Interesting read UT3 and 2900xt..Getting better?

already posted :
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/foru [...] ming-explo

Should have said, "$500 card outperforms a $300 card".

In Vista DX10 8800 series is all over 2900.

With price tags of $550 and $725 respectively, the Geforce 8800 GTX and Ultra are anything but cheap. That's a lot of money to invest into 3D gaming. Under DirectX 10, these graphics processors really fly. While their performance lead over the Radeon 2900 XT and the Geforce 8800 GTS was not as pronounced under Windows XP/DirectX 9, they offer between 50 and 100 percent more performance than these cards under Vista/DirectX 10.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/1 [...] age10.html

Installed 2900 Pro last wek. Ran one day. In a word, I was dissappointed. Realized it will take a while for drivers to mature and have a card able to run at it's full potential. I'm sure the 2900Pro is a nice card, but I returned it for a 8800GTS 640 OC. Very happy with my decision. Paid less for the 8800.

Actually 389.99 card outperforms a 329.99 card by a margin larger than it's price difference.

Performance differences @ 19x12 +32.5% & +24.6% & +33.5% , yet the price difference is only +18.2%

But anywhoo, still a bit short of the GTX for performance, but the price/performance relationship there is pretty good, since the GTX would be the true $500 card @ 469.99 AFR.

So according to those benchies, the best buys seem to be the GTS-320 and the XT-512, with the GTS-640, XT-1GB, GTX and Ultra all returning less favourable price/performance numbers (if we consider the XT-512 and XT-1GB as near equals since they mention only the XT being direct competition of the GTSs, but don't llist the model in the index).

What I do find funny is that most of us thought that Crysis would be an ATi-favourbale title, and UT3 an nV favourable title, but it doesn't look as clear cut a victory as most of us thought it would be.

Probably helps that I have NewEgg in my favourites.

This is Direct X9.

Yep, I would love to see an X1800 in the benchies though too, to get an idea as to whether the unbalanced shader ratio helped as much as people had predicted, and once again like Oblivion it may be paying off finaly.

I'm just happy the HD2600 is 'acceptably good' since really UT3 is a bit more important to me that Crysis, although I'm sure I'll play Crysis end-end, probably replay UT3 more with my UT2K4 friends.

I can't wait for the DX10 benchies, but I have a strong feeling I'll be playing in DX9 mode anyways (especially since my friends have X1600s and GF6s not GF8s and HD cards) so I don't know if DX10 results are important to me personally, but they should offer additional insight into the architectures which still offer surprises. Also I want to see the whole 320MB vs 640MB thing since so many people talked about Mark Rein's textures comments being a justification for 640MB and that the 320MB would be useless. I know you're likely more than a little interested in that subject too.

I too was wondering how the X1800XT would stack up. I was wishing I didn't seel mine just for testing. I know it was a nice card, it was really NFS: carbon that opened my eyes to what the 3:1 shader difference could do. X1950 pro shined way above the X1800XT and 7950GT in that game.
http://www.elitebastards.com/cms/i [...] mitstart=3

I've been quite happy with how my FX-55/8800GTS is doing in the UT3 demo. Looks by anands testing like I'll want to stick a dual core in though. Of course, the demo does lack the highest settings. I've put a few hours into offline UT3 so far and while I am not overly impressed by the graphics, I like the game quite a bit. I'll buy it for sure.

I just talked a friend of mine into a 2600XT as he wanted the black box or orange box anyway so it was a bargain for him to have that bundled with the card. He has never used fsaa anyway and it's looking like the 2600XT could keep him happy for a while at a cheap price. $100-130 with the black box is not bad at all for those who would buy the game anyway. Shoot, if I didn't have the orange box I would have bought a 2600XT now for a spare machine. Anyway, for his sake I'm happy to see the 2600's do good in UT3 too.

Ouch, looks like my days of high-settings gaming are over for my 7900GS, luckily most of those tests are at higher settings and res then I would normally use, and my 7900GS is pretty well overclocked(planning to do voltmod soon to push it higher!)

I was considering upgrading my card by the year's end, and depending on how ATI can stay for Price/Performance the HD 2900s are looking a bit more reasonable of a choice then earlier in the year.

You know what, I actual enjoyed Portal alot, am going though EP2 now and haven't really touched TF2 just yet. (was spectator in one game). But when some buddies get the game it will be all about TF2. But I know what you mean, there are so many good demos and games right now and too little time to play.

I don't have bioshock but the demo was fun and looked great. Enjoy.

Episode 2 seemed about twice as long as Episode 1. I thought it was pretty good, and had a lot of fun playing it. The graphics also seemed to be updated quite a bit. I think I put 7-8 hours into it before I beat it. I also thought Portal was a lot of fun too. Gaining momentum through the portals was a real blast. TF 2, I don't really like it, there's no submachine gun...

BTW, 8800 GTS 320 are under $300 on newegg. I got a Superclocked EVGA a couple weeks ago. Honestly, I think they are both bad deals atm. The new cards seem like they are going to be much better deals, I couldn't wait though.

I replaced my 7900gtx in SLI for a HD2900Pro.I oc'ed it from stock to 740/900 which is rock stable.Thats HD2900XT specs.So far every thing I have tested (Timeshift,Quakewars,etc)showing me this card is serious at res 1920/1200.Will down this game to see.For the $286 and chnge I paid for it ,its a steal