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PCI Express 3.0 vs. 2.0: Is There a Gaming Performance Gain?

We tested the gaming performance comparing the PCI Express 3.0 and PCI Express 2.0 connections for the video card. May it affect the actual performance? Check it out what we found!

Home » PCI Express 3.0 vs. 2.0: Is There a Gaming Performance Gain?

Gaming Performance

Contents

  • 1. Introduction
  • 2. How We Tested
  • 3. 3DMark
  • 4. Gaming Performance
  • 5. Conclusions

Battlefield 4

Battlefield 4 is one of the most popular games of the Battlefield franchise, being released in 2013. It is based on the Frostbite 3 engine, which is DirectX 11. In order to measure performance using this game, we walked our way through the first mission, measuring the number of frames per second (fps) three times using FRAPS. We ran this game at Full HD, setting overall image quality at “high.”
The results below are expressed in fps and they are the mean between the three collected results.
PCI Express 3.0 vs. 2.0

On Battlefield 4, there was no significant performance difference on the three tests.

Dirt Rally

Dirt Rally is an off-road racing game released in April 2015, using Ego engine. To measure performance using this game, we ran the performance test included in the game, in Full HD resolution and image quality configured as “high” and MSAA x2.
The results below are expressed in frames per second (fps).
PCI Express 3.0 vs. 2.0

On the Dirt Rally, the performance with PCI Express 3.0 x16 and PCI Express 2.0 x16 was the same. However, using PCI Express 3.0 x4, the performance dropped by 14%.

Dying Light

Dying Light is an open-world horror game launched in January 2015, using the Chrome Engine 6. We tested the performance at this game with quality options at “high” and Full HD resolution, measuring three times the frame rate using FRAPS.
The results below are expressed in fps and they are the mean between the three collected results.
PCI Express 3.0 vs. 2.0
In this game, the performance with PCI Express 3.0 x16 was 7%  superior to the test with PCI Express 2.0 x16. On the PCI Express 3.0 x4 test, the performance was similar to the PCI Express 2.0 x16.

Grand Theft Auto V

Grand Theft Auto V, or simply GTA V, is an open-world action game released for PCs in April of 2015, using the RAGE engine. In order to measure the performance on this game, we ran the performance test of the game (the part the camera follows the plane), measuring the frame rate with FRAPS. We ran GTA V at Full HD, with image quality set to the maximum in options referring to textures and to the minimum regarding post-processing.

The results below are expressed in frames per second.

PCI Express 3.0 vs. 2.0

On GTA V, there was a performance improvement of 3.6% when we used PCI Express 3.0 x16, compared to the test with PCI Express 2.0 x16. The test with PCI Express 3.0 x4 ran 13% slower than the first test.

Mad Max

Mad Max is an open-world action game launched in September of 2015, using the Avalanche engine. In order to measure the performance using this game, we ran its intro, measuring the frame rate with FRAPS three times. We ran the game at Full HD, with image quality set as “high.”

The results below are expressed in fps and they are the mean between the three collected results.

PCI Express 3.0 vs. 2.0
On Mad Max, the result was the same on the three tests.

Continue: Conclusions

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For Performance

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  • Does dual-channel memory make difference on integrated video performance?
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