x1900 vs 7900 (Fanboys welcome <3)

7900GTX or x1900xtx?

  • 7900GTX

    Votes: 49 39.8%
  • x1900xtx (or w/e best 1900 is)

    Votes: 74 60.2%

  • Total voters
    123

ia-Ryu

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Now I'll say this right up front: I'm an "nvidiot". I've never owned a single ATI video card in my life, and up until recently, never planned to.

However, after reading a lot of the benchmarks today, it seems that the 7900GTX hasn't entirely dethroned the 1900. Like stated in some other threads, the newer, shader heavy games show the 1900 coming out on top, where the older games, while extremely close, show the 7900GTX on top.

I have to make a decision on a card soon because my 6600GT is on the fritz, and my in-game FPS has been suffering as of late. I'm willing to spend about $500, maybe a little more.

Does it make sense to wait for these places to get the Superclocked EVGA GTX back in stock, or just pull the trigger on the 1900?

Which 1900 is best?
How well/easily does it Overclock?
Why would I stick with nvidia if the NEW stuff seems to work best with ATI?

The game I play the most is Counter-Strike Source (built on HL2 engine). I don't know why this decision is so hard for me to make, but I'd really like to get a new card soon. At this point, I'm willing to drop my fanboy ranking (sorry guys <3 youuu) to get a great card.

-Ryu
 

Acert93

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As a GF 6800GT owner (but Radeon 9700 before that, a TNT (NV), Riva (NV), and Voodoo2 (3Dfx) before that) I would recommend if you don't need to upgrade now (i.e. no games are demanding you upgrade) I would say wait until fall. The current cards will be a lot cheaper and the DX10 GPU's will be here.

But if you cannot wait, I would suggest the X1900XT.

It leads in a number of modern games (Fear, BF2, CoD2) by significant margins--and for the most part the extra Pixel Shaders are not being utilized to their fullest either so it has HUGE upside. Further, the X1900XT has significantly better Dynamic Branching and Flow Control (300-400% better). So more shader power + better SM3.0 implimentation means in most situations it should perform better in the future. As it stands, with soft shadows enabled in FEAR the X1900XTX has a 60% lead over the 7900GTX @ 1600x1200 (61fps to 38fps). (Note that FEAR is a Nvidia TWIWMTBP partner).

The one caveat would be if you are a big id Software gamer. The 7900GTX does well in Quake 4, and it indicates there is a good chance that the 7900GTX could excell at Prey and Quake Wars: Enemy Territory.

It really is about the games. But if I was going to throw down $500 right now it would be for the X1900XT. It does fine in older games, but it should really strut its stuff in shader heavy games and SM3.0 games. And it has HQ AF and FP blending + MSAA support (not that it has the bandwidth for such...)

As a 6800GT owner I have a very hard time recommending the 7800 or 7900 series over an X1900.
 

cleeve

Illustrious
Hi man,

Well, I've owned both Ati and Nvidia cards (last card was a 6800 Ultra), and I can honestly say they are all great, when it comes down to it you can't go wrong with either as long as you know what you're paying and what you're getting.

So first off, if all you play is CS: Source... do you really need to upgrade? Heck, a 6600 GT or X800 GT should be able to handle that at relatively high resolutions just fine, even with AA & AF.

Wait for a game that comes out that you can't play to your satisfaction on your current hardware... then upgrade after seeing the benchmarks.

But if you want higher res & more AA & AF in CS, and you feel the need to pull the trigger now... well... right now, the future looks like it's heading in the direction of more shaders, and 48 shaders is alot of processing power.

If I had to make the choice between X1900 XTX and 7900 GTX, I think I'd go X1900 XTX. You can't really go wrong with either, but I have a feeling the X1900 will age better.


(On a side note, it looks like Nvidia still hasn't fixed the limitation of no OpenEXR HDR & AA at the same time in the 7900 series... that's a little dissapointing, especially since the 7900's are plenty powerful to do both at the same time if they could)
 

ia-Ryu

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Hi man,

Well, I've owned both Ati and Nvidia cards (last card was a 6800 Ultra), and I can honestly say they are all great, when it comes down to it you can't go wrong with either as long as you know what you're paying and what you're getting.

So first off, if all you play is CS: Source... do you really need to upgrade? Heck, a 6600 GT or X800 GT should be able to handle that at relatively high resolutions just fine, even with AA & AF.

Wait for a game that comes out that you can't play to your satisfaction on your current hardware... then upgrade after seeing the benchmarks.

But if you want higher res & more AA & AF in CS, and you feel the need to pull the trigger now... well... right now, the future looks like it's heading in the direction of more shaders, and 48 shaders is alot of processing power.

If I had to make the choice between X1900 XTX and 7900 GTX, I think I'd go X1900 XTX. You can't really go wrong with either, but I have a feeling the X1900 will age better.


(On a side note, it looks like Nvidia still hasn't fixed the limitation of no OpenEXR HDR & AA at the same time in the 7900 series... that's a little dissapointing, especially since the 7900's are plenty powerful to do both at the same time if they could)
lol Trust me, the 6600GT leaves A LOT to be desired in CS:S. My frames constantly drop below 30 in firefights, and I have all the eyecandy turned WAY down.

Appreciate all the input so far. Anyone have any say on how easily/well the 1900s overclock? I was always a fan of the simple yet satisfying overclocking on the 6600GT.

-Ryu
 

cleeve

Illustrious
One of the advantages of the X1800/X1900 series is that you can control voltage (and even memory timings) in software with Atitool.

The X1800's and X1900's overclock like the dickens.

But the 7900's overclock well too, by the looks of it.
 

Acert93

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one thing HDR and AA, can the new card do that properly yet. nuke and militia are the 2 new maps which utilise(although i dont think as well as DOD) HDR and trust me, its a comp killer. with everything maxed i get 40-50's on militia so i would get the X1900XT cause it can handle the new source engine with the HDR enabled. all the maps which will be released from valve will be HDR enabled so it is a good investment for the future.

Valve's HDR method is shader based and can be done on any GPU; it does not require a GPU capable of MSAA and Floating Point blending capabilities.
 

ia-Ryu

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Oh noez... it looks like I might have been turned to the dark side (or light side, depends on your point of view).

Anyone have any numbers (core/mem) OC'd stable? I'd be interested to see how much extra people are extracting.

-Ryu
 

Heyyou27

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For a single card configuration an X1900 XT would be better than a 7900GTX. A dual card solution is better with 7900GTXs in SLI, as was seen on Tomshardware, anandtech, and hardocp.
 

cleeve

Illustrious
ati's overclocker.exe is a bit buggy though, and relaxes the memory timings so much that 600 mhz memory with Atitool will outperform 700 Mhz memory with Ati's Overclocker.exe

Atitol is the way to go.
 

cleeve

Illustrious
ye i noticed that. it might mean that all them whiners who say that dual gpu aint worth the performance gains will shut up

Everybody knows that dual GPUs perform better. But does that mean the performance increase is worth the $900 for two 7900 GTXs?

Hells, no.
 

ia-Ryu

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ati's overclocker.exe is a bit buggy though, and relaxes the memory timings so much that 600 mhz memory with Atitool will outperform 700 Mhz memory with Ati's Overclocker.exe

Atitol is the way to go.
You seem like a knowledgeable fella... what's your opinion?

You know of any great OC's on the 1900?

-Ryu
 

bourgeoisdude

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I vote NVIDIA and here's why. NVIDIA's latest definately fails to stomp the 1900xtx, they're very close in everything, anyway you slice it. However, the 7900 has so much less heat and power consumption than the x1900 series--it may just be worth it just to save on the electric bill :)
 

ia-Ryu

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Oh man...

Decisions decisions lol.

What's the best 1900? XTX?

Also, I have no clue as to brand of card (ie Nvidia has PNY/EVGA etc.) Appreciate the help!

-Ryu
 

cleeve

Illustrious
Viperjohn got his up to 810 or so, but I think he's watercooling.

On good air cooling, with voltage increased, typically guys will get 700 to 750-ish on the X1900 core, give or take.
 

Acert93

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I vote NVIDIA and here's why. NVIDIA's latest definately fails to stomp the 1900xtx, they're very close in everything, anyway you slice it. The 7900 has so much less heat and power consumption too.

Heat and power consumption are good points if they are important to your particular needs. Every consumer's needs are different and these are two important parts of the equation that definately can turn the tide.

But I do disagree the "very close in everything". I already explained my thoughts on how I look at the benchmarks, but to reitterate there is some serious stomping going on--it ain't close in all areas. We see is the ATI X1900XT(X) in shader heavy tasks and heavy dynamic branching dropping the 7900GTX like a bad habit. 60% performance difference in a shader heavy scenario (like FEAR with soft shadows) ain't close in my book and a 300%+ edge is heavy dynamic branching is going to make a big difference when we start seeing SM3.0 games.

I guess I will need to check back in 9-12 months. I remember how hard it was to explain to people NV30 had poor DX9 performance and people kept pointing to how the FX5800 rocked in DX8(.1) games. The 7900GTX is not a FX-disaster, but in terms of the difference in raw shading performance and in SM3.0 performance we are going to see a significant gap between these two GPUs over the next 12 months.

Not much of a fortune teller seeing as we already are seeing such in some games now. But it ain't may money ;)

But performance is not everything as you noted. Every consumer needs are different.

But my vote was for the X1900. Anyone want to trade an X1900XT for my 6800GT with aftermarket Zalman cooler? It is quiet :D
 

cleeve

Illustrious
I guess I will need to check back in 9-12 months. I remember how hard it was to explain to people NV30 had poor DX9 performance and people kept pointing to how the FX5800 rocked in DX8(.1) games. The 7900GTX is not a FX-disaster, but in terms of the difference in raw shading performance and in SM3.0 performance we are going to see a significant gap between these two GPUs over the next 12 months.

Not much of a fortune teller seeing as we already are seeing such in some games now. But it ain't may money ;)

EXACTLY.

Excellent post, sir.
 

pauldh

Illustrious
I guess I will need to check back in 9-12 months. I remember how hard it was to explain to people NV30 had poor DX9 performance and people kept pointing to how the FX5800 rocked in DX8(.1) games. The 7900GTX is not a FX-disaster, but in terms of the difference in raw shading performance and in SM3.0 performance we are going to see a significant gap between these two GPUs over the next 12 months.

Not much of a fortune teller seeing as we already are seeing such in some games now. But it ain't may money ;)

EXACTLY.

Excellent post, sir.
I agree.


Also, I want IQ and the shimmering issues looked into more. [H] complained about major shimmer issues running driver defaults on the 7900's, and we have all heard of this with past cards at driver defaults. Get rid of the optimizations and the performance lacks. More info and comparisons would be nice.
 

SuperFly03

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I am not going to disagree that the x1900xtx performs better in Sm3.0 games, but didn't we all see this coming with the 7900GTX? It was basicly supposed to be a G70 on 90nm with some optimizations, which is exactly what it is and it does its job well. I would surmise we will see nVidia's G80 really beef up the sm3.0 performance.

As it sits they are both damned fast cards, and if you intend to play fear I would definately say x1900xtx but along with that comes more power consumption and size. Lets not forget how freakishly large the x1900xtx is. the 7900GTX is smaller, cooler, lighter, and fits neatly in a smaller case. As pointed out before in SLI the 7900GTX's are as strong as the x1900xtx in crossfire and in fear it reduces the split to about 18% (ball parking it with mental math hehe) from the single card gap of 60%. Mind you also these %'s are at smaller frame rates so 5% at 30FPS obviously is less of a diffrence than 5% at 100FPS.

In the end: Props for ATI's monster 1 card solution, props to nvidia for the dual card solution and reduced size and power utilization.
 

jeremy_pro

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I guess I will need to check back in 9-12 months. I remember how hard it was to explain to people NV30 had poor DX9 performance and people kept pointing to how the FX5800 rocked in DX8(.1) games. The 7900GTX is not a FX-disaster, but in terms of the difference in raw shading performance and in SM3.0 performance we are going to see a significant gap between these two GPUs over the next 12 months.

Not much of a fortune teller seeing as we already are seeing such in some games now. But it ain't may money

You couldn't have said it better. I'm still waiting but I think ATI will take my money this time.