Future Proof trap, Performance/ Price Ratio

T

Tez

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Sep 20, 2006
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Iv fallen for the trap every time getting a new card when its life has expired for eye candy games.

I want eye candy on all games and blistering frame rates but im not prepared to sell my sole for this frenzy leap on new technology. I have the following setup that iv built based on max power for ultra quiet stealth operation.

DFI Lanparty nf4 UT Ultra D, 3700+ San diego Water cooled all Danger den, cpu TDX. OCZ gold 3200 2gig kit, Its all packed into a Thermaltake Armor silver powered from a Tagan 480wat PSU. Theres no case fans running but my radiator 120mm, 1700rmp fan which is extreemly silent.

My X800XT just cant run the current games as Id like to see them. 1280 x 1024 full eye candy 2x AA, 8X AF on games like BF2, Fear and the treaded engine of GRAW.

So I want a new card thats gona deliver at least double my cards perfromance and play the current games with ease. I was looking at mainly 2 cards ATI 1900 XTX, 512mb or Nvidia 7950GX2. Iv gota get new blocks either way but dont want to add too much extra heat into my loop as iv got 2.85ghz from my 3700+ at ok tempertures.

Can somone please give me ther low down, pros and cons of the current cards giving consideration for me not being over wealthy my system is a silent one so heat is a issue.
 
X1900XT or higher will fill the void nicely.... Especially now with the X1950XTX prices being so low.
 
If you want to stay silent, the XFX 7950GT with passive cooler is an interesting option. No need to add water to it, and it would tackle things at 1280X1024 with lots of eye candy.
 
Stop trolling, a passive cooler would overheat in his case because it has no fans, he needs to watercool it or use active.

I would get still get a 7950GT and overclock it though, they usually overclock to near 650MHz on the core and more than 800MHz on the mem, which should be similar to a 7900GTX.

Here's one for $290

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814130061

There is an X1900XT 256MB for $230 AR, it'll be as fast as the 7950GT at stock speeds, but can't overclock nearly as much and will add more heat to your system

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102051.

Your choice.
 
firewolf said:
Stop trolling, a passive cooler would overheat in his case because it has no fans, he needs to watercool it or use active.
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Trolling? :confused: Don't know where you get that. If every other component in his case is water-cooled, doesn't that keep temps low enough to use a passive cooler without case fans? [H] did their tests on the XFX with an open test-bench rig, so there was no fan-driven airflow over the card, right? Or would the heat coming off the pipe/fins just build up inside until it cooked itself?

In any case, don't call troll unless you can back it up.
 
I'd go for the 512mb X1900XT.
With water cooling, you should be able to get some really nice speeds on the core/memory.
It will handle newer and upcoming games better than a 7950GT.
Crytek uses X1900s to show off Crysis.
 
Commander Suzdal said:
If you want to stay silent, the XFX 7950GT with passive cooler is an interesting option. No need to add water to it, and it would tackle things at 1280X1024 with lots of eye candy.
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A pasive cooler in my system wont do a good job as a water cooling block as I have very little air in my pc being it has no fans. pasive needs good air flow front to back. Thanks for your comment though this option would be nice in some systems.

IM now looing at the x1900xt as prices seem quite fair athough the x1800xt dont seem that far of performance wize. Btween the x1800xt and the 1900xt it looks like the 9800xt V 9800 pro trap that I fell for, me getting the 9800xt. :confused:
 
The XTs overclocking 99.9% of the time to XTX speeds which would make the XTX and XT equivalent in speed. Now i believe that the XTX has a different BIOS which i think you can flash your XT?

Anyways, at 1280x1024 an XT 256mb would be enough to play games with all eye candy.

My X800XL OCed plays BF2 at 1280x1024 with everything on max and 2x AA nad 16x AF. If the X800XL can do it then so can the X1900. There is basically no game my X800XL cant play today apart from GRAW.

First chance i get, i am going to snag myself an X1900XT 256mb and be done until DX10.
 
id get the x1900xt or a 7900gtx... honestly they are both good cards and similar price, just pick the brand you like the drivers better and you'll be happy
 
Endurancevm said:
The XTs overclocking 99.9% of the time to XTX speeds which would make the XTX and XT equivalent in speed. Now i believe that the XTX has a different BIOS which i think you can flash your XT?

Anyways, at 1280x1024 an XT 256mb would be enough to play games with all eye candy.

My X800XL OCed plays BF2 at 1280x1024 with everything on max and 2x AA nad 16x AF. If the X800XL can do it then so can the X1900. There is basically no game my X800XL cant play today apart from GRAW.

First chance i get, i am going to snag myself an X1900XT 256mb and be done until DX10.
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I have the X800XT right now and can no way play at even medium settings at 1280 x 1024? Mybe theres somthink im missing.

The x1900xt looks to be a good performer nto a bad price iv seen it at. I was gona get one on ebay but it seems these days people are just paying too much for used graphics cards such as the x1900xt on there.
 
Tez said:
Btween the x1800xt and the 1900xt it looks like the 9800xt V 9800 pro trap that I fell for, me getting the 9800xt. :confused:
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Going from X1800 to X1900 is worth it. It's not like 9800pro to XT.
 
Stereophile said:
Going from X1800 to X1900 is worth it. It's not like 9800pro to XT.
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I was refering to x1800xt and the 1900xt it looks like the small difference between the 9800 pro and xt in their day.
 
Tez said:
I have the X800XT right now and can no way play at even medium settings at 1280 x 1024? Mybe theres somthink im missing.

The x1900xt looks to be a good performer nto a bad price iv seen it at. I was gona get one on ebay but it seems these days people are just paying too much for used graphics cards such as the x1900xt on there.
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Memory?
 
My X800XT has 256meg and I have 2 gig kit OCZ 3200 Gold Gamer eXtreme XTC Edition.
 
GX2 FTW

You won't double your performance with any single GPU card cept maybe x1950. People here seem to be forgetting the x850xt was as fast as a 7800GT or just a little slower than 7900GT and nothing has doubled that performance since at the resolutions he's talking.
 
tightline said:
GX2 FTW

You won't double your performance with any single GPU card cept maybe x1950. People here seem to be forgetting the x850xt was as fast as a 7800GT or just a little slower than 7900GT and nothing has doubled that performance since at the resolutions he's talking.
Click to expand...

What about the 7950 GX2 thats gota be the fastest card out there plus it works with my mobo as well.

My cpu and memory are doing well so I aint gona worry about upgrading them. They seem very stable at 466mhz for memory 2.3.3.8 with a 600mhz over clock on my cpu.

Its just the games are becoming too hungry where they have to be at high res for them to look as they should on a 19" monitor.
 
Tez said:
My X800XT has 256meg and I have 2 gig kit OCZ 3200 Gold Gamer eXtreme XTC Edition.
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Hmmm 850xt with 1.5 gig ram.... I play everything maxxed out 1440x900 8x aniso NO AA... It's quite fluid... Average 60+fps... Hovers around 35-50fps online with 40+ players most of the time... I set it to medium I get around 70+ fps..
 
Tez said:
What about the 7950 GX2 thats gota be the fastest card out there plus it works with my mobo as well.

My cpu and memory are doing well so I aint gona worry about upgrading them. They seem very stable at 466mhz for memory 2.3.3.8 with a 600mhz over clock on my cpu.

Its just the games are becoming too hungry where they have to be at med to high for them to look as they should on a 19" monitor.
Click to expand...


It's gonna be real hard to 'double' your performance.

http://www23.tomshardware.com/graphics.html?modelx=33&model1=575&model2=517&chart=210

Scroll the games around there inputing your card, your desired 12x10 res with candy, and any card you're thinking about buying. Double is difficult. X800/x850 was no slouch especially in modern DirectX API games...

The closest to doing it in a single slot is GX2..that's why I said GX2 FTW (for the win)
 
@ Marvelous Id be interested to find out if I have somthink setup wrong somwhere. On paper my system should be fast enought to play most games at 1280 x 1024 which I do try to do, however I get way to much mouse lag at crucial moments. In BF2 in a helicopter everythink looks stunning but its so slow that I have to drop all settings which is a shame.

@ tightline The dual core GX2 looks very nice but isnt there going to be a new lot of cards soon that may leap a good amount in performace which will make the prices drop on current cards?
 
Yea that's always the case... Maybe x1900xt for $239 is best choice and see what happens.... You should be able to get $120 for your card and really were only talking 12x10 here.. you don't need "double" performance just very playable and x1900xt will deliver good frames, above 40, at that resolution with most everything jacked up.
 
Tez said:
@ Marvelous Id be interested to find out if I have somthink setup wrong somwhere. On paper my system should be fast enought to play most games at 1280 x 1024 which I do try to do, however I get way to much mouse lag at crucial moments. In BF2 in a helicopter everythink looks stunning but its so slow that I have to drop all settings which is a shame.
Click to expand...

Maybe it's your mouse? :)

I haven't ran into a single game where I couldn't play 1440x900 everything high quality or maxxed even Oblivion... Of course I haven't tried GRAW yet and I here it's graphically demending...

You might want to uninstall drivers completely and install just drivers with ATITOOL or TRAY without CCC... One time it did the trick for me... Made my games smoother...
 
Commander Suzdal said:
Trolling? :confused: Don't know where you get that. If every other component in his case is water-cooled, doesn't that keep temps low enough to use a passive cooler without case fans? [H] did their tests on the XFX with an open test-bench rig, so there was no fan-driven airflow over the card, right? Or would the heat coming off the pipe/fins just build up inside until it cooked itself?

In any case, don't call troll unless you can back it up.
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Inside the case, without fans to move air, the heat would build up because it would have no where to go. I think active, or a water cooled GPU is the way to go.

The 7950GX2 is really the undisputed king of single card performance. The X1950XTX is pretty damned good, and I'd recommend that for Core 2 Duo based systems, just because nVidia SLI compatible motherboards can't OC for crap.

In your case, I'd go with either the 7950GX2, or the X1950XTX, or even an X1900XTX (crappy loud fan, bear this in mind) or possibly a 7900GTX. All of these cards should last a good while, and provide great performance. Even though you only game at 1280x1024, the cards mentioned above are all overkill, and will keep providing you eye candy with no performance hit at that resolution for some time to come.

tightline said:
GX2 FTW

You won't double your performance with any single GPU card cept maybe x1950. People here seem to be forgetting the x850xt was as fast as a 7800GT or just a little slower than 7900GT and nothing has doubled that performance since at the resolutions he's talking.
Click to expand...

Not true. The 7800GTX was almost double the performance of the 6800GT's. It could compete with many SLI rigs as a single card. Just as the X1900XTX was double the X850XT, and the same is true of the 7950GX2 now and is almost the performance of dual 7900GTX's in SLI.

psychot|K said:
Yeah but then he'd be stuck with an nvidia card... and no one wants that.
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Why not? Let me guess image quality differences? Perhaps you haven't been paying attention, but the nVidia cards are offering image quality that is almost indistinguishable from their ATi counterparts. Yes the default settings of the Forceware drivers suck, but that is a quick fix and not worth whining about.

I've also had less driver problems with games over the years with nVidia drivers than I have with ATi. Soul Reaver 2 wouldn't even work on my ATi card, Far Cry didn't work right either for awhile, and there are a few more instances, but on both sides the problems were generally something that could be worked around quickly, or by using a beta driver or driver update released shortly thereafter.

Don't forget that the Geforce cards haven't had as many availability problems over the last couple years that ATi has had, and they have usually beaten ATi for price vs. performance. Though right now I think the best buy you can get is the X1950XTX on the high end. I got mine for $476 shipped to my door. (Which I am eagerly awaiting now)
 
I generally don't like recommending products here, but the GX2 seems like the best option. If water cooling is where you want to be, though, grab the X1950 XTX. DangerDen is just about to release their GX2 block, but odds are, it'll be a bit pricey. You would have a few more options cooling the XTX.

On the other hand, there's no real question concerning performance. The GX2 is the fastest single card solution available, and the price reflects that. If you have some serious cash to spend and do not have some of obsessive compulsive image quality disorder, grab the GX2. If you want to spend less, while getting still impressive performance (and nice IQ to boot), grab the XTX.

I hate to do it, but I'm going to have to disagree with Dan on one point: the concept of "overkill" with video cards is, in my opinion, somewhat void. Even with Quad SLi, there will always be some ceiling. This option cannot be enabled, this needs to be reduced and so on and so forth. I'm fairly confident that with one GX2, you're going to find few options you cannot enable while maintaining a solid sixty frames (probably 8XSSAA with current games - boy howdy, I love that AA mode), though there may always be something.
 
Tez said:
I was refering to x1800xt and the 1900xt it looks like the small difference between the 9800 pro and xt in their day.
Click to expand...

I know what you meant. You brought up the X1800 compared to the X1900 and seemed to imply the difference in performance may not be worth the price. ;)

Tez said:
IM now looing at the x1900xt as prices seem quite fair athough the x1800xt dont seem that far of performance wize. Btween the x1800xt and the 1900xt it looks like the 9800xt V 9800 pro trap that I fell for, me getting the 9800xt.
Click to expand...

I'm telling you through personal experience there is much larger gap in performance between an X1800 and X1900 compared to a 9800pro and 9800XT.

With an X1900XT you have 3 times the shader muscle, the difference is very worthwhile in games. It made a huge difference in games like FEAR and Oblivion. I had a 9800pro and remember the jump to XT, I agree with you, was really not worth it. I flashed to an XT bios and my 3dmark03 went up 300 points. :rolleyes: While playing games you could not tell the difference. But for the price increase, the X1900 is really a better value than an X1800.
 
Dan_D said:
Not true. The 7800GTX was almost double the performance of the 6800GT's. It could compete with many SLI rigs as a single card. Just as the X1900XTX was double the X850XT, and the same is true of the 7950GX2 now and is almost the performance of dual 7900GTX's in SLI.
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From the reviews I've seen no way was x1900XTX double the performance of X850XT, more like 50% faster, at best. Toms roundup I posted eariler shows this and here too. http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/285/8

Some examples..

Doom3 High
1280x1024
X1900 XTX - 94.9 FPS
X850XTPE - 74.4 FPS

Far Cry Very High
1280x1024
X1900 XTX - 68.59 FPS
X850XTPE - 67.93 FPS

If you have information to the contrary I'd be interested in seeing it as I know HardOCP does the reviews differently.. But I never seen y'all do a X1900XTX vs X800/x850 cards... just going off what I've seen..

the 7950GX2 now and is almost the performance of dual 7900GTX's in SLI.
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You can't be serious? No site show SLI GTX's slower than GX2 let alone a GX2 doubling up on them.
 
Thanks for all the replys guys, much apreciated. I have been looking at some reviews and your right there is a fair gap between the 1800xt and the 1900xt, it must have been the odd bar chart that threw me off between them. One of my main dissopoinments was GRAW I was so looking forward to playing it and pre ordered it to find it looked awfull and played very lame but thats another thred lol.

I think id go for the x1900xtx or xt and just clock it to a xtx.
 
tightline said:
From the reviews I've seen no way was x1900XTX double the performance of X850XT, more like 50% faster, at best. Toms roundup I posted eariler shows this and here too. http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/285/8

Some examples..

Doom3 High
1280x1024
X1900 XTX - 94.9 FPS
X850XTPE - 74.4 FPS

Far Cry Very High
1280x1024
X1900 XTX - 68.59 FPS
X850XTPE - 67.93 FPS

If you have information to the contrary I'd be interested in seeing it as I know HardOCP does the reviews differently.. But I never seen y'all do a X1900XTX vs X800/x850 cards... just going off what I've seen..

You can't be serious? No site show SLI GTX's slower than GX2 let alone a GX2 doubling up on them.
Click to expand...

The way I look at it... With 1900xt/xtx you can add 4xADAA or run higher resolutions for free and have about same frame rates as 850xt/xtpe...
 
I've been with nVidia for my last 3 cards, including the current one, but if I was upgrading today, I'd buy the X1900XT 512, especially if I could hunt around and find one somewhere for under $300. There were a few at NewEgg, but they've bumped up in price. Even at $319, there simply isn't better value for money out there right now.
 
Marvelous said:
The way I look at it... With 1900xt/xtx you can add 4xADAA or run higher resolutions for free and have about same frame rates as 850xt/xtpe...
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Is true, I can see that for me the biggest leap in terms of performance was from the 9800XT to X800XT PE. Now with the X1900XTX is not a big jump in performance, is just like you say, more eye candy for free with same frame rates, also the ADAA has a bigger impact on the X8X0 series. Great job to ATi with the R3X0/R4X0 architecture!! Beating the NV40 in modern games where the NV40 is supposed to be able to run even better because of it's "fat feature set" Ironic.
 
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