2560x1600: At 2560x1600, the AMD Radeon HD 6970 dominated the pack, outperforming even that much more expensive NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580. The Radeon HD 6950 easily beat out the GeForce GTX 570, and even the Radeon HD 6870 performed better for us than the GeForce GTX 560 Ti.

1920x1200: At 1920x1200, the AMD Radeon HD 6970 gave us a "best in show" performance, allowing the highest possible in-game settings with 4X MSAA at a nice performance level for a smooth and enjoyable gameplay experience. Even the Radeon HD 6950 allowed the highest in-game settings, but was not powerful enough to give us AA with that. The inexpensive Radeon HD 6870 came close to maximum settings, but fell just short. Interestingly, the $200 video card matched the performance level of the $490 GeForce GTX 580. The GTX 570 came in just a little shy of the performance offered by the GTX 580.

1680x1050: At 1680x1050, the GeForce GTX 580 gave us a good experience, but was still outperformed by the Radeon HD 6970. The GeForce GTX 570 was just shy of allowing maximum in-game settings, but SSAO proved to be too much for it. The Radeon HD 6950 had no problem with SSAO at this resolution. The GeForce GTX 560 Ti struggled to keep up, but was ultimately outmatched by the Radeon HD 6870, which managed maximum settings without AA.

Obviously, performance is seriously degraded on NVIDIA video cards, when compared to AMD video cards. A quick Google search showed us that the problem is widespread, with very little outward activity on it from NVIDIA. This performance issue has been a problem since the Dragon Age 2 demo. Before the retail game was released, NVIDIA released a series of beta drivers, citing improved compatibility with Dragon Age 2. In our investigation, we found that "improved compatibility" does not necessarily mean "improved performance." NVIDIA and BioWare have some work to do to get this game running faster on GeForce video cards.