Problem with Powercolor x800xl

S

swflbatth

Weaksauce
Joined
Oct 13, 2004
Messages
108
Just built my new system from new egg the other day. One component was the new x800xl from powercolor, which is supposed to hav the 1.6ns ddr on it. Well, it doesnt. I got it out of the box, and it has 2.0ns samsung on it. I figured what the heck, plugged it in to see what it could do. I can barely get it over 510 on the memory. I am definitely going to return it to new egg, but I am wondering should I even bother getting another powercolor? I figure that it is not just by chance mine has 2.0ns ddr on it, and most likely any of the cards I get will have it instead of the 1.6ns. So I am wondering, should I stick with the powercolor and hope for better results, try another brand such as ati or sapphire, or should I just get a 6800gt ? I am definitely frustrated :(
 
It works at the rated speeds out of the box, you are now abusing the system because the card didn't meet overclocking standards. :(
 
Its not abuse if the memory that was said to come on this card was not on this card, which happens to be the problem. Every test had 1.6ns memory, and when i bought it i expected 1.6ns memory, not 2.0ns. I believe I am well within my rights to return it.
 
I've complained to the egg about problems and/or discrepancies in the advertising of the product and they've always been good to me. Ex/ Bought a case that said it had 2x120mm...The case came (badly damaged, thanks fedex ya jerks) and it had 1x120mm. They made good on their end and sent me the extra 120mm at no cost, and just a minor inconvenience.

I'd say you're on track with the false advertisement as it makes a differences in the final product recieved.
 
Consider yourself lucky. The 1.6ns on my Pro VIVO won't do over 500 MHz. Did the newegg spec sheet specifically list 1.6ns RAM?
 
No, newegg said nothing about the memory, just that it was gddr3. Powercolor is the one who sent out all of their samples with 1.6ns on it. I think I might call powercolor first.
 
^ then you'll need to get proof that Powercolor states what kind of memory comes on that particular card.

then you'll have to show that proof to Newegg and then at least you'll have a leg to stand on.
 
swflbatth said:
Its not abuse if the memory that was said to come on this card was not on this card, which happens to be the problem. Every test had 1.6ns memory, and when i bought it i expected 1.6ns memory, not 2.0ns. I believe I am well within my rights to return it.
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Nowhere does powercolor state what ram is on the card, not on their site and not on the box....Its the luck of the draw, they could have sent out engineering samples with 1.2ns ddr3 and sent you 2.0ns, its all about what they wanna put on their cards that month it was made, there is no guarantee.

You dont have a right to return it, this is the same case as if you had bought a card to flash it, and it didnt flash.
 
dude that is wrong to return a video card that wont OC. it ran at its rated speed so no need to return it. that is why video card prices are so high because of people like you
 
You all don't read. I am wanting to return it b/c it lacks the 1.6ns ram that powercolor led everyone to believe came on this card. If you were looking to buy a car and it was tested with a v8 engine, then you bought it and ended up with only a v6 though they didnt tell you that, I think you would be dissappointed. It's basically false advertising. How bout sending out samples of a 3200+ amd proc, but have it running 2.4ghz to be tested. I think that would be the same issue. There is no such thing as "luck of the draw" either. You cant give one segment a good product and another segment a lemon. That is dishonest.
 
swflbatth said:
You all don't read. I am wanting to return it b/c it lacks the 1.6ns ram that powercolor led everyone to believe came on this card. If you were looking to buy a car and it was tested with a v8 engine, then you bought it and ended up with only a v6 though they didnt tell you that, I think you would be dissappointed. It's basically false advertising. How bout sending out samples of a 3200+ amd proc, but have it running 2.4ghz to be tested. I think that would be the same issue. There is no such thing as "luck of the draw" either. You cant give one segment a good product and another segment a lemon. That is dishonest.
Click to expand...

No it is not. Almost ALL video card vendors will send better than typical cards to reviewers....PERIOD! They don't want to send out cards for review that may fail or have issues. Your analogy is also flawed..you sitll have a V8 engine...they just didn't put in the $200 fuel injectors that all you to tweak beyond rated horsepower. They put in fuel injectors that allow them to meet LISTED specifications.

Again..the board meets LISTED specifications and never quoted 1.6 ns RAMs. Please point out an exact article which "leads" people to believe that powercolor would ship 1.6ns RAM. You should have used your noodle and realised that since the framework of the XL would work with 2.0ns RAMs...they someday might switch to them if producibility/yield allows it.

I'm sorry..your relative moralism in this case is not on the right track. If you return it that is your choice. But in my eyes you are being highly unethical.

-tReP
 
swflbatth said:
You all don't read. I am wanting to return it b/c it lacks the 1.6ns ram that powercolor led everyone to believe came on this card. If you were looking to buy a car and it was tested with a v8 engine, then you bought it and ended up with only a v6 though they didnt tell you that, I think you would be dissappointed. It's basically false advertising. How bout sending out samples of a 3200+ amd proc, but have it running 2.4ghz to be tested. I think that would be the same issue. There is no such thing as "luck of the draw" either. You cant give one segment a good product and another segment a lemon. That is dishonest.
Click to expand...

Your example sucks and you're still not justifying your case. A 10,000$ V8 Engine is a little wee bit more important to be listed on a spec sheet than the rated speed of 40$ GDDR3 Chips.
 
Dillusion said:
Your example sucks and you're still not justifying your case. A 10,000$ V8 Engine is a little wee bit more important to be listed on a spec sheet than the rated speed of 40$ GDDR3 Chips.
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Well some people have enough of an education to put 2 and 2 together to figure out an analogy. Don't ask me to spell it out for you. And if you have to be a jerk, keep it to yourself. Go back to downloading stolen music while telling yourself how moral you are.
 
I don't see this as unethical. Luck-of-the-draw shouldn't factor in when you're buying a specific part. If Powercolor/ATI sent 1.6ns parts to reviewers then educated consumers should expect that quality on the shelves. If not then the manufacturer is playing stupid little games with all of us. Some of you don't mind getting played like that, but I certainly care.
 
Sizer said:
I don't see this as unethical. Luck-of-the-draw shouldn't factor in when you're buying a specific part. If Powercolor/ATI sent 1.6ns parts to reviewers then educated consumers should expect that quality on the shelves. If not then the manufacturer is playing stupid little games with all of us. Some of you don't mind getting played like that, but I certainly care.
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But it is unethical. The vendor never stipulated or guaranteed that final shipping products would have 1.6ns RAM, only that the RAM would be running at xxxMHz speed. This is absolutely no differnt than the 9800np cards that were shipping with Samsung RAM and were easily flashing to Pro speeds, and at some point ATi switched to another brand (don't remember which brand), but that memory didn't o/c nearly as well. That didn't change the fact that when I got the card the RAM was running at advertised speeds.

Unless the vendor states in their specifications that they are going to guarantee a specific speed of RAM, or guarantee specific o/c levels, you have no right to return a product that won't overclock to your expectations because you made an ASSUMPTION...and we all know what happes when you assume.
 
Un4given said:
But it is unethical. The vendor never stipulated or guaranteed that final shipping products would have 1.6ns RAM, only that the RAM would be running at xxxMHz speed. This is absolutely no differnt than the 9800np cards that were shipping with Samsung RAM and were easily flashing to Pro speeds, and at some point ATi switched to another brand (don't remember which brand), but that memory didn't o/c nearly as well. That didn't change the fact that when I got the card the RAM was running at advertised speeds.

Unless the vendor states in their specifications that they are going to guarantee a specific speed of RAM, or guarantee specific o/c levels, you have no right to return a product that won't overclock to your expectations because you made an ASSUMPTION...and we all know what happes when you assume.
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Exactly. Hynix was the 'shitty' ram that replaced the sammies, didnt OC worth 10mhz. ATi also allowed Sapphire to use 9700 PCB's that were black and has FDD power connections, and it was perfectly legal, as it performed on par with all the other 'normal' ones, it just didnt give more than 2% of headroom in OCing, but that wasn't guaranteed anywhere.
 
Dillusion said:
Exactly. Hynix was the 'shitty' ram that replaced the sammies, didnt OC worth 10mhz. ATi also allowed Sapphire to use 9700 PCB's that were black and has FDD power connections, and it was perfectly legal, as it performed on par with all the other 'normal' ones, it just didnt give more than 2% of headroom in OCing, but that wasn't guaranteed anywhere.
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Yeah, I knew it started with an H, and I was thinking Hyundai, but you're right, it was the Hynix. I was lucky and could get upwards of 325MHz, but nowhere near Pro speeds on the memory.

But I agree with you in that returning a product that functions withing the specifications set forth by the manufacturer is wrong, and we all end up paying the price for this type of activity.
 
Un4given said:
Yeah, I knew it started with an H, and I was thinking Hyundai, but you're right, it was the Hynix. I was lucky and could get upwards of 325MHz, but nowhere near Pro speeds on the memory.

But I agree with you in that returning a product that functions withing the specifications set forth by the manufacturer is wrong, and we all end up paying the price for this type of activity.
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Thats the bottom line! :D

If anyone else argues below this line...

_____________________________________________________________

It wont matter, because the winning arguement is up there. ^
 
Dillusion said:
Thats the bottom line! :D

If anyone else argues below this line...

_____________________________________________________________

It wont matter, because the winning arguement is up there. ^
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FYAD, troll. If the manufacturer wants to play games then the consumer can't be faulted for doing the same. When I worked in a production environment we didn't pull this shit. "hay guys, we're going to stick lower quality knobs and repair putty and trim on our cabinet doors and hope no one gives a shit kekekekekeke TEH WINNING ARGUMENT IS RIGHT HERE DUURRRR" didn't fly in that situation, shouldn't fly now.
 
Sizer said:
FYAD, troll. If the manufacturer wants to play games then the consumer can't be faulted for doing the same. When I worked in a production environment we didn't pull this shit. "hay guys, we're going to stick lower quality knobs and repair putty and trim on our cabinet doors and hope no one gives a shit kekekekekeke TEH WINNING ARGUMENT IS RIGHT HERE DUURRRR" didn't fly in that situation, shouldn't fly now.
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The parts are not "shitty". Again your logic is more flawed than my wife's logic during that time of the month. The parts are exactly what they need to be...nothing more and nothing less. You are "lucky" if they ship the w/ the 1.6ns RAMs, not entitled.

So please...stop with your relative moralism trying to justify everything you do because you "think" its fair...not because society says its fair. Be willing to bet you have a HD full of movies and music that you never bought...same probally goes for your software because you somehow feel "entitled" to have them. If you got the nuts...ask a one of us over to your home to see your PC. I'll be willing to bet a few founding fathers than I am correct. If i'm wrong...i'll be more than glad to apologize in this forum.

When you take the low road...be prepared to have people put you in the gutter.

Also...every manufactuer in the world does this. They will keep reducing the cost of the board to keep increasing profits while still maintaining specifications. If you owned your own business you would do the exact same thing. If not the investors would fire your sorry ass and get someone in who would.

-tReP
 
eastvillager said:
The firingsquad review clearly shows 2.0 ns memory on the powercolor x800 xl. heck, they even have a picture of just the memory, entitled, "2.0ns memory module"

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/powercolor_radeon_x800_xl/page3.asp
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And you know what the funny thing is, here is at the [H] complaining that the modules are supposed to be 1.6ns and even the review here had the modules listed at 2.0ns. While the [H] review says this is an ATi X800XL, I haven't seen any reviews for this card that say the modules are supposed/expected to be 1.6ns.

The RAM modules being used are Samsung GDDR3 chips rated at 2ns for a clock speed of 500MHz...
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http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NzAw
 
Hey if you all wanna preach morals, go to a religious forum b/c I don't really care to hear it. Why dont you stick on the topic, which wasnt "Please help me with my moral dilemma".

Btw, http://www.vr-zone.com.sg/?i=1721&s=1 is the review with 1.6ns, and if you read the forum some more when ppl talk about the PC x800xl they relate it to the molex connector and the 1.6ns ram.

Also, dont tell ppl their logic is flawed when you obviously lack anything better than your own opinion to back yourself up.

Finally, customers have a right to return any piece of merchandise they don't want. That is why there is a return policy. Many goods fall under the "dissatisfied" category, not just defective, and a customer can have their own reasons for why they are dissatisfied, and they dont have to coincide with yours. Don't believe it? Go ask wal-mart. Or even any vendor that offers a return policy.
 
swflbatth said:
Hey if you all wanna preach morals, go to a religious forum b/c I don't really care to hear it. Why dont you stick on the topic, which wasnt "Please help me with my moral dilemma".

Btw, http://www.vr-zone.com.sg/?i=1721&s=1 is the review with 1.6ns, and if you read the forum some more when ppl talk about the PC x800xl they relate it to the molex connector and the 1.6ns ram.

Also, dont tell ppl their logic is flawed when you obviously lack anything better than your own opinion to back yourself up.

Finally, customers have a right to return any piece of merchandise they don't want. That is why there is a return policy. Many goods fall under the "dissatisfied" category, not just defective, and a customer can have their own reasons for why they are dissatisfied, and they dont have to coincide with yours. Don't believe it? Go ask wal-mart. Or even any vendor that offers a return policy.
Click to expand...

Fine, then when they ask you why you are returning it, be honest. Tell them that...

1. The card runs fine at the specified speeds.
2. That you were expecting 1.6ns RAM modules, not 2.0ns, even though 2.0ns modules are fast enough to run at the specified speeds.
3. That you are not satisfied with the overclocking potential of the card.
 
And no customers DON'T have the RIGHT to return merchandise (again, stop with the relative moralism). Customers only have the right to return mechandise if the vendor says so and upon their conditions. In most cases for technology related items there is a restocking fee (10%-20%). The return policy conditions are available in paper form from B&M stores or as a link on websites. Also most websites even make you click a button to accept their terms and conditions of usage/purchase.

So be a good man and return the card...just tell them the REAL reasons why as stated by Un4given. Do that and i'll have no qualms w/ your actions. If they take it back w/ no fees...call yourself happy. But I doubt they will.

Finally morals can be completely decoupled from religeon. You can have a moral society w/o the need for a religeon. However w/ your saying "I don't want to hear it" is the same responses I get from people who know their guilty/wrong but refuse to admit it. You just feel offended that you thought you were in the "right" and a SIGNIFICANT majority of the people disagreed w/ you. And now to save grace you must defend it violently. Don't worry to much about it...I think we all do it from time to time.

So do the right thing and lets see what the outcome is...I dare you.

-tReP
 
Look, they had a clause for a refund for dissatisfaction, and they accepted it under that circumstance.
 
Someone email this to Newegg CSR. This is rediculous, someone is mad that there card can't OC to exepcted, people go outside and enjoy life :confused:
 
swflbatth said:
Look, they had a clause for a refund for dissatisfaction, and they accepted it under that circumstance.
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Then legally you have done nothing wrong. I accept that.

I still don't agree w/ your moral decision...but I cannot fault you completely. Morals are sometimes subjective and in this case I see your point...I just disagree completely.

Takre care...peace

-tReP
 
I have to side with swflbath on this one, wholeheartedly.

From the review he referenced:

Powercolor was kind enough to use 1.6ns GDDR3 rams for the card
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When you make a product for mass use, ideally it should have as little variation as possible. If you use a component that has 1.6ns for a *review site*, who obviously Powercolor is full aware will be broadcasting their specs and performance and so on, it is 100% understandable that a consumer would expect the same performance and standard of quality.

It is not ok to make suped-up versions for a *review*, and reduce the quality of the components later. That is deliberately misleading, and any company should feel ashamed of such action (in the least).

Even if this was unintentional, and its simply a matter of that they began to buy different components from vendors, they are,or should be, completely aware of the specifications of the components they are using to build their product, and stand by a certain level of quality for their product. If they made an honest mistake, well, then a mistake was made, and it trickled down to the consumer, who shouldn't have to bear their mistake.
 
ownedthx said:
I have to side with swflbath on this one, wholeheartedly.

From the review he referenced:



When you make a product for mass use, ideally it should have as little variation as possible. If you use a component that has 1.6ns for a *review site*, who obviously Powercolor is full aware will be broadcasting their specs and performance and so on, it is 100% understandable that a consumer would expect the same performance and standard of quality.

It is not ok to make suped-up versions for a *review*, and reduce the quality of the components later. That is deliberately misleading, and any company should feel ashamed of such action (in the least).

Even if this was unintentional, and its simply a matter of that they began to buy different components from vendors, they are,or should be, completely aware of the specifications of the components they are using to build their product, and stand by a certain level of quality for their product. If they made an honest mistake, well, then a mistake was made, and it trickled down to the consumer, who shouldn't have to bear their mistake.
Click to expand...

1. The "souped" up version of the part makes NO difference to the boards performance at STOCK speeds. So what you are saying is Powercolor should not ship video cards if they don't use the exact same parts on every board until they obsolete the board? I am sorry...the business world doesn't work that way. Maybe I should go after Intel for a stepping change to a processor by your logic...AMD too. How dare Crucial use a new type of DDR modules for their PC3200 memory even though they meed JEDEC standards.

2. The review site should be held liable by Powercolor for stating the 1.6ns when Powercolor never made the statement by your logic. They (Powercolor) gave the card to the review site based upon investation of the cards STOCK performance and not OC performance. Good investigation by their team should have yielded that 2.0ns may be used on this board. This is the same case of "well, I was trying to use a product outside of its intended specification because somebody else did it and I don't get the same performance therefore it is the vendors fault". The [H] reviews ALWAYS state that cards they receive may not be representive of full production runs in terms of overclocking. Overclocking is not a right...its is a feature that may or may not work.

Again the only thing Powercolor is responsible for is meeting the specifications on the side of the box. If its said 1.6ns GDDR then you got them by the balls...

Hrm...yeah I need to go return my PS2 because they rev'd the design...I want rev 1.0...it is my right you know!

-tReP
 
swflbatth said:
Hey if you all wanna preach morals, go to a religious forum b/c I don't really care to hear it. Why dont you stick on the topic, which wasnt "Please help me with my moral dilemma".
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You don't want to hear about morals, but you want help with a moral dilemma.


Paint me confused.
 
If you could read, I never asked for help with any supposed moral dilemma. Please reread then come back again.
 
Trepidation:

You (and the most of the rest of this board) disagree with Swfl and I over the importance of this specification (1.6ns vs 2.0ns). I understand its not listed in the specs. At the same time, the speed of the memory is a critical component on the overall performance of the card no? I would argue (and do ;)) that they should have this stat down in their specs.

Take an extreme example, so we can have some common ground. Say they didnt say how many megs of vid memory the card had, yet the reviews all showed that it was 256 megs, and then when you got it, it was 128. You, me, anyone would be upset, because we can all agree that video memory isn't something you short people on.

So, this example is obviously a case of a metric we can all agree matters.

In this case, we don't agree about the memory speed.

I say it matters. Its a key part of a high-performance video card.
 
ownedthx said:
Trepidation:

You (and the most of the rest of this board) disagree with Swfl and I over the importance of this specification (1.6ns vs 2.0ns). I understand its not listed in the specs. At the same time, the speed of the memory is a critical component on the overall performance of the card no? I would argue (and do ;)) that they should have this stat down in their specs.

Take an extreme example, so we can have some common ground. Say they didnt say how many megs of vid memory the card had, yet the reviews all showed that it was 256 megs, and then when you got it, it was 128. You, me, anyone would be upset, because we can all agree that video memory isn't something you short people on.

So, this example is obviously a case of a metric we can all agree matters.

In this case, we don't agree about the memory speed
I say it matters. Its a key part of a high-performance video card.
Click to expand...

But see, that example is still wrong...its so far off from whats actually happening. If you got a 128Mb card, and the reviewed version was 256, your STOCK PERFORMANCE would not be the same. Stock performance on 1.6 and 2.0ns ram IS the same, its just the overclock that changes.
 
You buy a pizza from a place that says "delivered in 30 minutes or less or it is free". A reviewer says he gots his pizza in 20 minutes. That is 10 minutes faster than advertised. Then one day you decide to order from the pizza place and you get it in 28 minutes.

So by your logic the pizza should be free? Just think about it....

The card runs EXACTLY the same at STOCK speed w/ either 1.6ns or 2.0ns. There is NO difference. Now if you got 1/2 a pizza when you ordered a WHOLE pizza...then you have bitching rights.

-tReP
 
Trepidation and Dillusion are right.

You have a right to expect the card to run at GPU core speeds and RAM speeds that are advertised. So for example, if a card's core runs at 250MHz and RAM at 500MHz as advertised by a vendor, and yours comes clocked lower, you have the right to be upset.

However, if 2.0ns RAM is all that is required to run stock at 500MHz, then that is all that is required of the manufacturer. If they provide faster RAM, that might be a plus to an overclocker, but at stock 500MHz, the card's RAM will run at the same speed whether you use 2.0ns or 1.6ns ram. A manufacturer is obligated to give you a card that runs as advertised, and not more. In this case, neither the manufacturer nor NewEgg advertised what the RAM chips were rated for on the card. Only a review or two mentioned what speed chips came on THEIR card. Reviewers know that your mileage may vary, and not all reviewers had cards with faster RAM even. But the original poster here is like a lot of people who returned a Geforce 6800 card because they couldn't unlock it from 12 to 16 pipelines without graphics corruption. Nevermind the fact that it wasn't a guarantee or advertised by the vendor or manufacturer, a lot of their friends got it to work, so they wanted more than they were promised, and when they didn't get it, they got greedy.

If the original poster isn't satisfied, it's because his expectations go beyond what the product was promised to do. When you want something for nothing, or more for less, it's unreasonable, but that doesn't stop many people.
 
for shit's sake people...this thread's getting rediculous.

1st...I agree with Un4gien...if you should return the card, give them the reasons that Un4given gave.
2nd...whilst you read a review that had 1.6ns ram, you should have googled to hell and back looking for reviews of a piece of hardware (any hardware) that you're considering purchasing. If you'd have done this, you'd have seen that your purchase was a crap shoot at best.
3rd...after seeing it was a crap shoot, you should have then looked for a store that would happily verify that you were getting the 1.6ns chips. Many places do this these days with CPU's and specific weeks.
4th...be happy that the card performs as specified at stock settings. If you're not happy, get some education and then mod the hell out of it to get more out of it. a decent vmod can go a long way sometimes.
5th...if you're still not happy with any of the results, get a small oven that'll heat up to 350 degrees f. buy some Samsung 1.2ns chips (be sure and get the spec sheet). heat up the oven, put the card in, pull the bga chips off and replace with the 1.2ns chips and then re-write the memory latency and timings in the bios and flash the card.

Personally, I have an x800x w/2.0ns memory. It clocks up to 575Mhz. And if you want the flat out truth, the people with 1.6ns memory aren't getting much better overclocks than the people with 2.0ns. It is quite possibly a board limitation regarding the surrounding circuitry.
 
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