Bigfoot Killer E2100 & Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Testing
Bigfoot Killer E2100 & Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Testing
In this section, we are going to found out whether the two key pieces of dedicated gaming hardware that GIGABYTE have outfitted to this motherboard actually improve the overall gaming experience. We are going to do this using both quantitative and qualitative analysis, since ‘gaming feel’ and sound quality aren’t things you can capture and explain with numbers.
Competitors:
- GIGABYTE G1.Assassin: Creative CA20K2 (Audio) | Bigfoot Killer E2100 (LAN)
- ASUS Rampage III Extreme: Realtek ALC889 (Audio) | Intel WG82567V (LAN)
- Sapphire Pure Black X58: Realtek ALC892 (Audio) | Marvell 88E8057 (LAN)
As you can see, all three motherboards feature different audio and LAN chipsets, so this is going to allow us to see what kind of difference there is between the G1.Assassin’s high-end onboard hardware and more common parts.
Bigfoot Killer E2100 Network Testing
- PassMark PerformanceTest 7 x64 - Advanced Network Test
The PassMark Advanced Network Test is designed to test the data transfer rate between two computers both of which must be running PerformanceTest. One of the computers must act as the server and will sit waiting for a connection. The other computer acts as a client. It connects to the server machine and sends data to it for the duration of the test.
TCP is a connection-oriented protocol, which means it is a very reliable means of data transfer. It is used when data integrity is important, errors are corrected using data re-transmission. Your LAN, WAN, WiFi, and internet connection all use TCP/IP. Some games, like World of Warcraft, use it as well.
UDP is a connectionless protocol, which means it is an unreliable means of data transfer. UDP is a simple transmission model that provides no checking of the transferred or received data. This is the protocol that is used for video streaming and by most online games today, since these are applications that are tolerant to data loss such.
Settings:
TCP: Variable Block Size: 20 Bytes to 16384 Bytes – Test Duration: 60 Seconds
UDP: Variable Block Size: 20 Bytes to 1024 Bytes – Test Duration: 60 Seconds
Best of 5
As you can see, the G1.Assassin gets clobbered in this test. We suspect that the Killer E2100 NPU is shaping this non-game traffic in a certain way that is hindering this particular benchmark, at least with our selected settings. However, if we selected a large
fixed block size for both TCP and UDP, in this case 16384 bytes and 1024 bytes respectively,
the results were quite a bit different. The G1.Assassin still lost to the other two motherboards, but it put in a much more respectable showing.
Based on the in-app 'CPU Load' meter, the G1.Assassin also had the highest CPU utilization during this benchmark. However, if our assumption is correct that the NPU is actively managing traffic during this test, a little higher CPU utilization wouldn’t be unexpected, even though the NPU is supposed to be offloading the bulk of the workload from the CPU.
- AIDA32 V3.94.2 - Network Benchmark
The Network Benchmark Plugin for AIDA32 is designed to measure the performance of TCP/IP networks using the classic HTTP protocol in a master-slave architecture between 2 computers.
Best of 4
In this older, but very reliable benchmark, the G1.Assassin puts in a better showing, but still has a average transfer rate that is a solid 10% lower than the competition.
The G1.Assassin tied for lowest CPU utilization with the Pure Black X58, while the Intel-based GbE LAN on the Rampage III Extreme had extremely high CPU utilization.
In this test, we wanted to determine whether the E2100 NPU would provide lower latency to our favourite servers outside of actual game play. We averaged the ping of 40 pre-selected Team Fortress 2 servers, on 3 different occasions per motherboard. This test was done on all 3 motherboards in the span of about one hour, before dawn in order to minimize the effect of congestion. The G1.Assassin ended up having highest average latency results, but really only by a bit. Online testing is a reviewer's nemesis since it's really not a controlled testing environment. Therefore, since the margin is so small and the nature of the test so unpredictable that we can’t really make a judgment one way or another.
Once again, this test was done on all 3 motherboards in the span of about one hour, before dawn in order to minimize the effect of congestion, and all on the same Team Fortress 2 server. We simply ran around with the scoreboard visible for 10 minutes, noted down the ping every 30 seconds, and then averaged the results. Surprisingly, in this actual online game play test we achieve identical pings across all three motherboards.
While this all suggests that the Killer E2100 NPU has no effect, we did some notice some differences that are a little harder to quantify. On the G1.Assassin, we seemed to enter games faster and were more often the first to load a map/round, even when we did not have the lowest ping. Given the fact that all three of our setups had the same configuration, and the fact that we weren’t using a faster disk subsystem than your average joe, this is indeed an advantage that the NPU is responsible for. Is it a big advantage? We supposed that depends on how much of a hardcore gamer you are.
- Left 4 Dead & Team Fortress 2 Benchmarks
Left 4 Dead: Blood Harvest campaign – Chapter 4 & 5 – 4 rounds per motherboard.
Team Fortress 2: Dustbowl map – Soldier class – 10 rounds per motherboard.
FRAPS 3.3.3 was used to record the frame rates.
Reliability and Performance Monitor was used to record the CPU utilization.
First, let us restate that online gaming is a reviewer's nightmare since it's really not a controlled testing environment. There is simply no way to control all the elements and reproduce the same scenes time and time again. Having said that, we are quite confident in our results given our little variance there was between the individual rounds. Much to our surprise, the G1.Assassin did in fact manage to pull a small 3% to 6% victory when it comes to average frame rates in both Left 4 Dead and Team Fortress 2. The GIGABYTE motherboard did seem to take a small hit when it comes to minimum framerate in L4D, but then took a small lead in the minimum framerate in TF2.
When it came to overall CPU utilization, there was effectively no difference between the three motherboards. There might have been expectations of lower utilization given the dedicated gaming hardware that is supposed to offload work from the CPU. However, the G1.Assassin is also doing a lot more gaming-related processing (audio effects, traffic shaping, etc) than the other two motherboards, and none of that is ever really done independently of the CPU. Overall, not too bad when you consider the overall experience on the G1.Assassin motherboard is fair bit better than on the other two thanks to the onboard Creative X-Fi audio.
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Audio Testing
The Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Creative CA20K2 digital audio processor (and accompanying audio subsystem) really is the crown jewel of the G1.Assassin, and as we have alluded to throughout the review, it is pretty awesome. Here is where we show you why.
- RightMark Audio Analyzer (RMAA) 6.2.3
A sample size of 16-bit and sample rate of 44.1 kHz , also known as 'CD Quality', is the accepted norm when it comes to PC audio, it is the Windows default setting after all. However, we wanted to kick things up a notch since more and more records are being offered in a higher resolution 24-bit format, and even Apple is supposedly mulling over introducing 24-bit music files in iTunes. As a result, we selected a sampling mode of 24-bit @ 48 kHz in RMAA in order to see just how well these three onboard audio solutions could handle high quality audio.
Sampling mode: 24-bit, 48 kHz
Interface: MME
Testing chain External loopback (line-out - line-in)
20 Hz - 20 kHz filter: ON
Normalize amplitude: ON
Level change: 0.4 dB / 0.4 dB
Mono mode: OFF
Calibration signal, Hz: 1000
Polarity: correct/correct
As you can see, when it comes to the basic fundamentals of audio performance, the G1.Assassin crushes the competition. The Creative chip achieves significantly better results than the Realtek CODECs in six of the eight tests, and is only slightly let down by its frequency response. For some reason, this alone knocks down its general performance rating to 'very good', while the Realtek ALC889 solution on the Rampage III Extreme gets 'excellent'. Needless to say, we found those overall ratings more than a little out of touch.
Ultimately, this is irrelevant though because audio is one area where quantitative analysis really doesn’t tell much of the story, since sound quality is obviously qualitative and different to everyone. Based on our 40-50 hours of total listening – with a mix of Grado SR225i and well-worn Koss PortaPro headphones, Westone UM1 IEMs, and Logitech Z-5500 5.1 speakers – we can tell you that whether it is for gaming, music, or movies, the G1.Assassin sounds distinctly better than any onboard audio solution or dedicated sound card that we have ever used yet.
Most importantly though, the X-Fi chip is unmatched with regard to in-game audio thanks to EAX 5.0, OpenAL, and the surprisingly good X-Fi CMSS-3D capabilities. Footsteps, ricocheting bullets, and gib hitting the floor were as clear, loud, and directional as we have ever heard. Not only could we better tell what direction enemy gunfire or footsteps was coming from, but we could much better tell how far away those noises were coming from. Just a better soundstage in general, properly three-dimensional for the lack of a better description.
Although Windows Vista SP1 was our principal OS for the majority of benchmarks, we did use Windows 7 (with all the latest updates) when benchmarking AIDA64 and when testing the onboard Bigfoot Killer E2100 LAN and Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi audio.
