AMD Radeon HD 2900XT Review

go for it ekhaat judging by the kuk ati has released it wont get better than nvidia

im not sure how shock managed 22k on 3dmark05 but then again its sythetic and judging from what ive seen all 3dmark's are not a good choice in testing

gaming benchmarks FTW
 
Why would nvidia go with AMD here? I like Nvida heaps but despise AMD. So by buying the 8800gts would it somehow minimize my performance? Im looking at the Nvidia MOB chipset as well.

ANy ideas.
 
Nvidia with AMD? I don't think I understand your post, but ATI and AMD are the same company now.

lol killa, I always hate having to skip past the 3D Mark benchmarks in any review. It might be useful comparatively with your own system...

It all depends on ATI's pricing, and what they can get done with their Vista drivers before they release the new cards. The actual (mid range) cards look better on paper..
 
Hey hold on a little. Please I implore you to not get ahead of yourselves...
Oh n Froggytwo don't ever call me a fanboi this is my 1st ATI card since a Radeon9200SE I had for backup and a Radeon 9700 I had in 2003 for a whole 4 days...
There's no Nvidia gfx card I haven't owned from NV1 to NV50 right now (used three in two different computers up until now, where one PC has GTS the other the AMD card)

I stood alone with a few others defending NV30 when others called the R300 the card to lay waste to Nvidia for good. I even left Rage3D when the Nvidia bashing didn't stop for months on end. My support wasn't a mouth piece either, I went on to post 17K in 3DM2K1 and 47K in AM3 with the NV36 out doing the Radeon 9600. I had 2nd fastest NV36 core in the world only being beaten by Coolaler as he was at 24K with a much stronger CPU cooled far better than I could ever afford.

Don't ever call me a Fanboi, I'm a fan of technology 1st then a specific IHV later. I'm about numbers and objectivity not mindless picking of sides...
Find any top overlocker (even 1) here in this country who will agree with you that I'm a fanboi of ATI...

Don't take a chance you don't know me and I don't know you. So lets rather stick to what we know and the name calling out...
Bring the numbers and lets debate the card not me....
========================================================

As for HD 2900XT the drivers used by all review sites are old simply because these are drivers that were made available to everyone with the card. 8.37/8.38
I'll put it in context for you when the Nvidia driver first came out, it was rel 96.xx using those drivers the HD2900XT would come ahead of the 8800GTS by a large margin. from rel 96 we're at rel 160 now with nvidia cards. It's been 6months and a bit (full product cycle for GPUs was 6 months) for the forceware team to get the drivers right and they're still learning to optimize the ASIC.

Why 3DMark is so important is because it tries to looks ahead of the current gaming trends at what might be needed in the future. Games are concerned with selling as much as they can while that isn't the case with 3DM.

Having had an 8800 in late October/early November I know exactly the issues that existed with the nvidia drivers so much so to the point where NVIDIA had a feedback program on their site to fix the mess the drivers were at one point. This is not fiction, it happened a few months ago.

Now you want to bash the HD2900XT based on a first release driver? come on, get real. Drivers are the corner stone of a gfx card. What do you think helped the NV3X series survive through the storm that was the R300? Drivers that's it. Forceware drivers came into existence because they made such a huge difference on the NV3X cores and made them remotely competitive with the ATI parts. The whole 3DMark03 hoopla with Nvidia pulling out of BDP and the subsequent patch that disabled nvidia's optimizations. Nvidia cheated in the 1st place because 3DM03 was that important to them and even after the significant amount of time and money spent on the Foreware drivers they could not match the ATI parts...

performance/mm the HD2900 is better. performance/$ the HD2900XT is better. I use synthetic tests only because they tend top stay consistent with each driver release on the same platform...
AA is broken in the driver not on the card. AA on the HD is far more flexible as it's programmable while it isn't on nvidia parts.

Wait for drivers to come. You didn't have to do this with the GF8 cause there was no other card and even so there were still many complaints...
Do not be quick to draw conclusions without looking at the whole story.
 
ShockG said:
Having had an 8800 in late October/early November I know exactly the issues that existed with the nvidia drivers so much so to the point where NVIDIA had a feedback program on their site to fix the mess the drivers were at one point. This is not fiction, it happened a few months ago.
Click to expand...

It's not fiction at all, the feedback program is still on the site for Vista drivers.

It is a bit irritating though... if I have to wait a month for the HD 2600's to come out, then the drivers might still not be showing a fair comparison with Nvidia's newest drivers by then.

I guess I could at least base my choice on the recommended Dollar price. If the 2600Pro is much more than the 8600GT then I wouldn't be able to afford it anyway... but they should actually be priced very similarly.
 
All I ask is that we look at the results objectively. The R600 in the HD2900XT was never meant to beat the 8800GTX, it was meant to beat the 8800GTS 640MB which it does and as drivers get better the lead will increase.
Saem with the HD2400/2600 series. By the time those two come out the drivers will be a little better and you'll see that their superior to the 8600.

AMD was targeting $399 and for $399 we are getting allot more than NVIDIA has ever given us.

Nvidia castrated the GTS and only in the 8900GTS will they bring it up to the rightful 128-streams. AMD on the other hand is giving us the full 64 5-way shaders that will be on the XTX as well. Nvidia did it again with 8600 and 8500. Mid-range is supposed to be half high end (that is at least 48 streams if working of the 8800GTS) but they have cheated us with a higher than $199 MSRP and only given us 32 streams and a 128-bit card.

Only now do I realize how cheated we actually were by NVIDIA with the 8800GTS 640MB.
 
hmmm, the more i look at the different benches the more excited i get about this card. for the recommended price, it looks like its gonna knock the socks off the GTS 640MB counterpart. at least in the sense of value for money, included sound capabilities and bundle. and lest we forget the drivers, as mentioned many times already.

i'm getting one with my next paycheck... uhhh if i can find one that is
 
No not really. There are 5 SPU's in each shader hence its referred to as a vec5 shader. It's actually 24 shaders (24x5 = 120)
They are not the same streams per se as in the G80. On R600 the 5 SPU's make up one ALU (albeit very advanced ALU )while on G80 each stream processor is a full MIMD ALU with co-issue.

A bit more involved than that but really interesting question well worth investigation :D
 
http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/05/14/r600_finally_dx10_hardware_from_ati/

been waiting for this one...

"Overall, HD2900XT is more forward looking than GeForce 8800 and it should be; it took an extra six months getting it to market. If you are leaning towards longevity of a card, R600 looks more attractive with a dedicated tessellator, programmable filters, high-clock speeds and crazy amounts of bandwidth. It is a hot and a little loud. It is hot enough that a warning label might soon accompany cards and systems. We can only hope that it will become more cool and quiet as more cards hit the market."
 
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Shank said:
Why would nvidia go with AMD here? I like Nvida heaps but despise AMD. So by buying the 8800gts would it somehow minimize my performance? Im looking at the Nvidia MOB chipset as well.

ANy ideas.
Click to expand...

Dont despise the AMD, they are the underdog. While Intel would have been like Telkom if they didn't have the competition from AMD....
 
All I ask is that we look at the results objectively. The R600 in the HD2900XT was never meant to beat the 8800GTX, it was meant to beat the 8800GTS 640MB which it does and as drivers get better the lead will increase.

it does not beat the 8800gts is most tests, in most tests it gets beaten by the 8800gts 320, plz stop making statements when we have seen the tests

this card does not beat anything but the 7xxx series and lowly 8600's

most ppl doubt the drivers will make it better

right now that card is behind the 8800gts 320 meg

kuk card simple as that

the more AA the worse it gets so right now this card does not do its intended job, i dont care that the drivers are a problem, why release a card without working drivers? has ati lost the plot

they have taken so long to release it and it still does not work

if you have a big expensive card you'll be running most games at the moment with 16x AA 16 x AF and super sampling, this card will simply crumble with those settings
 
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killadoob said:
it does not beat the 8800gts is most tests, in most tests it gets beaten by the 8800gts 320, plz stop making statements when we have seen the tests

this card does not beat anything but the 7xxx series and lowly 8600's

most ppl doubt the drivers will make it better

right now that card is behind the 8800gts 320 meg

kuk card simple as that

the more AA the worse it gets so right now this card does not do its intended job, i dont care that the drivers are a problem, why release a card without working drivers? has ati lost the plot

they have taken so long to release it and it still does not work

if you have a big expensive card you'll be running most games at the moment with 16x AA 16 x AF and super sampling, this card will simply crumble with those settings
Click to expand...
i don't know what benchmarks you were looking at, but so far most of the benches the 2900 beats the GTS 640MB. if it doesn't beat the 640 at low res, it invariably beats it at high res. which is more important? low res or high res capability?

according to Toms, the 2900 trumps GTS in:
3dmark 2005
doom3 (beats at high res)
FEAR (beats at high res, and with AA and AF turned off it beats it hands down)
Oblivion Outdoors
Oblivion Indoors (beats at high res)

...as for the bolded quote above, you not caring about the driver issue doesnt mean that it wont be fixed. didnt something similar happen to nvidia when they launched the 8800 series?
http://forums.legitreviews.com/about8264.html

hehehehe, killa, if you can be changed from an AMD fanboi to an INTEL fanboi, you might yet get swayed to the Red Side.
 
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i was changed purely by performance which was obvious that core 2 took amd and beat the shyte outta even its flagship product :)
this card however not in the same league

eye suc i try and buy the best and ati is not the best

nvidia only problems with vista drivers xp driver where perfect

shock i know dx 10 cards should only be run in windows vista but i run mine in windows xp like alot of ppl and it works really well considering windows xp is dx 9

http://vr-zone.com/?i=4946&s=12

look at the bottom one, when running 2142 with 16 af and 16 aa is has 18 frames per second yes you heard it 18 frames

never winter nights it gets owned

half life 2 owned

basically if you buy this card you need to play only certain games for it to work well other games it will run shockingly when the AA and AF is high

have a look at that page eye and you tell me this card is a good buy over a 8800gts 320

2142 owned
hl 2 owned
nwn owned
 
killadoob said:
2142 owned
hl 2 owned
nwn owned
Click to expand...
2142 : should be fixed by drivers
HL2 : same as above
NWN2 : crap game, struggles on the best of systems, the developers should be shot and made into boerewors

they might not be the best, but at least they are the competition to the great big green monster that is nvidia. the card isn't kuk like you say, it just isnt the best on the market. if you wanted the best then you would have a 8800GTX, but that is ridiculously priced.

this new card from ATI offers more than the GTS, at least on the surface, we have yet to see VISTA performance. can your GTS do sound output as well VIA HDMI? uhhhh, mebe later

killa, you have voiced your opinion based on looking at half of the benchmarks, and not reading any of the technical specs :) read that toms review from start to finish and tell me you are not excited about the future of gaming :P its not about who has the biggest weiner, its about whos weiner looks the smoothest and has the best bump mapping and pixel shaded hair follicles :D
 
ShockG said:
No not really. There are 5 SPU's in each shader hence its referred to as a vec5 shader. It's actually 24 shaders (24x5 = 120)
They are not the same streams per se as in the G80. On R600 the 5 SPU's make up one ALU (albeit very advanced ALU )while on G80 each stream processor is a full MIMD ALU with co-issue.

A bit more involved than that but really interesting question well worth investigation :D
Click to expand...

Thanks. Generally the shaders are usually better (and it looks like it from the 2900 benchmarks) on ATI cards. Do you think the 2600 Pro would perform better here than the 8600GT, even though it actually has a few less real shaders?

ATI seem to think their new 5 SPU model is much more advanced than the Nvidia method from what I could see on those leaked papers.
 
well from what ive seen ati are far behind and need to do something better than this

if there selling point is sound via hdmi then the big green machine will keep on racking in the clients and profit because gaming is about performance and not sound via hdmi, a nice touch i will admit but i dont think ppl are going to fall over to get this card

will be interesting to see the price because if this card is more than 3k in this country its doomed

if its over 4k anyone who buys it will be silly :)
 
killadoob said:
lots of amd/ati fan boi's will soon be nvidia fan boi's

if anything this will damage ati beyond repair but we will see
Click to expand...

What would you suggest they do? Suck one out of their thumb? Sometimes you don't have the product at the right time. There is nothing they can do about that other then release it when it is ready at the right price point. Although everyone wows about the top end card, its the entry to mid range and integrated where the majority of product is sold (and money is made). How may people care about a R10K card that they can't afford in any case? If anything, the 2400 and 2600 are looking extremely attractive at their relevent price points (< $99 and $99 - $199). The majority of people just want a graphics card that does not break the bank, supports DX9 (DX10 now) and will play most games at 1024 x 768. They don't care if the damn thing does 189 frames per second at that speed. Just that it works.
 
Just got pricing in GeCUBE Radeon HD2900XT - Available Now @ R3,595 excl. vat to resellers
 
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abe your missing the whole point man

you can get a 8800gts 320 meg version which is on par with it for a cheaper price

so they are releasing a card that cannot compete with nvidia semi mid range cards, suck on out of their thumbs you say, maybe they should just create one in their huge factory with their thousands of workers

the 2600 and lower have not been release hence why no one is talking about them, we are debating the 2900xt which is not very good and in my opinion does a piss poor job at competing with 8800gts 320/640 versions

99 dolla can get a 8500gt which has been out for awhile now

you would think trying to get market share by offering inferior products would be bad business but i guess you just release your product no matter if it can compete or not
 
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