Before diving in to the next set of benchmarks, it’s worth making a note about how Windows 10 handles 4k.  The TL;DR is “not so great”.  Some things look great with Mac OS style scaling.  The desktop itself doesn’t really give any hint that you’re running at the massive pixel density of 3840 x 2160 on a 15″ panel.  But then certain apps, likely utilizing older raster APIs, require a magnifying glass.  And still other apps, utilizing probably yet again different APIs, actually render blurry.  I’ve tried to capture some of this in the images below:

To be fair Windows drags along legacy code support dating back to moldy APIs like GDI and, when it comes to rendering, is a mixed bag of lots of standards over time.  Plus vector rendering has always been a “sure, why not!” rather than an enforced standard.  OSX, benefiting from the Apple “nuclear option” approach, has done a better job with adapting their Aqua and Cocoa to ultra high res, but of course they also force developers forward and will drop legacy support.  It’s a tradeoff and hopefully the Windows situation will improve over time as apps modernize.  I can’t help but think though, with Microsoft having created all new UX paradigm confusion through Windows 7 to 8 to 10 that we may be dealing with a mixed bag for a while.  Anyhow, on to the benchmarks!

BioShock Infinite

BioShock Infinite is continues to be the diametric opposite of Metro.  Where Metro leaves you crying and broken, BioShock leaves you with with your head held high!  Settings were basically 3840 x 2160 at “ultra max”.  Settings detail is included below.  The results were actually quite excellent with the 980Ti able to maintain a solid 68fps across the benchmark.  Not only playable, but above the magic 60 mark!

I captured a video of this one as well using the XBox App DVR.  Note that the video has about a 10fps hit on perf at 4k, so the video is reflecting a final result of 57fps.  Still gives a great idea of how beautiful the game looks in 4k though!

Per Scene Stats:

Scene Duration (seconds)	Average FPS	Min FPS	Max FPS	Scene Name
32.52	62.76	12.86	144.90	Welcome Center
7.09	66.71	37.59	84.01	Scene Change: Disregard Performance In This Section
21.81	66.88	33.24	116.12	Town Center
8.13	68.52	44.26	100.31	Raffle
9.09	84.40	33.62	137.05	Monument Island
3.02	89.74	48.42	116.72	Benchmark Finished: Disregard Performance In This Section
81.66	68.20	12.86	144.90	Overall

Settings Used:

StaticDecals	true
DynamicDecals	true
UnbatchedDecals	true
DynamicShadows	true
DirectionalLightmaps	true
DepthOfField	true
DiffusionDepthOfField	false
Bloom	true
Distortion	true
FilteredDistortion	true
DropParticleDistortion	false
bAllowDownsampledTranslucency	true
bUseMaxQualityMode	false
OnlyStreamInTextures	false
LensFlares	true
OneFrameThreadLag	true
UseVsync	false
VsyncTo60WhenUnder30	false
UpscaleScreenPercentage	true
AllowD3D10	true
AllowD3D11	true
AllowRadialBlur	true
EnableSoftwareOcclusion	false
EnableGPUOcclusionQueries	true
EnableDepthPrePass	false
bAllowWholeSceneDominantShadows	true
bForceCPUAccessToGPUSkinVerts	false
bDisableSkeletalInstanceWeights	false
EnableScreenSpaceAmbientShadows	true
EnableSPUScreenSpaceAmbientShadows	true
UseHighQualityLightShaftRendering	true
EnableSM5ShadowSystem	true
EnableSM5ShadowBlur	true
EnableLightShafts	true
EnableFXAA	true
EnableSM5FXAA	false
EnableHDAO	true
HDAOHighQuality	true
DisableAOFiltering	false
UseLowPrecisionColorBuffer	false
UseHalfResAmbientShadows	false
UseComputeShaderAmbientShadows	true
bInitializeShadersOnDemand	false
bEnableParallelApexClothingFetch	false
SkeletalMeshLODBias	0
ParticleLODBias	0
DetailMode	2
ShadowFilterQualityBias	3
MaxAnisotropy	16
MinShadowResolution	64
MaxShadowResolution	2048
MaxPerObjectShadowResolution	2048
CullCastersSmallerThanTexels	0
ResX	3840
ResY	2160
UnbuiltNumWholeSceneDynamicShadowCascades	3
ShadowFadeResolution	128
LightFadeResolution	0
LightMinResolution	0
GraphicsQualityLevel	5
DisplayMode	1
MaxPrecachePrimitivesPerFrame	50
ApexDestructionMaxChunkIslandCount	2147483647
ApexDestructionMaxShapeCount	2147483647
ApexClothingAvgSimFrequencyWindow	60
ScreenPercentage	100.000
SceneCaptureStreamingMultiplier	1.000
ShadowTexelsPerPixel	1.273
ShadowDepthBias	0.012
ShadowDepthBiasWorstCase	0.003
CSMSplitSoftTransitionDistanceScale	4.000
CSMSplitDepthBiasScale	0.500
UnbuiltWholeSceneDynamicShadowRadius	20000.000
ShadowFadeExponent	0.700
LightFadeExponent	1.000
DecalCullDistanceScale	1.000
SM5ShadowSunWidth	0.100
SM5ShadowSunWidthWorstCase	50.000
NewShadowPenumbra	8.000
NewShadowSplitPenumbraScale	0.500
NewShadowFilterWidth	2.000
ShadowCascadeScale	1.000
NewCSMSoftTransitionDistance	600.000
NewNonCSMSoftTransitionDistance	60.000
MassiveLODDistanceBias	0.100
CullDistanceBias	0.100
StaticMeshLODDistanceBias	0.100
SkeletalMeshLODDistanceBias	0.100
ParticleSystemLODDistanceBias	0.100
DistortionFadeResolution	1.000
DistortionMinResolution	0.000
SM5DiffusionNearBlurScale	0.600
SM5DiffusionFarBlurScale	0.350
OverallTextureStreamingBias	1.500
ParticleCountHardLimitScaleFactor	10.000
MaxDistanceToApplyOcclusionRotationalScaling	5000.000
ApexLODResourceBudget	1000000020040877300000.000
ApexDestructionMaxChunkSeparationLOD	1.000

 

GTA V

GTA V provides a preposterous amount of customization including ATI and NVidia specific coding. It’s enough to be really daunting but the funny part is, most of the settings don’t seem to have massive visible impact (to my eye at least).  This test, like the BioShock test, was “ultra max”.  Or at least as close as I was able to get.  The full settings detail is included below again, but all settings were basically pushed to max except where applicable, with resolution at 3840 x 2160.  Total video RAM consumed was 4190GB, so this pushed above the 4GB mark.   Results were also actually surprisingly good with all but two of the passes averaging 50 or higher and the worst result at just a tick below 40.  More importantly minimums only dipped to a minimum of 13 and generally held above 25fps.  This is actually quite playable, but could be pushed significantly higher without impacting the visuals much (if at all).

Per Scene Stats:

Frames Per Second (Higher is better)	Min	Max	Avg
Pass 0	13.646277	75.104530	50.821064
Pass 1	26.738440	80.633537	39.429516
Pass 2	28.072886	90.179489	53.573467
Pass 3	39.807632	81.359215	57.577740
Pass 4	21.597679	109.402603	48.290871
Time in milliseconds(ms). (Lower is better).	Min	Max	Avg
Pass 0	13.314776	73.280060	19.676880
Pass 1	12.401788	37.399342	25.361712
Pass 2	11.088996	35.621559	18.665956
Pass 3	12.291171	25.120811	17.367823
Pass 4	9.140551	46.301270	20.707848

Frames under 16ms (for 60fps)
Pass 0	4/474 frames (0.84%)
Pass 1	1/367 frames (0.27%)
Pass 2	91/492 frames (18.50%)
Pass 3	133/536 frames (24.81%)
Pass 4	345/5474 frames (6.30%)

Frames under 33ms (for 30fps)
Pass 0	471/474 frames (99.37%)
Pass 1	359/367 frames (97.82%)
Pass 2	491/492 frames (99.80%)
Pass 3	536/536 frames (100.00%)
Pass 4	5462/5474 frames (99.78%)

Percentiles in ms for pass 0

50%	19.00
75%	21.00
80%	21.00
85%	21.00
90%	22.00
91%	22.00
92%	23.00
93%	23.00
94%	23.00
95%	23.00
96%	24.00
97%	24.00
98%	25.00
99%	28.00

Percentiles in ms for pass 1

50%	25.00
75%	27.00
80%	28.00
85%	29.00
90%	29.00
91%	30.00
92%	30.00
93%	30.00
94%	30.00
95%	31.00
96%	31.00
97%	31.00
98%	32.00
99%	35.00

Percentiles in ms for pass 2

50%	18.00
75%	21.00
80%	22.00
85%	23.00
90%	23.00
91%	23.00
92%	24.00
93%	24.00
94%	24.00
95%	25.00
96%	25.00
97%	26.00
98%	26.00
99%	28.00

Percentiles in ms for pass 3

50%	17.00
75%	19.00
80%	19.00
85%	20.00
90%	20.00
91%	20.00
92%	21.00
93%	21.00
94%	21.00
95%	22.00
96%	22.00
97%	22.00
98%	23.00
99%	24.00

Percentiles in ms for pass 4

50%	21.00
75%	23.00
80%	24.00
85%	24.00
90%	25.00
91%	26.00
92%	26.00
93%	26.00
94%	27.00
95%	27.00
96%	27.00
97%	28.00
98%	29.00
99%	30.00

=== SYSTEM ===

Windows 10 Home 64-bit (6.2, Build 9200)

DX Feature Level: 11.0

Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6700HQ CPU @ 2.60GHz (8 CPUs), ~2.6GHz

16384MB RAM

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti, 6342MB, Driver Version 353.84

Graphics Card Vendor Id 0x10de with Device ID 0x17c8

=== SETTINGS ===

Display	3840×2160 (FullScreen) @ 59Hz VSync OFF
Tessellation	3
LodScale	1.000000
PedLodBias	0.200000
VehicleLodBias	0.000000
ShadowQuality	3
ReflectionQuality	3
ReflectionMSAA	8
SSAO	2
AnisotropicFiltering	16
MSAA	0
MSAAFragments	0
MSAAQuality	0
SamplingMode	1
TextureQuality	2
ParticleQuality	2
WaterQuality	2
GrassQuality	3
ShaderQuality	2
Shadow_SoftShadows	5
UltraShadows_Enabled	true
Shadow_ParticleShadows	true
Shadow_Distance	2.000000
Shadow_LongShadows	true
Shadow_SplitZStart	0.930000
Shadow_SplitZEnd	0.890000
Shadow_aircraftExpWeight	0.990000
Shadow_DisableScreenSizeCheck	false
Reflection_MipBlur	true
FXAA_Enabled	true
TXAA_Enabled	false
Lighting_FogVolumes	true
Shader_SSA	true
DX_Version	2
CityDensity	1.000000
PedVarietyMultiplier	1.000000
VehicleVarietyMultiplier	1.000000
PostFX	3
DoF	true
HdStreamingInFlight	true
MaxLodScale	1.000000
MotionBlurStrength	0.000000