FiringSquad's Review of the 6800U

TheGreatGrapeApe · Apr 14, 2004

Just more info on top of that already provided by andyddr.

FiringSquad has their review up, and it has the cards run under equal setting to give you an idea of direct comparisons, unlike the [H] review. Alot of pretty impressive results at first blush. The difference at hi res are extremely impressive. And then look at two notoriously poor performers, TombRaider, and Halo. Anywhoooo....

<A HREF="http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/nvidia_geforce_6800_ultra/default.asp" target="_new">http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/nvidia_geforce_6800_ultra/default.asp</A>

Discuss amongst yourselves, I'm going to bed!

- You need a licence to buy a gun, but they'll sell anyone a stamp (or internet account) ! - RED GREEN GA to SK :evil:

Guest · Apr 14, 2004

Yay finally a descent review!
F |_| ck the boston bruins btw!

Asus P4P800DX, P4C 2.6ghz@3.25ghz, 2X512 OCZ PC4000 3-3-3-8, Leadtek FX5900@450/875, 2X30gig Raid0

Guest · Apr 14, 2004

Inetresting the according to them the Ultra should be priced at 499$

Whereas GeForce 6800 Ultra sports 16 pixel pipelines, for GeForce 6800, NVIDIA has reduced that number to 12. This change reduces transistor count (although we weren’t given an exact figure), making the die size smaller and therefore NVIDIA is able to yield more chips per silicon wafer, ensuring lower production costs. NVIDIA has not announced clock speeds on the GeForce 6800, although it’s expected to debut around the same timeframe as GeForce 6800 Ultra, late May.

So much for the lower cloked cheaper sister..

Asus P4P800DX, P4C 2.6ghz@3.25ghz, 2X512 OCZ PC4000 3-3-3-8, Leadtek FX5900@450/875, 2X30gig Raid0

TheRod · Apr 14, 2004

F |_| ck the boston bruins btw!

Are you from Montreal, I am! And the last nigth Montreal Canadiens defeat was very bad, they totally dominated the Bruins! But in Hockey, only the scores count, not the efforts.

--
Would you buy a potato powered chipset?Edited by TheRod on 04/14/04 08:01 AM.

cleeve · Apr 14, 2004

Holy crap... that's pretty damn impressive.

My biggest problems with the NV3x series are 1) the crappy AA, 2) the weak shader strength, and 3) partial precision. the NV40 seems to have delivered on ALL counts, plus a hefty dose of raw speed. And PS 3.0 support to boot!

Now all we need to see is how the r420/r423 fares against it. Even if it matches the nv40 for speed, the shader 3.0 issue may be the deciding issue if developers embrace it quickly. It's funny that the 6800 is in the same position the 9700 was on release; just a little ahead of it's time.

Regardless, the first shots have been fired in this stage of the war of graphics supremacy!

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jclw · Apr 14, 2004

I'm very surprised at the low core clock speed on the nV40. Maybe nV can sort the yeilds out and release a 6850 with a 450+ core. From the rumors spreading about the R420 low-k yeilds, they might need to.

The memory speed is a bit confusing as well. Why are these cards running Samsung 2.0 (500) memory at 550? I'm assuming the retail cards will have real 550 memory. Even that seems low, as Micron is churning out 833 (1666!) GDDRIII.

Apart from that it does look like a very nice card, but I think you'll need a P4EE or FX to fully appreciate it.

*Dual PIII-800 @900 i440BX and Tualeron 1.2 @1.7 i815*

coylter · Apr 14, 2004

wow

Athlon 2700xp+ (oc: 3200xp+ with 200fsb) , Radeon 9800pro (oc: 410/370) , 512mb pc3200 (3-3-3-2), Asus A7N8X-X

kinney · Apr 14, 2004

Holy crap... that's pretty damn impressive.

My biggest problems with the NV3x series are 1) the crappy AA, 2) the weak shader strength, and 3) partial precision. the NV40 seems to have delivered on ALL counts, plus a hefty dose of raw speed. And PS 3.0 support to boot!

My sentiments exactly.

You mention partial precision, now R420 is doomed to using partial precision.. as with DX9C full precision is 32.

I was laughing my ass off @ some tool in the forum in RL when I read he found the improvements "unimpressive".
Talk about bias, or stupidity.

My favorite review is THGs.. has the best information.

I dislike H's choice to use "playable settings".. which I commend them from offering us the playable settings, I dont like the "fudge room" that could introduce because it requires user perception.
I like apples to apples comparisons, then I will personally decide what I think is playable.
You know what I'm saying? I am/never was a huge fan of AA/AF, I prefer to pump the resolution to astronomical proportions, 2048x1536 anyone? :tongue:
Thats just me, but I'm sure most of you agree (referring to apples to apples comparisons).

Besides Toms review, which is obviously getting the site SWAMPED.. I like Anands and Firingsquads.
I have little quarrel with any, even H's... even though I disagree with their "playable settings" choices.. Kyle Bennett is a real knucklehead sometimes.

The thing that is painfully obvious to me cleeve, is that any graphical anomaly that is found to happen on NV hardware will be deemed a "hack" or cheat by all who despise Nvidia and are set on its destruction.
Have their been hacks/cheats? Yes. Are there still? Yes, I'm certain. But ATI has them as well.
Its just not right to place all graphical anomalies on the drivers.
That would be an absolute statement first of all, and an absolute statement on such a subject is undoubtably false.

Anyway, I'm REALLY enjoying this!!!!
I look forward to your response as I value your opinion, you dont have to elaborate just yes or no will work if you are time constrained.

BTW I also replied to your helping me with the 9600 in my thread about my relative.. thanks but he ended up getting the Pro as I recommended to him.. hes very happy!
I have another question that I ask you answer in that thread but he does 3dstudio max or something to that degree, will that card improve his rendering times or is that mainly CPU based?

Thanks again, I'm off to get stuff done!
Today is a very good day and truley a new beginning for Nvidia!

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TheGreatGrapeApe · Apr 15, 2004

You mention partial precision, now R420 is doomed to using partial precision.. as with DX9C full precision is 32.

According to whom? According to most recent reports the R42X series will support full FP32 throughout.

From <A HREF="http://www.digit-life.com/articles2/dx-next/index.html" target="_new">Digit-Life's DX article</A>; "But we are happy with another aspect: that pixel calculation precision in R420 has reached the standard 32 bits."

So show me who's got the reliable info that it is 'doomed'.

Until then it's simply guesswork, just like all the NV40 predictions.

- You need a licence to buy a gun, but they'll sell anyone a stamp (or internet account) ! - RED GREEN GA to SK :evil:

pauldh · Apr 15, 2004

I really wonder what the folks at ATI are feeling now. Is it,
1) crap look what it does to our 9800XT, R420 can't do that.
2) NV did well and we'll have to push this card out and market it the right way as things look fairly equal.
or is it
3) NV40 did well, but not what we expected; we are going to kick their butts again.

I suspect it's closer to number two although not so cut and dry. But I sure hope it's not number one. I'd love to be buzzing around within ATI headquarters today. Calm and excited atmosphere, or shocked and perplexed?

ABIT IS7, P4 2.6C, 512MB Corsair TwinX PC3200LL, Radeon 9800 Pro, Santa Cruz, TruePower 430watt

Vapor · Apr 15, 2004

[H]'s had 1.6ns Samsung. I wonder what happened to the prototypes that used 800MHz GDDRII and GDDR3.

I can't wait for FUGGER to get a hold of one (well, more will likely be needed) of these puppies. Also, I wonder about it's performance on 4x AGP....I might need to fry my new 9800PRO--->XT so that I can get one of these beasts. Meh, I can wait till X800XT comparisions.

Maxtor disgraces the six letters that make Matrox.

kinney · Apr 15, 2004

If it does have full FP32 precision, great! But they still need full VS/PS 3.0 compliance.

BTW, my NV40 predictions that have for the most part turned out correct.. were educated guesstimates to quote the exact method used. :lol:

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kinney · Apr 15, 2004

I think your verbage is not properly put together, instead of

"For once nVidia has finally done something right ever since R300 came out and doomed them."

I think it should read-

For once ATI had finally done something right with the R300 and now their own success has doomed them.

Doomed their own selves by bringing on the fury of the superior GPU engineer Nvidia that is. :lol:

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TheGreatGrapeApe · Apr 15, 2004

VS 3.0 complaince, almost a sure thing, PS 3.0, not likely, but PS 2.X likely.

Reread the article it illuminates alot of the aspects of what will be easily exploitable.

Current 'PS3.0' title would likely play/look the same under both cards as they are for the most part slight tweak add-ons. The games built around PS3.0 complaince will be a completely different story. And I wouldn't be surprised if those types of stresses, effects will only be exposed by demos for the foreseeable.

NV40 predictions have been close to what we all expected, but then again there were a heck of alot more leaks and we were closer to release. Those leaks may yet appear for ATI (and most likely if it benifits their PR designs) but until that happens, there is almost nothing bankable, but names and release dates.

We shall see. Personally, I don't expect many surprises from the R420 either, unless everything said to date was meant to downplay the card, which isn't unheard of for either side. I suspect things will fall along the architecture lines we were thinking of. Performance on the other hand, I couldn't even tell you if I had the final specs in my hand.

I am a little disappointed that the 8x2 12x1 showdown never happened. But the 16x1/32x0 versus pssbily only 16x1 may still be possible. Even 16x1/32x0 vs another 16x1/32x0 could offer some interesting differences in their approach to the same architecture.

Either way this is still an unwritten story, with a very intruiging opening chapter.

EDIT;

For once ATI had finally done something right with the R300 and now their own success has doomed them.

Doomed their own selves by bringing on the fury of the superior GPU engineer Nvidia that is.

Doomed are those who think they know for sure what the future brings; as are those who fail to learn from their history.

The only company I see doomed at this very moment is XGI!

I'll wait until all the cards are played before planning anyone's wake though.

- You need a licence to buy a gun, but they'll sell anyone a stamp (or internet account) ! - RED GREEN GA to SK :evil:

Edited by TheGreatGrapeApe on 04/14/04 07:02 PM.

kinney · Apr 15, 2004

VS 3.0 complaince, almost a sure thing, PS 3.0, not likely, but PS 2.X likely.

Thanks for that info.

Current 'PS3.0' title would likely play/look the same under both cards as they are for the most part slight tweak add-ons. The games built around PS3.0 complaince will be a completely different story.

"Patching in" PS3.0 should increase performance for the NV40 based stuff as well.

NV40 predictions have been close to what we all expected

You honestly dont think it was more than expected?
I sure was shocked.. I was actually kind of prepared for a bit of a let down prior to about the last week when I got confirmation of a 16x1 architechure, among other things.
I was beyond shock to find out about the AA/AF quality, I find it a bit better than ATIs personally. Certainly at least, most would agree they are about equal in comparison.
I figured NV would stay in 2nd place in AA/AF for sure.

I'll wait until all the cards are played before planning anyone's wake though.

Just another one of my guesstimates! :tongue:
No.. like I said to Paul I do hope for ATIs competitiveness for the good of the market.
As I said to Paul, who now says competitive capitalism doesnt work??

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Slava · Apr 15, 2004

============
I think it should read-

For once ATI had finally done something right with the R300 and now their own success has doomed them.
============

ROFL

) Yeah, this sounds about right

Stingy people end up paying double. One kick-ass rig that will go strong for three years or one half-good one every year?

kinney · Apr 15, 2004

Stingy people end up paying double. One kick-ass rig that will go strong for three years or one half-good one every year

Yep! Thats why I think the time to upgrade is now, and the 6800 Ultra is probably going to be one of those "big leaps" like the R300 was, hence a great time to buy!
Should last quite some time.

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jclw · Apr 15, 2004

I noticed a few more sites got some faster memory as well.

ATi is rumored to be snatching up all the 800 and 833 GDDR3 that Micron can make, so that might prove interesting in a couple of weeks.

*Dual PIII-800 @900 i440BX and Tualeron 1.2 @1.7 i815*

Slava · Apr 15, 2004

============
Yep! Thats why I think the time to upgrade is now, and the 6800 Ultra is probably going to be one of those "big leaps"...
============

Yeah. I usually build me a "supercomputer" and never upgrade it incrementally. When it starts struggling and o/cing does not help anymore I just build a new one sparing no expense. Usually, useful life of a well-balanced system where all components are made to complement each other is at least 2 years.

THIS year I made a mistake however. I figured I would inject another 8-12 months into my PC and wait for products that fully comply with PCIE instead of migrating to AGP8x right now just to drool over PCIE in six months.

So I bought a few mid-range components. I now see very clearly that half-measures are a waste of money. I am out of $700 while it does look like once 6800 ships I will need new everything - mobo, case+psu, ram, p4ee CPU (cuz EVEN p4ee is a bottleneck in a 6800 system... mmm ... to make a really good system around 6800 what do you need ideally? mmm? ... quadruple Xeons ??).

Anyhow, shoulda waited till June ... just buid me an absolute top-of-the line machine and forget about it for the next 2-3 years...

Stingy people end up paying double. One kick-ass rig that will go strong for three years or one half-good one every year?

TheGreatGrapeApe · Apr 15, 2004

You honestly dont think it was more than expected?

REALLY, BOTH will be FAR LESS than I expected.

Is the architrcture and pipeline numbers more than I expected? Yes, but remember that people like XbitLabs broke that 'rumour' over a month ago. However, the performance, is below my expectations.

Since they skipped a generation I epxected alot more than this. Don't get me wrong, it's impressive, but I did expect alot more.

Heck the ORIGINAL R400 was to be 2X the R9700, and now the R420 and NV$) are going to be that power level. Jeez! A long wait for what we were expecting performance wise for the fall.

Maybe I'm just cynical.

As for AA/AF quality. The AF is definitely better, definitely.
The AA like I mentioned yesterday is not so clear, but all the screenies so far suck. I have BIG monitors, and all the screenies are of too low a quality. From what limited stuff I saw the actually screenies of games look better on the FX5950 to me. 3Dcenter did show promise, but also weakness. The thing is I want to reserve even criticism until the next drivers are out. Right now the AF impresses me, the AA not so much (other than performance with it enabled)

As I said to Paul, who now says competitive capitalism doesnt work??

[yakov smirnoff voice, or just a glug of smirnoff]In Soviet Russia Internet Searches YOU![/smirnoff]

- You need a licence to buy a gun, but they'll sell anyone a stamp (or internet account) ! - RED GREEN GA to SK :evil:

kinney · Apr 15, 2004

Heck the ORIGINAL R400 was to be 2X the R9700, and now the R420 and NV$) are going to be that power level. Jeez! A long wait for what we were expecting performance wise for the fall.

Well, I suppose that this card actually lived up to the expectations NV had pumped it up to have.. including their hotshot CEOs claims.

I didnt think that was going to become the truth, but it did and that is why it was beyond my expectations.

I dont know much about previous claims.. I just based my assumptions off of the prelaunch NV40 propaganda.
They didnt sound modest this time, but actually were quite so.

Kinda makes it that much more impacting for me at least.
Contrary to last time, which sucked.
Besides the 5900XT I've fully gave up on the NV30 era.
Hence me telling my cousin to get a 9600 Pro (the best low end video card available).

The thing is I want to reserve even criticism until the next drivers are out

Aye. But I doubt it will improve.. who knows. Like I stated earlier, my conclusion is nearly identical to Anands.. things currently are great for NV as long as they dont f' it up.
Pllllleeeeaaaazzezeeeeeeee dont NV!
I just started sacrificing goats to you again!

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kinney · Apr 15, 2004

I am waiting till either Intel or AMD gets PCIE mobos out, and for the 6800Ultra PCIE version.. hopefully that will be June (my birthday month hehe).

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FiringSquad's Review of the 6800U

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