2 7800 GT's in SLI or 1 X1900XT?

[beggerking]

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster

Originally posted by: RobertR1

Originally posted by: beggerking
just read xlab review... 1900xtx doesn't lead 7800 512mb in many benchmarks.. its more like a split..

so I guess 1900xtx is actually tailored for only games that (uses alot of shaders, none opengl), where 7800 gtx 512mb is more balanced to most games.

Perhaps ATI should add a few more texture processors to 1900xtx as well..

Anyone following the path the of the R580 will tell you that it's only purpose was to add shader capacity. Read the B3D interview posted with the Ati developers http://www.beyond3d.com/reviews/ati/r580/int/ and even they will state that while having more traditional pipelines would be nice for current games, they rather go with better shader performance since that is their prediction for the future of gaming.

By summer, you'll know exactly which train of thought won out.

True. But if only ATi cards imrpoved on there stencil shadow performance.

agreed.

 

[beggerking]

Originally posted by: Skott
What one also needs to consider is that from the reviews I been reading the 1900XT matches or beats the the 7800GTX 512 in the benchmarks. So you can say its about on par or a little above the 7800GTX in performance. But... its alot cheaper and will be easier to get. Thats a crucial selling point for the 1900XT when comparing it to a 7800GTX 512. Rumor is nVidia is discontinuing the the 7800GTX 512 soon. At least thats what Monarch was told by nVidia according to a post on their forums.

Yes. 1900xtx is a very nice card at an excellent price and is available(so far), and yes it is in the same league as 7800GTX 512mb for ALOT cheaper. The only thing is its lack of opengl/stencil shadow performance... ATI is going radical and bidding on only shader performance..

 

[Reznick]

For someone like me, with an AGP 6800GT rig, running a P4 3.0GHz, and trying to decide whether to go Xfire or SLI with a AMD X2 4400+ CPU, etc. etc., this sort of thread drives me crazy. Great discussion, but I feel like I am watching a tennis match...

For me, either a leap to a 7800 nVidia or X1900 ATI will be huge for me. The only deciding factor on a card/motherboard is cost and whether it helps me play games like Chaos Theory, FEAR, or BF2 without having to dumb down detail too much. I could care less how two cards perform against each other in Doom 3 or Quake 4 (which I am still playing) if their FPS are both extremely acceptable at 1600x1200. Increases in frame rate beyond 70-80 FPS, to me, are irrelevant from a gameplay perspective.

Based on this, the new ATI cards seem to be the best card for these newer shader extensive games. Forget if one is a few FPS faster or slower for a given game. In general, the x1900XT seems to work extremely well as a single card, and I assume when the new XFire RD580 motherboards start coming out, will be a real force in an XFire configuration.

For me, the x1900 XT as a single card (for less than $500), running with a 4400+ on an cheaper nForce Ultra M/B, is a cost effective solution. When the new Xfire M/B comes out, I can then consider at a very affordable XFire dual card system that, although may not the fastest out there once nVidia launches its G71, gives me more than adequate power to handle virtually any game I would be interested in playing for the next several years.

And I do assume that when the G71 launches, the ATI card prices will be adjusted down a bit further. I want my system now, but can wait a month or so to see what happens with the G71.

Point is, regardless what card you choose, the results are still sweet for those of us who are making a leap from a much slower system. Considering cost and performance, ATI is the current winner in my opinion.

 

[DidlySquat]

Funyy how all the "smart" 7800GT owners which bought their card just a couple of months ago are coming out of the woodwork already wanting to upgrade. I guess getting this card wasn't so smart after all

 

[Ackmed]

Originally posted by: thilan29

Originally posted by: Rollo

Originally posted by: Ackmed

Originally posted by: M0RPH
Update. 1900XT already selling for under $500, even sooner than I thought.

http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=AT-1900XT&show=p

Whoa, thats a nice price. They had the first under $500 X1800XT price too if I remember right. May have to start looking at them when buying hardware. At that price, its hard to recommend any NV card, other than the 7800GT and under. Its only about $50 more than a slow clocked 256MB GTX. Highend is owned by ATi, in my opinion.

NO! Who'd have thought?!?!



We can buy 7800GT SLI for $540 that outperforms this card, with no comparable Crossfire even close.

We can buy 7800GTX SLI <$900 that beats X900XT Crossfire costing >$1000. (and not available yet I believe/)

So I think "highend is owned by ATI" might be an Ackmed-ism. :beer:

Didn't most of this thread show that the GTs in SLI doesn't win in EVERYTHING (ie. it wins some and loses some)?? At least that's what I gathered.

And the fact he doesnt have his facts straight, again. X1900XT Crossfire Edition cards, are, and have been for sale.

You see, he used to be all about mocking people for buying "old tech", with X800 cards. Now that NV has the "old tech", not one peep. The simple fact is, the X1900XT is about the same price, and about the same performance as 2xGT's. It also has more features over the GT's, and the ability to add another down the road. GT's are already maxed out. Pretty funny how he flip-flops when it helps his agenda.

And then there is the simpel fact, that the vast majority of people, do not Crossfire, or SLI. Most buy a single card. Making most of this a moot point.

 

[Wreckage]

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster

Originally posted by: beggerking
just read xlab review... 1900xtx doesn't lead 7800 512mb in many benchmarks.. its more like a split..

so I guess 1900xtx is actually tailored for only games that (uses alot of shaders, none opengl), where 7800 gtx 512mb is more balanced to most games.

Perhaps ATI should add a few more texture processors to 1900xtx as well..

The 7800GTX 512mb won 11 and the X1900XTX won 9.

That should make an easy road for the G71.

 

[Yreka]

Here is a C&P of my respoonse to the same topic @ Hardforum if anyone is still curious.

Sorry to go off topic

Originally Posted by Mayhs under the topic of 7800GTSLI vs X1800XT
what about one of the mods (brent) whos tested both of these cards? which is better? and to owners of both..if there are any

I acutally have both currently, I am in the process of deciding which setup I like better then selling the other.

I was running an Opteron 170@ 2600, 2gb of ram, and 2 EVGA CO?s @ 470,1100 on an A8N32-SLI board for reference. Now same setup, but with a BBATI X1800XT at stock speeds.

Let me start off by saying, I am firmly in the IQ > FPS camp. 30-40fps and above, the relevance of 3,5,10 fps starts meaning less and less to me. Let me also say, this is my first ATI card since... well I cant even remember the last one.. maybe ever * I was MIA during the 9700,9800 heyday*. I am still getting used to the ATI drivers, ccc, and all the other hoo haw. Please take noobishness there into account. Lastly, IMO fastest != best, see above Image Quality comment.

Installation:
First of all, I am not a big fan of ATIs drivers and CCC right now. Whenever I get a new piece of hardware, I am in the >bad?< habit of chucking the disc in a drawer, and downloading the most current driver from the mfg?s website.. oops, THE DRIVER ON THE WEB WILL NOT WORK WITH THE X1900 AT THIS TIME!! Kinda odd, but moving along and a few straggles aside I get the card and CCC installed. After playing around with this for awhile, I find myself missing my forceware+coolbits, and even profiles a little bit. I really think ATI has some room for improvement here.

IQ:
Being an IQ junky, I have been wanting to try an ATI for awhile now. The AA+HDR, and HQ-angle independent AF sealed the deal for me. The AF improvement is very noticeable to me, most notably the terrain in EQ2. The textures are much more crisp on the rolling hills and valleys, where they seemed blurry and less defined on the GT?s. AA is still not working in EQ2, but it barely worked with my Nvidia gear either. Because of that, I can?t tack this one soley on ATI. I just really wish it would get fixed, I don?t care who does it. COD2, Quake4, and FEAR appeared to have slightly better filtering as well, but not as dramatic. I was only able to spend about 1-2 hours with EQ2 and maybe 15min each with the other 3 so take it all with a grain of salt.

Performance:
I play on a 2005fpw, so not insanely high res. Neither setup has any trouble with playable settings. For the games I play currently, EQ2, Fear, Quake4, COD2, and NFS:MW the performance is pretty damn close. I call a draw there from experience; one isn?t noticeably better than the other in overall smoothness. I am not going to waste my time with benchies, there are enough out now to cherry pick pretty much any results you want to see



Noise:
I was seriously afraid that the ATI was going to be a screamer. Its not that bad. In comparison, I have 2 NV silencers on the GT?s and generally the noise level is about the same. The ATI does sound pretty scary when it winds up to full bore at first bootup, but I haven?t reached those speeds during normal gaming yet. I have pretty good case ambient, so I don?t suspect it will be an issue. The cooler also seems to move a lot more air at idle speeds than the silencers did. Its quite a little blast furnace at the back of the case. The ATI fan does seem to have a slight growl at certain RPMs. Noticeable, but not bad enough at this point to force me into an aftermarket solution.


Overall, I am pretty impressed. Overall IQ is actually closer than I expected between the two other than the AF. I haven?t got to mess around with the HDR+AA yet, so jury is still out there. As for which one I am going to keep.. Right now I am leaning twords the X1900XT. Any time I can get 2 card performance in 1 card, I am going to pick the 1 card every time. SLI is very polished, and works very well but it still isn?t without its drawbacks, quirks and hassles that you don?t have with a single card solution.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Ackmed
And the fact he doesnt have his facts straight, again. X1900XT Crossfire Edition cards, are, and have been for sale.

You see, he used to be all about mocking people for buying "old tech", with X800 cards. Now that NV has the "old tech", not one peep. The simple fact is, the X1900XT is about the same price, and about the same performance as 2xGT's. It also has more features over the GT's, and the ability to add another down the road. GT's are already maxed out. Pretty funny how he flip-flops when it helps his agenda.

And then there is the simpel fact, that the vast majority of people, do not Crossfire, or SLI. Most buy a single card. Making most of this a moot point.

Yes I remember when the 6800s and x800/x850s were out that the argument for all those "Should I buy a 6800 or x8x0?" threads was "Go with nV cause their tech is brand new and can do HDR, SM3. Future proof yourself." Granted HDR probably looks nice on the nV hardware but after using AAA (without HDR on my x800GTO2) with playable frame rates, I won't play any game without AA turned up as high as possible. I notice the jaggies too much.

Currently, I think if you're gonna buy a high end card, it should be an x1900. And also, living in Canada, for some reason the nV cards always seemed more expensive. For example, people have been claiming that you can get 2 7800GTs for the price of one x1900. That's not the case at least up here. The cheapest I've seen a 7800GT is CAD$350 so CAD$700 for 2 and the cheapest for a x1900xt is CAD$580-600. And for some reason you can buy the crossfire master card for cheaper than the XT. I think a CAD$100 savings is pretty big, it can even go towards a decent motherboard. Oh and a 7800GTX 256mb cheapest I've seen is CAD$560 STILL. Soooo, for about 20 bucks more you can get something a LOT better.

 

[tooltime]

i am not sure i would use that much power. i also wonder if i am cpu limited anyway

 

[LiquidImpulse]

Originally posted by: Fenixgoon
wouldnt it be better to go single 1900 that way you can expand (get crossfire card) later on?

thats what i was thinking also

 

[aigomorla]

dude if u have enough money for x-fire u should get the quad gtx setup from dell if they ever decide to sell that outside there renegade system

2GB on 4 7800GTX in SLI = UBER SEXY!~!~