expectations from a 7800 gt perspective----x1900xt

[woodwork]

I currently use the 7800 gt. I am considering upgrading to the x1900xt. I am wanting to run everything at full. Currently in fear i get some very low frame rates in places.. Will I be impressed with the x1900xt or am I expecting to much? I am looking for more eye candy and a boost in frames. Will the x1900xt deliver the goods. Will it keep me above 50 fps most of the time? Maybe drop to 40 or so at the lowest?

 

[ZackInTheBox]

i just ordered one and ill be glad to tell you, but what i do know is that it all depends on all your computer specs, and the resolution. they have benchmarks for FEAR on this site with a really nice computer to give you an idea of how yours would compare.

 

[Tyrvidar]

well I will buy your current 7800gt if your decide for the upgrade, 200 bucks!

 

[pauldh]

What resolution do you game at? The X1900XT and XTX currently own fear compared to any other single card.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2679&p=12

In this review, at 1920x1440 with FSAA, the X1900XT more than doubles the FPS of a 7800GTX, never mind the GT. AT a more playable 1600x1200 with FSAA, it's about double. There is no doubt the X1900XT would give you much higher playable settings, but depending on your resolution, it may not be able to keep the framerates as high as you are hoping to see without lowering FSAA. STudy the charts to see how it does with and without FSAA at your resolution.

 

[woodwork]

Well all teh settings are set at max.. I dont think the resolution with go to 1600 on my moinitor.. I believe im playing 1280x960.

 

[woodwork]

Also, is the xtx worth the extra mulla? Or is the xt the better investment?

 

[woodwork]

4000+
1gb mem
a8n sli basic mother

 

[Heyyou27]

Also, is the xtx worth the extra mulla? Or is the xt the better investment?

The XT is a better choice.

firstly prozac26, you must be on more than just prozac to compare a 7800gt which is a midrange card to a x1900. i understand you maybe thought it was a gtx but even then your statement was well off.

Seeing as the G80 and R600 series will be popping up around June and July, I don't think buying an X1900 right now would be the best idea. Yes the X1900 is much faster than the 7800GT, but it won't be worth wasting that 500+ $$ that can be used on a G80 or R600 in July.

 

[cleeve]

I don't know if the difference is worth the cash you'd spend on an upgrade.

You might be better off just overclocking your 7800 GT.

 

[sojrner]

man, i just ordered an x1900xt because i was not going to wait 4 MONTHS! that is what you are asking everyone to do isnt it? If we always did that then we would never get a card at all. With the generations getting shorter and shorter, 4 months seems a long time to wait only to see that in another 3 months after that the next+1 generation will be hitting...

...Just buy what you want when you want it. If I was paranoid about what is around the corner all the time I would never have bought my new system (x2 4200 etc...) That is of course provided that whatever hardware it is doesnt hit in like a week... then it would be prudent to wait and see.

sure, amd has socket m2 and ati/Nv have Gxx/Rxxx but then I have to wait and that means I will always wait... I hate waiting...

 

[Hameedo]

first who says that 7800GT is a med-range card ?
then what do you call 6800 ..or even 6600GT ..low-end ..
and then what do you call an ATI 9600 pro.. beyond low ?

7800GT is listed in high-end cards ...
I can tell you that your card can handle F.E.A.R. very well ..what do you say about 6600GT ..I play F.E.A.R. on it with every thing maxed out except Soft shadows(off) and Volumetric Light density (medium ) AA (off )
I get 25-30 FPS hardly !
so what do you say about your (4-times more powerful than mine ) card ..
X1900 is a very powerful card ..but it's not that "very" ..having only 16 pipelines (which is less than 7800GT ) do not make it that monster ..but it has 48 pixel shaders ..which boost performance ..but also not that much because current games do not have this huge amount of shaders ... I know X1900 is more powerful than 7800GT ...but it doesn't worth the money ..if you could just wait a week for 7900 to come out ..which will blow X1900 away ..by having 32 pipelines ...and an increased number of pixel shader ...that will worth your money and you won"t regret it .

 

[Hameedo]

you called me an idiot to defend your opinion ..and you own an X1900 ...and you say that image quality in X1900 is better than any dozens of pipelines cards ..right ? UNFAIR ...

please see this link ....
http://www.techreport.com/onearticle.x/9324

my point is image quality is the same ...both in Nvidia and ATI ..I just want you to speak with evidences ...pipelines are always an excellent way to increase performance ...perhaps it's not fully used yet ..(just like pixel shaders ) ...but the release of 7900 will show you !

 

[Hameedo]

here is a benchmark that will tell you that the difference between ATI X1900 and 7800GTX 512 ..isn't that much ..due to the unused number of pixel shader in current games (which don not use shaders that much ) .

I would have prefered that X1900 has 48 pipelines instead of pixelshader !

http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2006q1/radeon-x1900/index.x?pg=1

 

[Vokofpolisiekar]

Ooops - soz for the previous post (deleted already). Read like my behind....

I think ATi has the correct usage for their gpu. Why have more pipelines if they are not 100% utilized? Idle pipelines can have a detremental effect in through put. Stick to a number of ppipelines and push it to the max per clock cycle. Look at the difference between the 1800 and 1900 - same except for the pixel processors (and Fetch4), and look how it outperforms the 1800 in pixel intensive games (I'm treating frequency increase as trivial at this stage - although it might have a marginal impact)

 

[sojrner]

I think you fail to realize one of the bigger statements throughout the very review you posted: the r580 is a forward looking chip. this means that most current gen games will not use it to its potential. The original 9700 (r300) was the same way, and did not hit its stride until well more than a year after its introduction. (the 9x00 series STILL performs well in non-sm3.0 games) With ati's record of inovation ahead of Nv I am excited to see how far this x1900 goes! With the xbox360 essentially using similar architecture (general shader procs instead of dedicated...) that will ensure that game devs will code for it IMO.

Hopefully Nv will not go the same rout they did after ati hit with the 9700 (which came out next to the geforce4 and was only marginally better... at first) I love competition, and the geforce5 series was a backward step, so I do hope that Nvs next chip can keep up and not be another 5800... just a thought...

 

[Hameedo]

but when we are going to push the cards to their limits ?
7900 is coming soon ...then a new ATI cards will be released ...then Geforce 8XXX will be released ...games cann't keep up ...

 

[Vokofpolisiekar]

Well, I feel that Nvidia corrected the whole 5xx0 series in leaps and bounds - 6800 and above did quite well in terms of playing games (which is what should matter) - and I'm still open to any of these companies. Like you said, competition is good and we can first hand see the results of the competition - prices were dropped last week and watch tomorrow, the price war will become more fierce the closer the 1900 is to the 7900 (vice versa).

 

[sojrner]

but some cards hold up better over time as games implement more features. That is my point. I have a gut feeling that the x1900 will hold up better than the 7series from Nv. IMHO though, and I could be wrong... but my 9700 has been going strong with only the last year seeing games that make it tank like fear and B&W2. (it rocks on HL2, with HDR and AA enabled at 1280x1024)

If I get even half of that lifespan out of the 1900 it will be better than most GPUs out there.

It is a guessing game, sometimes you lose. So far ati has not lead me astray with their "forward looking".

and i totally agree w/ you Vokofpolisiekar, the 6 series for Nv are great cards, prb better overall than any x800/700/600 from ati... and price wars only make it better for us.

 

[pauldh]

I don't know if the difference is worth the cash you'd spend on an upgrade.

You might be better off just overclocking your 7800 GT.

While I agree it's alot of cash and a 7800GT is good, I can't help buy focus on the game he mentioned...the 7800GT is barely above the 6800U in Fear. And even if overclocked to equal a 7800GTX performance, that's still way below the X1900's in fear. It wasn't worth my extra $250, so I went with a 7800GT. But for someone with the money and a huge high res LCD, the X1900XT would be worth it if Fear is their game.

 

[xXDracoXx]

I have this dilema too for my next build. I don't mind the price difference all that much but how do you think a 7800GT will handle UT2007 at 1280x1024?

I'm trying to make my PC 'future-proof' (if that can be acheived in the computer world...). Dual Core cpu, 2GB of ram. It's really the gpu that's bugging me.

Do any games(or soon releases) actually take advantage of 512MB of VRAM?
It annoys to get a powerful 7800GT with 256MB, knowing that 256MB cards starting coming out 3 years ago. It doesn't feel so 'future-proof'.

 

[bront]

You will always be able to not use some features to make the game work at your requested resolution.

Can you live without AA? I did even when I didn't have to early on in my former card's life.

While it's nice for a game to look pretty, if it can be playable and still plesant, that's what's important. Anything much beyond that is bragging rights.

I went from a Riva TNT, to a Geforce 2 MX, to a Radeon 8500, to my current 7800 GT. When I got the cards, they were all fairly new and near the top of the line if not the top of the line (like the 8500). Now, I'm only an occasional gamer, but I've been able to make due with many games untill just reciently.

The good news? PCI-E should be around for a while, so if you're an upgrade hound, the resale value of your card should be pretty good, and if you're not, there will be an upgrade available to you in the far future that SHOULD be compatable with your current system in most forms. We're around an AGP 4x/8x area of performance (If you've had an AGP 4X slot, you've been able to upgrade pretty far for a long time on the video card end), where the bandwidth far exceded what is actualy being used in most cases (Not including SLI applications)

 

[Comas]

I have this dilema too for my next build. I don't mind the price difference all that much but how do you think a 7800GT will handle UT2007 at 1280x1024?

I'm trying to make my PC 'future-proof' (if that can be acheived in the computer world...). Dual Core cpu, 2GB of ram. It's really the gpu that's bugging me.

Do any games(or soon releases) actually take advantage of 512MB of VRAM?
It annoys to get a powerful 7800GT with 256MB, knowing that 256MB cards starting coming out 3 years ago. It doesn't feel so 'future-proof'.

Well I think that games like Doom3 or games using doom 3 engine could need more than 256mb Vram. Also Prey supports doom 3 engine, which will be future's big hit.

 

[pauldh]

COD2 is the best example of a current game that benefits from 512MB vram.