AMD Radeon HD 7990 Review: 7990 Gets Official

Hitman: Absolution

The third game in our lineup is Hitman: Absolution. The latest game in Square Enix’s stealth-action series, Hitman: Absolution is a DirectX 11 based title that though a bit heavy on the CPU, can give most GPUs a run for their money. Furthermore it has a built-in benchmark, which gives it a level of standardization that fewer and fewer benchmarks possess.

Looking at our average framerates, we see an interesting pattern with Hitman we don’t see elsewhere. Rather than pulling ahead, the 7990’s lead over the GTX 690 starts eroding as we go up the resolution ladder. Ultimately by the time we hit 5760, the two are virtually tied, and unfortunately neither has passed the 60fps mark.

It’s interesting to note though that at 5760 we’re seeing a very clear case of where the 7990 is trailing the 7970GE CF by more than clockspeeds alone would suggest. If the 7990 was boosting as frequently as the 7970GE CF here, then the two should be separated by no more than 5%; instead we’re looking at a gap of 8%. GPU binning covers a good bit of ground, but under heavy load the 7990 is going to have to pull back on its clockspeeds to stay under 375W.

With our minimum framerates the gap between the two AMD solutions widens considerably, leaving the 7990 behind by 17% at 5760. Hitman’s minimum framerates have proven to be reliable in the past, but still, if this is a case of throttling it looks to be a rather extreme one.