Radeon 3850 AGP Plus Single-Core CPU

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Video Decoding Benchmarks

One of the real advantages of upgrading an older system to a newer 3x00 series card is the new Radeon’s superb high definition video acceleration. We know that these cards can lower CPU utilization from 100% to 10% on older, slower CPUs, so HD video playback is an ideal application for someone who wants to get more life out of an older PC, perhaps by converting it into a home theatre box.

With this in mind, we tested 1080p HD-DVD video playback on the AGP Radeon X1950 PRO, and then on the AGP 3850, to see exactly what would happen.

Radeon 3850 AGP

Some very interesting results here! First off, we have to point out that the solid red line at 100% isn’t the top of the graph; it’s CPU utilization with the X1950 PRO. What’s worse, actual playback was in the 1-frame-per-second category on the X1950. Completely unwatchable.

The wavy green line between 90% and 100% CPU utilization is the Radeon 3850. Clearly, while it is offloading a ton of work off of the CPU, there is still a performance limitation here. This is probably a combination of the CPU and the AGP bus slowing down communication between the graphics card and the rest of the system.

Having said that, while the CPU utilization level isn’t pretty, the movie played well enough — it was very watchable, and for the most part appeared perfectly smooth. There was a hiccup at the beginning where it faltered a little, but it recovered, and although we scrutinized the playback for problems afterward, we didn’t notice any.

Clearly, the Radeon 3850 is a viable choice for those who would like to turn their old rigs into home theatre PCs; the only question is whether the AGP 2600 XT would be capable of the same feat for much less cost. We assume it would work, but without an AGP sample of the 2600 XT available for us to test, we can’t be 100% sure.

Don Woligroski
104 Comments Comment from the forums
  • nofxman
    This is the best article I have read lately, I installed AOC on an old desktop with a 2.8 P4 and vanilla 6600 and it ran like crap. I was debating purchasing a 3850 from Newegg until I saw how much the cpu holds it back so I just saved $80 buying a 2600pro instead.
    Reply
  • slapdashzero
    Excellent article. I love these "real world application" reads. I've got a garage full of older single core machines, and now I know that there are still useable things to be done with them.
    Reply
  • xx12amanxx
    Man i remember when my old 3000+ was considered fast..lol. But we already knew an older single core 64 would be a bottleneck.The real question is if a newer dual core will suffice? The computer i built for my mom has the older 3800+ dual in it and i paired it with a 7600gt. It played all games at that time great! She actually still uses it!
    Reply
  • You could overclock the 3850 card by using the bios and over clocking a cpu should of been no problem for you "old pros" I think you are not telling the whole story. AGP is alive and well and is good for most people..
    Reply
  • Preytor
    Nice to see such a great article done on AGP.
    AGP isn't dead yet. I still use a 7600GS 512MB on P4 @ 3.6Ghz, it's just fine for most games, and will play anything with the "right settings".
    Reply
  • Jakt
    Last week, I installed an AGP 2600xt in my Athlon 3000+ htpc, to replace an ATI 9600 AIW card that died. There was a very noticeable improvement in the picture quality on my television (Thanks, Avivo!), but there wasn't a large enough improvement in decoding HD to make it playable. I am still playing with the drivers to see if there is anything I can do to improve it, as theoretically it should be doable. The big problem that I have run into is that ATI has dumped support for this card on the AGP platform. I had specifically chosen ATI because it has superior support for dual monitors on an HTPC setup, but the lack of support is very discouraging.
    Reply
  • cleeve
    anonymous.You could overclock the 3850 card by using the bios and over clocking a cpu should of been no problem for you "old pros" I think you are not telling the whole story. AGP is alive and well and is good for most people.
    What part of the story are we not telling?
    Look at the system specs, we had to use 3 types of old DDR RAM to get to 2GB, some of it was very cheap - not even 400 MHz stuff. It doesn't matter how much of a pro I am, you can't squeeze more performance out by raising the CPU clock and lowering the memory clock into the basement to get it to work.

    I managed to scrounge up some better stuff for part 2, and it looks like we'll be using XP instead of Vista which will open up some videocard overclocking options. So hold on there sport, overclocking is on the way.
    Reply
  • cleeve
    anonymous.You could overclock the 3850 card by using the bios and over clocking a cpu should of been no problem for you "old pros" I think you are not telling the whole story. AGP is alive and well and is good for most people.
    What part of the story are we not telling?
    Look at the system specs, we had to use 3 types of old DDR RAM to get to 2GB, some of it was very cheap - not even 400 MHz stuff. It doesn't matter how much of a pro I am, you can't squeeze more performance out by raising the CPU clock and lowering the memory clock into the basement to get it to work.

    I managed to scrounge up some better stuff for part 2, and it looks like we'll be using XP instead of Vista which will open up some videocard overclocking options. So hold on there sport, overclocking is on the way.
    Reply
  • Great article

    shame that you ran the memory in single channel mode though.

    Reply
  • Mach5Motorsport
    Congrats to Tom's Hardware for again demonstrating that AGP is still a decent interface. I'm sure all the collective PCIe ubergeeks will be again shouting how AGP is dead..... ;) much to their dismay. AGP has now outlived PCIe standard 1.0!
    Reply