7950 GX2 coming in 2 weeks

[anandtechrocks]

Originally posted by: Crusader
Hm I dont see what the problem is, this card is going to slice and dice anything ATI has.
If you dont recognize that fact now.. you will be. All I'm saying is there is going to finally be a clear performance leader since the XTX/GTX are so close overall.
I say its the king, you can call it whatever you want, but you'll be seeing this fact laid out soon for all to see.

Yes it will be the performance leader for its price, but... it's the only card available for that amount. (I'd also be supprised if we see it for $600, expecially after the 7800GTX 512 craze)

I personally would never buy this card. One of the things I like about video cards is getting more for your money than stock performance (OCing anyone?). I doubt this card will overclock at all.

 

[imported_Crusader]

Originally posted by: anandtechrocks

Originally posted by: Crusader
Hm I dont see what the problem is, this card is going to slice and dice anything ATI has.
If you dont recognize that fact now.. you will be. All I'm saying is there is going to finally be a clear performance leader since the XTX/GTX are so close overall.
I say its the king, you can call it whatever you want, but you'll be seeing this fact laid out soon for all to see.

Yes it will be the performance leader for its price, but... it's the only card available for that amount. (I'd also be supprised if we see it for $600, expecially after the 7800GTX 512 craze)

I personally would never buy this card. One of the things I like about video cards is getting more for your money than stock performance (OCing anyone?). I doubt this card will overclock at all.

I think this is THE card to get.. why?

• -You then have the option to run Quad SLI if you wish, which puts you FAR FAR beyond anything ATI can muster

• -DX10 is not around the corner, Vista isnt due till fall or later

• -DX10 games wont even start to be released until ~6mo later

• -It will be 2 years or so when the DX10 equivalent of the important engines (Source/D3/UnrealEngine) are available and DX10 is a necessity.

• -DX10 wont be available on XP, not everyone is going to move to Vista AND DX10 cards very fast.. developers know this

9700/9800 cards pretty much suck today.. and if you bought one thinking you'd be able to ride out the DX9 era you were nuts.
Would have been better off waiting for HL2/D3 to be RELEASED.. then purchasing a Geforce6 (the leader in SM3 DX9C performance at the time). A GF6 is still a respectable card today, a 9700/9800 never really got to enjoy its DX9 performance "lead" due to a lack of DX9 games.

Its always best to wait for the games that you need or want next gen hardware for, then purchase. It will make complete sense for FartCry fans to pick up a DX10 card when Crysis is released though.. I wont because I never enjoyed FC (though I do own the game).

 

[beggerking]

Originally posted by: 5150Joker
What's the point of this "dual core" card when G80 is aroud the corner this summer? What a waste of money!

what is the point of this crossfire / HDR+AA when R600 is around the corner?
what a waste of money!

 

[ronnn]

Originally posted by: beggerking


what is the point of this crossfire / HDR+AA when R600 is around the corner?
what a waste of money!

I agree, spending that type of money without getting HDR+AA is bizzare and stupid. So lets hope this 7950 improves on lacklustre IQ - so nv can get back in the game.

 

[toyota]

Originally posted by: ronnn

Originally posted by: beggerking


what is the point of this crossfire / HDR+AA when R600 is around the corner?
what a waste of money!

I agree, spending that type of money without getting HDR+AA is bizzare and stupid. So lets hope this 7950 improves on lacklustre IQ - so nv can get back in the game.

how would it improve IQ?

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Crusader
A GF6 is still a respectable card today, a 9700/9800 never really got to enjoy its DX9 performance "lead" due to a lack of DX9 games.

Its always best to wait for the games that you need or want next gen hardware for, then purchase. It will make complete sense for FartCry fans to pick up a DX10 card when Crysis is released though.. I wont because I never enjoyed FC (though I do own the game).

The Geforce 6 competed against the 9700/9800??? I thought it competed against the X800/X850???

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: toyota

Originally posted by: ronnn

Originally posted by: beggerking


what is the point of this crossfire / HDR+AA when R600 is around the corner?
what a waste of money!

I agree, spending that type of money without getting HDR+AA is bizzare and stupid. So lets hope this 7950 improves on lacklustre IQ - so nv can get back in the game.

how would it improve IQ?

I think he was being sarcastic...in reponse to beggerking's sarcastic comment.

 

[ronnn]

Sorry thought I read that one of the nv types here were saying that the 7950 would have HDR + AA - that would be a major catch up on the features front for nv.

 

[anandtechrocks]

Originally posted by: Crusader

I think this is THE card to get.. why?

• -You then have the option to run Quad SLI if you wish, which puts you FAR FAR beyond anything ATI can muster

For most of us $1200-1500 for Quad SLI is not an "option." (atleast not for me)

 

[josh6079]

Originally posted by Crusader

I think this is THE card to get.. why?

-You then have the option to run Quad SLI if you wish, which puts you FAR FAR beyond anything ATI can muster

According to this thread, not really.

Quad SLI preview Link

The point Crusader is that it has the potential to definatley beat any previous Nvidia or ATI rig (it should, it would have four GPUs) but that may not be able to happen until very near the end of its life. Yes, I know DX10 is not going to be the primary and most popular thing in everyones rig once it hits, but by the time it is in the majority of systems the 7900GX2 might just finally be getting effecient at using its massive 4 GPUs.

 

[buzzsaw13]

Originally posted by: Crusader
Hm I dont see what the problem is, this card is going to slice and dice anything ATI has.
If you dont recognize that fact now.. you will be. All I'm saying is there is going to finally be a clear performance leader since the XTX/GTX are so close overall.
I say its the king, you can call it whatever you want, but you'll be seeing this fact laid out soon for all to see.

It'll be the performance leader, but who has the cash to shell out for it? I remember last December ASUS came out with a card with 2 7800GT GPU's on one card. It beat the 7800GTX512 at the time, but was horribly expensive and no one bought it. Same thing is going to happen with this card.

 

[Howard]

Originally posted by: Ronin

Originally posted by: munky
Well, if you cant beat 'em with 1 card, gotta try it with 2 cards... slapped together to have a faint resemblance of 1 card.

And use less power. And be more quiet. And run cooler. And have better performance.

Keep tryin, munky.

I'm fairly certain 2 7900 cores use much more power than a single X1900XT. Accordingly, the heat output is much higher, requiring either higher operating temps or louder noise output.

 

[imported_Crusader]

Originally posted by: josh6079

Originally posted by Crusader

I think this is THE card to get.. why?

-You then have the option to run Quad SLI if you wish, which puts you FAR FAR beyond anything ATI can muster

According to this thread, not really.

Quad SLI preview Link

The point Crusader is that it has the potential to definatley beat any previous Nvidia or ATI rig (it should, it would have four GPUs) but that may not be able to happen until very near the end of its life. Yes, I know DX10 is not going to be the primary and most popular thing in everyones rig once it hits, but by the time it is in the majority of systems the 7900GX2 might just finally be getting effecient at using its massive 4 GPUs.

Theres nothing in that link besides meaningless synthetic benchmarking. I'd say my 5 points still stand.

I will admit it would be nice if a card as fast as the GX2 had HDR+AA to really leverage its power, but few popular games supporting it (and others that allow HDR+AA on any hardware like HL2), then theres really no point.

The 7950GX2 looks like the first card with enough horsepower to allow HDR+AA as a viable option.
Quad SLI would make HDR+AA passe.

I'd say I'm interested to see the G80 8950GX2. Until then, this is a great bang for buck purchase and has a great expansion option with Quad SLI.

By the time HDR+AA has been integrated into major game engines like Crysis or Unreal Engine 3.0, cards will be performing like the 7950GX2 as an average.. and thats the kind of power they really need.

Its a shame, but its probably impossible for ATI to create a card with the level of power like the 7950GX2 due to their power/heat/noise issues that currently exist.
I'd like to see a GX2 with HDR+AA, but its not going to happen until Nvidia creates that card with the G80.
Until then, this is a great option.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Crusader
Its a shame, but its probably impossible for ATI to create a card with the level of power like the 7950GX2 due to their power/heat/noise issues that currently exist.

A single X1900XTX matches a 7900GT SLI in CERTAIN games such as Oblivion and Battlefield 2...so ATI have ALREADY created a SINGLE GPU card with that level of power. Granted a 7950GX2 will probably be faster than a 7900GT SLI setup but it won't completely massacre an X1900 card in certain games.

 

[bjc112]

Originally posted by: munky

Originally posted by: Ronin

Originally posted by: munky
Well, if you cant beat 'em with 1 card, gotta try it with 2 cards... slapped together to have a faint resemblance of 1 card.

And use less power. And be more quiet. And run cooler. And have better performance.

Keep tryin, munky.

Do I care if they slap 10 cards together and call it the gf79999gtxxxx nvownsjoo edition, and it runs at room temps while using 1 watt of power? There'a absolutely nothing that impresses me about multiple video cards, regardless of how they're connected together.

What about multiple CPU's? What is not to like?

 

[josh6079]

Originally posted by: Crusader

Originally posted by: josh6079

Originally posted by Crusader

I think this is THE card to get.. why?

-You then have the option to run Quad SLI if you wish, which puts you FAR FAR beyond anything ATI can muster

According to this thread, not really.

Quad SLI preview Link

The point Crusader is that it has the potential to definatley beat any previous Nvidia or ATI rig (it should, it would have four GPUs) but that may not be able to happen until very near the end of its life. Yes, I know DX10 is not going to be the primary and most popular thing in everyones rig once it hits, but by the time it is in the majority of systems the 7900GX2 might just finally be getting effecient at using its massive 4 GPUs.

Theres nothing in that link besides meaningless synthetic benchmarking. I'd say my 5 points still stand.

5 points? What do you have a score board or something? Figures you would say evidence that conflicts with your personal views is meaningless.

I will admit it would be nice if a card as fast as the GX2 had HDR+AA to really leverage its power, but few popular games supporting it (and others that allow HDR+AA on any hardware like HL2), then theres really no point.

The 7950GX2 looks like the first card with enough horsepower to allow HDR+AA as a viable option.
Quad SLI would make HDR+AA passe.

Really, that's interesting. I'm doing just fine in Oblivion with 4xAA/16X HQAF and HDR. Horsepower? It should IT HAS FOUR GPU's! I'm not disagreeing that it has more "horsepower", just that it is yet another set of 7 series GPU's put together with, so far, an inefficient design. When they construct some better drivers, or even configure a different chipset, then Quad SLI can really take off on its mulitGPU rendering potential. The only thing is, that might not happen until DX10 is popular and in which case, a G80 or R600 may be doing something better.

I'd say I'm interested to see the G80 8950GX2. Until then, this is a great bang for buck purchase and has a great expansion option with Quad SLI.

By the time HDR+AA has been integrated into major game engines like Crysis or Unreal Engine 3.0, cards will be performing like the 7950GX2 as an average.. and thats the kind of power they really need.

How would you know what kind of power it really needs? You're the type that would cut off your leg before buying a devil ATI card. And if your going to go off of others benchmarks testing the performance with HDR+AA turned on on an ATI card, then how can you go ahead and discredit another benchmark showing that Quad SLI sometimes loses to its own 7900GTX SLI or X1900 Xfire?

Its a shame, but its probably impossible for ATI to create a card with the level of power like the 7950GX2 due to their power/heat/noise issues that currently exist.
I'd like to see a GX2 with HDR+AA, but its not going to happen until Nvidia creates that card with the G80.
Until then, this is a great option.

Don't even get me started on this, as ATI's latest card (X1900GT) has the exact same cooler used on Nvidia's 78 series. As for the noise, the stock coolers for the 7900GT's weren't quiet either. Power IS impressive for Nvidia, as their cards don't seem to need much, yet most seem to discard this as soon as they volt-mod or throw another one in the system. Nvidia does not have that trinity of yours with every card.

 

[Cookie Monster]

Fact is a quad SLi consumes less power than X1900XTX crossfire. (according to techpowerup).

A 7900GT consumes 48W at load. The only reason these cards consume more power is because of the 1 gb GDDR3 memory while the 7900GT uses 256mb of GDDR3 memory. (big difference in both heat output/power consumption).

I know for a fact that the drivers for quad SLi are not up to par hence it losing to GTX SLi or Crossfire in some benchmarks. But it did show some potentional.

Thilan29 - a single XTX/GTX already does over 80 fps in 16x12 4xAA 16xAF in BF2. Oblivion seems to favor ATI although some new FW 87 drivers (beta however) seem to improve both GRAW and Oblivion performance by alot.

I think im going to reserve my opinion for this card til i see real life performance on May 30th.

 

[fierydemise]

Hey you guys just ignore Crusader, he's trolling he'll go away (hopefully) if you quit giving him attention

 

[Munky]

Originally posted by: bjc112

Originally posted by: munky

Originally posted by: Ronin

Originally posted by: munky
Well, if you cant beat 'em with 1 card, gotta try it with 2 cards... slapped together to have a faint resemblance of 1 card.

And use less power. And be more quiet. And run cooler. And have better performance.

Keep tryin, munky.

Do I care if they slap 10 cards together and call it the gf79999gtxxxx nvownsjoo edition, and it runs at room temps while using 1 watt of power? There'a absolutely nothing that impresses me about multiple video cards, regardless of how they're connected together.

What about multiple CPU's? What is not to like?

Actually, I did switch to a dual core cpu, and I'm not too excited about it either. Yes, it encodes movies in less than an hour, and dual cores really pay off in image processing applications like Photoshop or Fireworks, but in everyday use I don't notice much difference. And I dont do any crazy multitasking like running an AV scan while burning a dvd while gaming while running F@H... you get the idea.

Anyway, I'm sure in the next 6 months no single core cpu will come even close to equaling the performance of my dual cores in smp-aware apps. The same cant said about video cards, where a single high end card often equals of beats 2 high end cards of previous generation.

 

[Soccerman06]

Originally posted by: fierydemise
Hey you guys just ignore Crusader, he's trolling he'll go away (hopefully) if you quit giving him attention

Rollo never went away, atleast until he was caught.

 

[JustinMcG56712]

I think you are all missing one very important factor: $600 for a card/s that give you the SAME visuals, at twice to three times the price of a SINGLE card that can do the same exact things, is ridiculous.

There is absolutly NO difference between 100 to 150 frames. Beyond 60 FPS you see absolutly NO performance gain and experience NO lag. Why pay so much money for a card/s that gives you the same visuals, and same performance (lag free) for so much more?

This 7900GX2/7950GTX2 or whatever it's called, it pointless and shows how desperate NVIDIA might be, or, they just want to give a new card out to the market, considering Vista and DX10 won't be out for a LONG time.

As we have seen before, where NVIDIA leads, ATI follows, and eventually surpasses them. We have seen this with the 6800 series launch, only then to have the X850 series come out and beat it, and then with the 7 series launch, only to have the X1K series come out and beat it. And then SLI, after that CrossFire came out, and offers better performance. So, NVIDIA just gave ATI another great plan, I see an X1950XTX2 or whatever you wish to call it coming out in say August or possibly September.

Infact, I'm calling it, between August and September, or even earlier, ATI will launch a double GPU on a single PCB. And of course, will offer better performance.

 

[Praxis1452]

Originally posted by: JustinMcG56712
I think you are all missing one very important factor: $600 for a card/s that give you the SAME visuals, at twice to three times the price of a SINGLE card that can do the same exact things, is ridiculous.

There is absolutly NO difference between 100 to 150 frames. Beyond 60 FPS you see absolutly NO performance gain and experience NO lag. Why pay so much money for a card/s that gives you the same visuals, and same performance (lag free) for so much more?

This 7900GX2/7950GTX2 or whatever it's called, it pointless and shows how desperate NVIDIA might be, or, they just want to give a new card out to the market, considering Vista and DX10 won't be out for a LONG time.

As we have seen before, where NVIDIA leads, ATI follows, and eventually surpasses them. We have seen this with the 6800 series launch, only then to have the X850 series come out and beat it, and then with the 7 series launch, only to have the X1K series come out and beat it. And then SLI, after that CrossFire came out, and offers better performance. So, NVIDIA just gave ATI another great plan, I see an X1950XTX2 or whatever you wish to call it coming out in say August or possibly September.

Infact, I'm calling it, between August and September, or even earlier, ATI will launch a double GPU on a single PCB. And of course, will offer better performance.

lol it's like japanese companies vs American companies. America invents japan makes it better

 

[josh6079]

I see Nvidia here as Sega, great gaming company but gives other ones good ideas. Those other companies, in this analogy, Nintendo come along and do something better. Then the process starts all over again.

While this is another 7 series GPU, it does offer a bit of a different feature, but only in Quad SLI. 32xAA is something no other set up can do. Whether or not you can notice the difference between 32x and 4x/8x is another debate. Some claim not to notice much of a difference between 8xAF and 16xAF, but others do. This, I think, will be the same case with such a feature.

Ah, competition. Love it.

 

[imported_Crusader]

Originally posted by: fierydemise
Hey you guys just ignore Crusader, he's trolling he'll go away (hopefully) if you quit giving him attention

And let an ATI troll like yourself get away with spreading your propaganda? I dont think so.

 

[buzzsaw13]

Originally posted by: Crusader

Originally posted by: fierydemise
Hey you guys just ignore Crusader, he's trolling he'll go away (hopefully) if you quit giving him attention

And let an ATI troll like yourself get away with spreading your propaganda? I dont think so.

He hasn't said anything pro ATI at all in this thread, wheres the propoganda?