Q9550 (4x2.83GHz, 1,333MHz FSB, DDR2)
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Core 2 Quad Q9450 (4x2.66GHz, 1,333MHz FSB, DDR2)
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Core 2 Quad Q9450 (4x2.66GHz, 1,333MHz FSB, DDR3)
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Core 2 Quad Q6700 (4x2.66GHz, 1,066MHz FSB, DDR2)
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Core 2 Quad Q6700 (4x2.66GHz, 1,066MHz FSB, DDR3)
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AMD Phenom X4 9950 BE (4x2.6GHz, 2.0GHz HTT)
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AMD Phenom X4 9850 BE (4x2.5GHz, 2.0GHz HTT)
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AMD Phenom X4 9750 (4x2.4GHz, 1.8GHz HTT)
Frames Per Second - higher is better
In
Half-Life 2: Episode Two the extra MHz and memory bandwidth nets about 12 frames per second more performance, a nice jump and it's clearly the fastest thing on the table. The overclock has given us about 13 percent more performance and compared to a 3.2GHz quad core Penryn about 10 percent more.
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