7900 cards are scarce because it's outselling its ATI competitor by a ratio of 4:1

[videopho]

While stumbling in the eVGA site in order to find out a good reason why my eVGA step-up program has been nothing but step-up. Here is an article from techreport that I've found interesting and sort of an answer to my own question, some quote:

"We weren't able to get any e-tailers to go on record with proportional sales data on ATI and NVIDIA cards, but we did get a clear sense that the picture NVIDIA painted of the situation is fairly accurate. GeForce 7900 cards are outselling the ATI-based competition by well over four-to-one ratios at some online vendors, amazingly enough. The supply is substantial, too: shipments of 7900 cards are arriving on palettes and selling out within the space of a day or two?sometimes less. Vendors are not satisfied with the volumes of cards they are getting, of course; they would like more. But this is not a simple case of extended, persistent lack of product from NVIDIA and stellar supply from ATI. NVIDIA appears to be moving many more high-end GeForces through e-tail than ATI is high-end Radeons. "



article in full

For those who are in the eVGA step-up program for a 7900GTX series cards, it looks like eVGA finally be able to turn corner on the shipment track as my 7900GTX SC's queue #231 has jumped to #170 in less than a few days. Keep my fingers crossed for this Oblivion cure.

 

[morgash]

this is about what i expected. despite the fact that ATI has the single fastest stock card and supposedly superior image quality(i cant see the difference between my 7900gt and my friends x1800xt and my 7900 is way faster so...) nVidia still has the ONE thing that matters when sales time comes around and that ATI never has been able to understand. MARKETING! the whole "way its meant to be played" thing cost them like 120 mil but my god did it skyrocket their product awareness to waaaaay above ATI's. Hell in mainstream life ATI might as well be a specialist provider. too bad

 

[jiffylube1024]

Last I heard 7900GTX supplies weren't that great. 7900GT are selling like hotcakes though, and in large volumes.

If you're in the eVga step-up program then I guess you've gotta wait; otherwise, it would make good sense to dump your card on FS/FT and pick up an X1900XT or XTX.

 

[Munky]

This has already been posted and debated about 2 weeks ago. The original thread might have been deleted because I cant find it now.

 

[LittleNemoNES]

7900 GT is not way faster than a x1800xt unless you mean quake 4 or doom 3...

 

[tuteja1986]

lets hope ATI can get some ground back with R600 or it may seem a doom future for ATI. We need ATI and Nvidia like we need AMD and Intel or it will be like Microsoft . But anyways ATI may have done bad in gaming sector they did however gain alot of the marketshare through deals with Microsoft and Intel.

 

[framerateuk]

With the enthusiast gaming sector ATI do very well, and as far as OEM stuff theyre doing well too, its just in the casual sector they dont seem to be doing too well. Ati need to get their logo on more games, and have a "the way its meant to be played" type slogan and logo.

 

[Alaa]

Originally posted by: gersson
7900 GT is not way faster than a x1800xt unless you mean quake 4 or doom 3...

dnt forget that reviewers use stock 7900gt..most of ppl buy overclocked ones.

 

[CaiNaM]

Originally posted by: Alaa

Originally posted by: gersson
7900 GT is not way faster than a x1800xt unless you mean quake 4 or doom 3...

dnt forget that reviewers use stock 7900gt..most of ppl buy overclocked ones.

doesn't matter. the statement is still incorrect.

it's not even faster in q4 w/ latest drivers:

1024 4xaa/8xaf

7900GT 87fps
x1800xt 88fps

1600 4xaa/8xaf

7900GT 65fps
x1800xt 63fps

this is the "overclocked" 7900 GT XXX edition from XFX with a core clock speed of 560MHz and memory clocked at 825MHz (1.65GHz DDR) - 130mhz core increase and 660mhz mem increase over a reference 7900GT.

the "reference" 7900 GT would obviously get spanked.

Q4 Benchmarks

 

[Dman877]

An overclocked 7900GT at 550 core is about equal to the X1800XT at stock in games like Oblvivion, Fear, CoD2, etc. GT powns the ati in D3/Q4 and flight sims. Still, you can oc the X1800 too. Whoeever said the GT is way faster than an X1800 needs to check some reviews.

7900GT vs X1800XT 512

 

[TraumaRN]

Newegg as of about 11:15am had about 7 models of the 7900GTX in stock so supply for that is looking up....

However the 7900GT is selling like hotcakes they only have one model in stock right now...yesterday at this time there were 7 models in stock....

 

[tvdang7]

well i rememeber when the x1900 came out the first day or 2 they sold i dont rememeber the number......20000? 50000? iono. thats alot to me. im sure ati was out selling nvidia when that came out. and x800 gto was out selling.......and hte 6800 gs was out selling. what ever(not just anything of course x1600 x1300 7300) is new it out sells.

 

[Skott]

I would say marketing-wise ATI isnt doing as well as it could. nVidia certainly does a better job at it.

 

[GTaudiophile]

Here's my recent upgrade path:

ATI Radeon 9600XT -> eVGA GeForce 7800GT OC (new machine) -> eVGA 7900GT OC (Step-Up).

Now, I went nVidia this time for two reasons: 1) I felt an nVidia GPU would go best with my ASUS A8N-SLI motherboard (nForce 4). 2) The 7800GT offered the best price/performance ratio at the time IMO.

With that said, The image quality on my Radeon 9600XT was more "radiant" I would say, in terms of colors. I would say I also prefer the IQ my Radeon provided over my 7900GT. As for driver performance, I never had problems with ATI's drivers, and I haven't had any problems with nVidia's. I do like the fact that the 7900GT draws less power and produces less heat than ATI's current crop. I remain open to both brands.

But I will add this. I know I am one of MANY who realizes that AMD has been the performance leader with their X2 processors. And I am one of many who knows that nVidia supplies the best motherboards for AMD processors. So I think the fact that AMD has been on top now for a few years has helped nVidia more than ATI. And I fault ATI for that. It's taken them quite a while to get a really good chipset to market. And WTF is with their South Bridge? CrossFire also leaves a lot to be desired compared to SLI! These are two big fronts that have been looking ATI in the face for quite some, and it's anyone's guess why they haven't stepped up their efforts to combat these issues.

And ATI has also seemingly let nVidia have the most lucrative $300 price point. I mean, where is the X1900GT? Or X1900XL? Had this been available late last year, I probably would have bought one instead. I didn't want to spend $500+ on an X1900XT!

 

[otispunkmeyer]

i heard this a while ago

7900's selling like hot cakes, selling more than can be made, and its not because the fabs arent trying.

Ati do have the better product (at the high end with the x1900) right now, but its like AMD and intel, its all well and good if you have the best product, but its worthless if your marketing department operates with the same panache as an afternoon drizzle

marketing is everything, you can sell lumps of sh!t if you market it well enough, and there will be people to buy it.

 

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally posted by: CaiNaM

Originally posted by: Alaa

Originally posted by: gersson
7900 GT is not way faster than a x1800xt unless you mean quake 4 or doom 3...

dnt forget that reviewers use stock 7900gt..most of ppl buy overclocked ones.

doesn't matter. the statement is still incorrect.

it's not even faster in q4 w/ latest drivers:

1024 4xaa/8xaf

7900GT 87fps
x1800xt 88fps

1600 4xaa/8xaf

7900GT 65fps
x1800xt 63fps

this is the "overclocked" 7900 GT XXX edition from XFX with a core clock speed of 560MHz and memory clocked at 825MHz (1.65GHz DDR) - 130mhz core increase and 660mhz mem increase over a reference 7900GT.

the "reference" 7900 GT would obviously get spanked.

Q4 Benchmarks

while the numbers point in ATi's favour

for all intents and puproses, the cards are pretty well matched, and no ones going to be able to tell the difference when sat playing games

 

[otispunkmeyer]

Originally posted by: DeathBUA
Newegg as of about 11:15am had about 7 models of the 7900GTX in stock so supply for that is looking up....

However the 7900GT is selling like hotcakes they only have one model in stock right now...yesterday at this time there were 7 models in stock....

its not suprising, everyones caught on to the unleashing the beast within the 7900gt, since the volt mods are painfully easy..........i think the possibility of more speed than the 7900GTX for less money than a 7900GTX is probably whats causing people to buy them up

 

[5150Joker]

Does anyone here actually buy a lot of pancakes/hotcakes? I don't so I'm wondering why that term is so frequently used.

 

[Madellga]

One must compare a 256mb card with another. The 512mb x 256mb will create a gap at higher resolutions and goodies on.

I've seen here a Sapphire X1800XT 256mb. That would be a good comparison to the GT.

 

[CaiNaM]

Originally posted by: Dman877
An overclocked 7900GT at 550 core is about equal to the X1800XT at stock in games like Oblvivion, Fear, CoD2, etc. GT powns the ati in D3/Q4 and flight sims. Still, you can oc the X1800 too. Whoeever said the GT is way faster than an X1800 needs to check some reviews.

7900GT vs X1800XT 512

wow.. contradict yourself with your own example?

q4 tests you linked to show @ 1024 & 1280 they are on par (same as the results i linked earlier) tho the 1600 bench show some discrepency with FS showing the GT with about 15% faster.

the oblivion benches show the GT getting it's ass kicked:

HDR, 1280, 8xAF (foliage)

x1800XT 51.6
7900GT 31.8

at various resolutions the XT beats the GT by 15- 28fps! you call that "about equal"?

while i like FS, that's a poor test to reference anyway as they don't state what clocks the GT was running,

tho the 150mHz oc they got on the gto is pretty awesome, although @ 250 msrp it's priced about the same as the 256mb x1800xt so you should get the same type of performance, lol...

 

[evolucion8]

Originally posted by: 5150Joker

Does anyone here actually buy a lot of pancakes/hotcakes? I don't so I'm wondering why that term is so frequently used.


LOL

 

[professor1942]

I couldn't find an X1800XT for anywhere near the price of the XFX 7900GT I picked up (unless I wanted to order from a US retailer and pay duty and shipping etc. which would defeat the purpose). ATI may make the better cards, but it doesn't mean anything if you can't get one at a reasonable price.

 

[zephyrprime]

(wtf? I didn't mean to post. how did this happen?)

 

[Stoneburner]

Why do people act like nvidia cards are the only ones that can be overclocked? the x1800 and x1900 overclock very well and scale well.

 

[openwheelformula1]

because the G70 is more overclockable due to it's higher efficiency. Those simple volt-mod techniques are a plus as well. Let's face it 7600 and 7900 series are simply better for the price than ATI's counter parts.