Another ATI vs. Nvidia thread -- x800xt/XL or 6800GT?

T

tim-x

Limp Gawd
Joined
Apr 16, 2004
Messages
297
Hey All
I've come across a dilemma. I can buy either at the same price right now with warranty etc. I was wondering what your thoughts are on either of these cards? Basically I'm asking your advice on which one to get.
I'm a noob.
My system right now is in my sig!
 
How much are you getting them for? I usually don't recommend the 6800GT or X800XL because a 6800GS is much cheaper and doesn't perform significantly worse at all.
 
The 680GS is a PCI-E part for now, and his machine is still AGP.

To tide me over until I can afford a high end GPU, I bought a PCI-E ($250) x800XL. It does not offer the same performance that my AGP 6800GT did. The x800XT would have, but it still is pretty expensive and is around the same price the x1800XL and 7800GT. AGP cards are pretty expensive compared to PCI-E equivs.

You don't make out a distinction between the x800's. Is it either the x800XL or the XT? They're not the same card - the XL has slower core and memory speeds, but both (all 3 actually) have 16 pixel pipelines.
 
well I live in Canada and up here in the cold Canadian winter, things can be expensive. I was going to buy either the x800xt or 6800gt for roughly $300 CDN. The x800xl is slightly cheaper and I heard that it can perform almost exactly to the x800xt pe. But again.... i'm pretty noobish and know nothing of the sorts.
sadface
 
tim-x said:
well I live in Canada and up here in the cold Canadian winter, things can be expensive. I was going to buy either the x800xt or 6800gt for roughly $300 CDN. The x800xl is slightly cheaper and I heard that it can perform almost exactly to the x800xt pe. But again.... i'm pretty noobish and know nothing of the sorts.
sadface
Click to expand...

My x800XL feels worse than my 6800GT did. I mean, when I got my 6800GT, I could play everything! The experience was great and it really felt as if the card was really worth it. I hadn't felt like that since I added a second Voodoo 2 to my rig in 1999 or 2000. So, when I had a problem and moved to socket 939 and PCI-Express, I picked up an x800XL because it was cheap, and supposedly near 6800GT levels. It is not, it feel much slower and mine does not want to overclock at all. I'm using the stock passive heatpipe with a Panaflo L1 blowing on it from my side panel and it still artifacts and locks when I overclock even a little bit.

The x800XT is a tad faster than the 6800GT, and if the price was rignt, I would have gotten myself one, but the price was not right and I could not exactly afford another 6800GT.

For the same price, take the 6800GT or the x800XT.
 
Hey
Thanks for all your input. I do have another question though :p I've heard a little about "future-proofing" and that nvidia cards are the way to go. Canadian trading posts are littered with x850s and x800xt pes and 6800gts and the nvidia cards seem to be a little more expensive. I don't REALLY care about the price difference, I just want the one that's going to perform best with my system. Any thoughts? :D
 
tim-x said:
Hey
Thanks for all your input. I do have another question though :p I've heard a little about "future-proofing" and that nvidia cards are the way to go. Canadian trading posts are littered with x850s and x800xt pes and 6800gts and the nvidia cards seem to be a little more expensive. I don't REALLY care about the price difference, I just want the one that's going to perform best with my system. Any thoughts? :D
Click to expand...

I'd save your money and get a PCI-E setup. AGP is a dead technology and getting PCI-E will allow you to upgrade again in the future, plus you can get a Connect3D X800GTO and unlock it to 16 pipes, overclock and get performance that rivals the X800XTPE for $160. Best bang-for-buck in a video card.

-fro
 
It depends on how much an x800 GTO is in Canada, and if you can get one and want to take the risk. Not all cards will overclock to higher speeds and not all will be able to unlock the extra pipelines. What happens if you get a card that won't do either?

For future proofing, it depends on how often you plan to upgrade. If you want something to last as long as humanly possibly, take the x800XT (even the x850XT series would be good/better) or the 6800GT. The GT has a slightly more future proofed feature set with pixel shader 3.0. The card is not as fast as an x850XT though. Maybe check which games use 3.0 and compare them to what you're interested in?

PCI-Express is what all the cards from now will be, but if you can't afford a new CPU?mobo etc, there's no reason to wait unless you want to jump onto the PCI-Express bandwagon. At this point in time, most PCI-E cards do not offer any speed increases over AGP.

Also, maybe scour [H]ard OCP's main page for reviews on the x800/x850 series and the 6800GT's. That will help considerably.

Here's a few reviews:

x850XT compared to 6800Ultra and GT: http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NzI2
 
Pooky said:
My x800XL feels worse than my 6800GT did. I mean, when I got my 6800GT, I could play everything! The experience was great and it really felt as if the card was really worth it. I hadn't felt like that since I added a second Voodoo 2 to my rig in 1999 or 2000. So, when I had a problem and moved to socket 939 and PCI-Express, I picked up an x800XL because it was cheap, and supposedly near 6800GT levels. It is not, it feel much slower and mine does not want to overclock at all. I'm using the stock passive heatpipe with a Panaflo L1 blowing on it from my side panel and it still artifacts and locks when I overclock even a little bit.
Click to expand...

See, my experience was the exact opposite.

I'm back on nVidia now (7800GT), but I felt let down by the 6800GT. It's true that the X800XLs don't overclock for shit, but even overclocked, the 6800GT...didn't feel very fast. Granted, I never got the huge "6800 Ultra+" overclocks that everyone else seemed to, but it still went up a bit.

Anyway, the 6800 always felt sluggish in games. In titles where 6xFSAA could be used on the ATI card, 8xS on the 6800 was simply not workable, so I had to drop to 4xFSAA. 2xQ AA was a neat gimmick (something kinda like 4xAA at the performance cost of only 2xAA...although VERY blurry), but ATI's "temporal AA" just totally rocks the house - 4xAA *in actuality* with the performance of 2xAA.

And two of the games I played at the time ("Silent Hunter III" and "Pacific Fighters") both had compatibility problems with nVidia cards. Also, the X800XL just felt "smoother" than the 6800GT, and the performance in artificial benchmarks bore that out - it outscored my GT in 3dMark03 and 3dMark05 by QUITE a margin.

On the other hand...nVidia's Purevideo decoder sure is nice! It's actually why I ended up going BACK to nVidia for this gen. It's not really that the 6800GT was a bad performer, it's just...I dunno, didn't feel like it was worth the price. It was a LOT more expensive than the X800XL I had, and to perform....kinda as well/sorta not? No, didn't like that much at all.

Anyway, given the choice between those two, I'd take the X800XL. Given a choice of ANY card, I'd probably go with the PCI-E 6800GS. Yes, it's slower than the 6800GT, but it also runs cooler, overclocks better, has a FULLY functional Purevideo decoder, and is a LOT cheaper.
 
dderidex said:
See, my experience was the exact opposite.

I'm back on nVidia now (7800GT), but I felt let down by the 6800GT. It's true that the X800XLs don't overclock for shit, but even overclocked, the 6800GT...didn't feel very fast. Granted, I never got the huge "6800 Ultra+" overclocks that everyone else seemed to, but it still went up a bit.

Anyway, the 6800 always felt sluggish in games. In titles where 6xFSAA could be used on the ATI card, 8xS on the 6800 was simply not workable, so I had to drop to 4xFSAA. 2xQ AA was a neat gimmick (something kinda like 4xAA at the performance cost of only 2xAA...although VERY blurry), but ATI's "temporal AA" just totally rocks the house - 4xAA *in actuality* with the performance of 2xAA.

And two of the games I played at the time ("Silent Hunter III" and "Pacific Fighters") both had compatibility problems with nVidia cards. Also, the X800XL just felt "smoother" than the 6800GT, and the performance in artificial benchmarks bore that out - it outscored my GT in 3dMark03 and 3dMark05 by QUITE a margin.

On the other hand...nVidia's Purevideo decoder sure is nice! It's actually why I ended up going BACK to nVidia for this gen. It's not really that the 6800GT was a bad performer, it's just...I dunno, didn't feel like it was worth the price. It was a LOT more expensive than the X800XL I had, and to perform....kinda as well/sorta not? No, didn't like that much at all.

Anyway, given the choice between those two, I'd take the X800XL. Given a choice of ANY card, I'd probably go with the PCI-E 6800GS. Yes, it's slower than the 6800GT, but it also runs cooler, overclocks better, has a FULLY functional Purevideo decoder, and is a LOT cheaper.
Click to expand...

Guess why I wanted an ATI card? I was having compatability problems with some of my older favorites (Midtown Madness 1 &2 and Crimson Skies espcially). My 6800GT overclocked really well; to 425/1200 (I never bothered to push farther), so maybe that's why I'm feeling jaded - I'm expecting more performance than a stock GT would offer.
 
Pooky said:
It depends on how much an x800 GTO is in Canada, and if you can get one and want to take the risk. Not all cards will overclock to higher speeds and not all will be able to unlock the extra pipelines. What happens if you get a card that won't do either?

For future proofing, it depends on how often you plan to upgrade. If you want something to last as long as humanly possibly, take the x800XT (even the x850XT series would be good/better) or the 6800GT. The GT has a slightly more future proofed feature set with pixel shader 3.0. The card is not as fast as an x850XT though. Maybe check which games use 3.0 and compare them to what you're interested in?

PCI-Express is what all the cards from now will be, but if you can't afford a new CPU?mobo etc, there's no reason to wait unless you want to jump onto the PCI-Express bandwagon. At this point in time, most PCI-E cards do not offer any speed increases over AGP.

Also, maybe scour [H]ard OCP's main page for reviews on the x800/x850 series and the 6800GT's. That will help considerably.

Here's a few reviews:

x850XT compared to 6800Ultra and GT: http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NzI2
Click to expand...

To get the C3D X800GTO to unlock is above 98% and that number is even contested. Basically they all unlock. You are right about overclocking through, some people have bad luck, others good.

The X800GTO unlocked to 16 pipes will at the very least do X800XL speeds.

-fro
 
Right now ATi is selling their AGP AIW x800xt with a $20 rebate. Its $290 shipped and $270 AR. Considering I havn't seen the AGP 6800gt under $300 for a while, I think this x800xt selling for less than most AGP x800xl is by far your best bet. Even has a tv tuner. Or you could try and pick up a used card. They really are all good cards.

As for pci-e x800gto (specially 3dconnect) or 6800gs are both great cards for the $200 mark
 
I agree with the pci-e board and connect3d x800gto, you can probably get both for less than the cost of an agp x800xt or 6800gt and be able to upgrade in the future. I can hit well over x800xt speeds with mine with stock cooling in an sff box that does not have good circulation.
 
Hey
great suggestions. The computer i'm talking about upgrading is in my sig. Would I be able to get a PCI-e board that would fit the specs of everything else I have? Or would I have to buy a new CPU etc....
:(
 
tim-x said:
Hey
great suggestions. The computer i'm talking about upgrading is in my sig. Would I be able to get a PCI-e board that would fit the specs of everything else I have? Or would I have to buy a new CPU etc....
:(
Click to expand...

Looks like you have a Socket 478 CPU and PC3200 DDR, so...this one would work. And if you want to take your chances with video card compatibility (basically, just check before buying any given card), this one, too. Cheaper, and can take AGP 8x *or* PCI-E 16x video cards.
 
Yeah that's what I need...
unfortunately for me though newegg doesn't ship internationally (Canada). I can't seem to find a Canadian store that sells a socket 478 mobo with pci-e. Puzzling. NCIX, CanadaComputers nor TigerDirect have them.
 
tim-x said:
Yeah that's what I need...
unfortunately for me though newegg doesn't ship internationally (Canada). I can't seem to find a Canadian store that sells a socket 478 mobo with pci-e. Puzzling. NCIX, CanadaComputers nor TigerDirect have them.
Click to expand...

ever since Newegg went w/UPS they now ship to Canada.

-fro
 
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