AMD beliefs: DirectX 11 Radeons pleasantly fast

[Schmide]

Originally posted by: OCguy
Except GT200 cleaned up as far as power usage due to the 2D downclocking.

The GT200 really only became power to 3d performance competitive after the die shrink. The 4870 is crap in idle power usage (about 30w over what it should be), the 4890 is on par with nvidia's 2d.

You missed the point of my post. Both nVidia and ATI generally follow the same power to performance curve for almost all cards regardless of fanboisim.

 

[lavaheadache]

Originally posted by: Keysplayr

Originally posted by: Schmide

Originally posted by: ShawnD1
Also, doesn't it seem weird that in a debate about performance, Anandtech is not referenced? In Anand's tests, 4890 and 275 seem fairly equal. Fallout 3 and GRID are the only ones that consistently work better on the 4890. Neither is "crushed" by the other.

:sun::sun::sun:

and the darkness cleared.

This is pretty much what it is.
The AMD club wants the 4890 to have a tag on it that says "Dangerously close to GTX285".
The Nvidia club wants the 4890 to be beaten by the GTX275 not even considering the 285.

That's pretty much it.
I've said it before, these cards, the 4890 and 275 are too close to really call a winner in gaming performance.

I agree completely with you keys... The main problem I see here is that there is particular member who continuously tries to start controversy by spreading misinformation. I personally am getting tired of coming in Video and having to read this unnamed person's pledge of alliegence. I just don't get it.

 

[Spike]

Wow... this thread is on it's third page (with max posts per page setting) and not a single post in the entire third page (all ~27 of them) talk about AMD's DX 11 cards. Last time I checked that was the thread title, not "4890 vs GTX 275". Can we please get back on topic? If the usual suspects want to have it out on the red vs green, can you please do it in another thread?

As for the topic at hand I am curious what their phrasing means. I really want AMD to do well this next gen and not just for cost purposes but also for the innovation competition generates. The brass there are not stupid, if they are actually happy with the performance, and it's not just PR spin, then the card should be a good one.

 

[SSChevy2001]

Originally posted by: thilan29

Originally posted by: OCguy
Except GT200 cleaned up as far as power usage due to the 2D downclocking.

That's very easy to do with software if it is a priority for you. Anyone running something like Rivatuner or Tray Tools could do this.

Exactly and what's even more amazing is the 4870 when underclocked will actually used less power on idle than a 4850.

http://www.computerbase.de/new...i/hd_4800_stromsparen/

 

[evolucion8]

Originally posted by: Spike
Wow... this thread is on it's third page (with max posts per page setting) and not a single post in the entire third page (all ~27 of them) talk about AMD's DX 11 cards. Last time I checked that was the thread title, not "4890 vs GTX 275". Can we please get back on topic? If the usual suspects want to have it out on the red vs green, can you please do it in another thread?

Agree. 🙂

As for the topic at hand I am curious what their phrasing means. I really want AMD to do well this next gen and not just for cost purposes but also for the innovation competition generates. The brass there are not stupid, if they are actually happy with the performance, and it's not just PR spin, then the card should be a good one.

Hopefully it should be competitive, now we will need the same pressure in the CPU market, times of charging more than $500 for a CPU are coming back, it's frightening.

Originally posted by: SSChevy2001
That's very easy to do with software if it is a priority for you. Anyone running something like Rivatuner or Tray Tools could do this.

Exactly and what's even more amazing is the 4870 when underclocked will actually used less power on idle than a 4850.

http://www.computerbase.de/new...i/hd_4800_stromsparen/

[/quote]

Probably the RV770 GPU's used on the HD 4870 has better characteristics like less leakage than their HD 4850 counterparts, or the GDDR5 consumes less power when idle or it could be that the HD 4870 PCB Power Distribution System are more efficient, don't know for sure.

 

[TC91]

The GDDR5 IS the power hog on the 4870/4890 cards. Underclocking the GDDR5 does wonders for power consumption on those cards except that screen flickering occurs when you change the clocks of the GDDR5 (could either be the GDDR5 memory itself or the memory controller on the RV770/RV790; guess we'll find out in the next generation) and some people (myself included) just cannot stand this screen flickering at all. All (or most) of the cards in the newer production runs have an updated BIOS that keeps the vram clocked the same across the board I believe.

I strongly believe that ATI/AMD did not underclock their 4800 series cards with GDDR5 in idle to prevent the screen flickering from occurring, as it would be absolutely unbearable if the card for example was constantly changing vram clocks by itself, resulting in constant screen flickering. This happened with my 4870 1GB before I figured out how to keep the GDDR5 clocks constant, especially when I was trying to open many videos (one after another) that were hardware accelerated by the card, resulting in an atrocious flicker each and everytime, and annoying me to no end, making the card seem to be broken or faulty. Users with a 4870 with an older BIOS can fix the flickering either by forcing constant vram clocks via software or a vBIOS update.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: SSChevy2001
Exactly and what's even more amazing is the 4870 when underclocked will actually used less power on idle than a 4850.

http://www.computerbase.de/new...i/hd_4800_stromsparen/

You can go below 550MHz on the core? I thought the lowest was 550?

EDIT: Just tried it...can only go to about 325 core and 200 mem or I get purple squares and it locks up.

 

[TC91]

Originally posted by: thilan29

Originally posted by: SSChevy2001
Exactly and what's even more amazing is the 4870 when underclocked will actually used less power on idle than a 4850.

http://www.computerbase.de/new...i/hd_4800_stromsparen/

You can go below 550MHz on the core? I thought the lowest was 550?

You can go as low as you want to on the core if you change the clocks in the vBIOS. I've successfully downclocked to 100mhz on my 4870 1GB's core but it did little to nothing to help power consumption so I brought it back up to 500mhz afterwards.

 

[nitromullet]

Originally posted by: evolucion8

Hopefully it should be competitive, now we will need the same pressure in the CPU market, times of charging more than $500 for a CPU are coming back, it's frightening.

I'm not really seeing this... In both the CPU and GPU markets we're enjoying unprecedented performance at a lower price than even a year ago.

Sure, you have CPUs like the i7 965, but you also have the i7 920 which is less than $300 for a top of the line CPU. ...Intel hasn't even launched the value i5/P55 segment yet.

Then you have AMD... Phenom II X4 940 + motherboard for $250! http://www.newegg.com/Product/...?ItemList=Combo.213790 That's a quad core CPU!

Graphics cards are the same story... 4890s for ~$160 AMIR, GTX 260 and 4870s for $150 without even a rebate. I don't see this changing in the near future. In this economy, value is going to play a role IMO. Sure, I think NV is still going to go after the crown (we'll see if they succeed), but I'm pretty sure there will be more price parity between ATI and NV next gen from the start.

 

[alyarb]

intel e6300 was $180 in 2007. that slot is now occupied by the Q8200 and Phenom 940. thanks deneb and congratulations.

 

[OCGuy]

Originally posted by: alyarb
intel e6300 was $180 in 2007. that slot is now occupied by the Q8200 and Phenom 940. thanks deneb and congratulations.

I think you may have posted in the wrong thread. Wrong sub-forum, even.

 

[alyarb]

i don't know how many of these sage scholars you have set to "ignore," but the discussion at hand happens to involve the proliferation of affordability in high end CPUs, particularly high-freq 45nm quads in recent months compared to low-freq 65nm duals popular just 2 years prior. at least the post above mine suggests it. think about ground previous architectures achieved in a 2 year period. netburst went from 1.5ghz to 2.8 GHz. how much did a 2.8 GHz P4 cost? $500 USD. In 1.5 years AMD went from single-core 130nm K8 to 90 nm dual core. I think in the early days of dual core the X2 4400 was the chip to get, and it was $537. The performance sweet spot from a cost benefit standpoint is far lower in 2009 even if you consider an i7, and none of this would be possible without AMD doing what they do best, which is coming within 5% of the leader at 50-70% of the cost. they tend to do this with GPUs also. I was merely supporting nitromullet's post with an example and didn't think anything needed to be spelled out.

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: thilan29

Originally posted by: OCguy
Except GT200 cleaned up as far as power usage due to the 2D downclocking.

That's very easy to do with software if it is a priority for you. Anyone running something like Rivatuner or Tray Tools could do this.

From what I gathered from some of the ATi people at Beyond3D, the problem with the 4000-series is that the GDDR5 downclocking doesn't work. That's why it's relatively powerhungry in idle mode.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: Scali
From what I gathered from some of the ATi people at Beyond3D, the problem with the 4000-series is that the GDDR5 downclocking doesn't work. That's why it's relatively powerhungry in idle mode.

Works fine for me with ATI Tray Tools. I have the memory at 200MHz (down from 900MHz stock) when idle. I know there was some issues with the driver continuously switching clocks causing the flickering but I think that was solved already.

 

[TC91]

Originally posted by: thilan29

Originally posted by: Scali
From what I gathered from some of the ATi people at Beyond3D, the problem with the 4000-series is that the GDDR5 downclocking doesn't work. That's why it's relatively powerhungry in idle mode.

Works fine for me with ATI Tray Tools. I have the memory at 200MHz (down from 900MHz stock) when idle. I know there was some issues with the driver continuously switching clocks causing the flickering but I think that was solved already.

I do not believe it was a driver issue, rather an issue with the vBIOS' power profiles.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: TC91
I do not believe it was a driver issue, rather an issue with the vBIOS' power profiles.

Oh okay. I'm not really sure as I've used Tray Tools from day one back in January to fix the clocks to what I want in 2D and 3D modes.

 

[ShawnD1]

Originally posted by: nitromullet
I'm not really seeing this... In both the CPU and GPU markets we're enjoying unprecedented performance at a lower price than even a year ago.

Sure, you have CPUs like the i7 965, but you also have the i7 920 which is less than $300 for a top of the line CPU. ...Intel hasn't even launched the value i5/P55 segment yet.

Top end CPUs have always been around $300 except for a few oddballs.
Anandtech E6600 - $316 in 2006 (best dual core at the time)
Anandtech Q6600 - $266 in 2007 (best quad core at the time)
Anandtech P4 640 - $273 in 2005 (Intel's top single cores at the time)
i7 920 now carries the flag for something like $300

GPUs are about the same as well.
Anandtech GeForce 6800 Ultra - $540 in 2004 (nv's top card)
Anandtech GeForce 7800 GTX - $500 in 2005 (nv's top card)
Anandtech GeForce 8800 GTX - $650 in 2006 (nv's top card)
Anandtech GeForce 8800 Ultra - $830 in 2007 (I actually know someone who bought this card)

I can't get newegg to respond but I'm pretty sure the GTX 295 is some retarded price like the above cards. There really hasn't been much change in the past 10 years. Top cards are still $500 and as usual the bulk of the market is in a very predicable price range around $200.

 

[Dribble]

Originally posted by: alyarb
i don't know how many of these sage scholars you have set to "ignore," but the discussion at hand happens to involve the proliferation of affordability in high end CPUs, particularly high-freq 45nm quads in recent months compared to low-freq 65nm duals popular just 2 years prior. at least the post above mine suggests it. think about ground previous architectures achieved in a 2 year period. netburst went from 1.5ghz to 2.8 GHz. how much did a 2.8 GHz P4 cost? $500 USD. In 1.5 years AMD went from single-core 130nm K8 to 90 nm dual core. I think in the early days of dual core the X2 4400 was the chip to get, and it was $537. The performance sweet spot from a cost benefit standpoint is far lower in 2009 even if you consider an i7, and none of this would be possible without AMD doing what they do best, which is coming within 5% of the leader at 50-70% of the cost. they tend to do this with GPUs also. I was merely supporting nitromullet's post with an example and didn't think anything needed to be spelled out.

/me looks at thread title and wonders what alyarb is on about?

 

[Creig]

Originally posted by: ShawnD1
Oh come on, let's not get silly. Radeon 4890 is $195 on newegg. GTX 275 is $205 and many of them come in COD 5. So basically it's $10 apart.
Ironically you an still buy a Radeon 4850 for $190 and GTX 260 for $285. When comparing the prices I usually just look at the cheapest one and say that's the price of the card. They might cost a little more if you have a certain brand preference.

Well, I provided a link to a current thread in the Hot Deals section where a 4890 OC could be had for an end price of $125. I haven't seen any GTX275 deals that get close to that. What's so silly about it? Just because the GTX275 and HD4890 are close in price on Newegg doesn't mean there aren't other e-tailers out there that have better deals.

Originally posted by: ShawnD1
Also, doesn't it seem weird that in a debate about performance, Anandtech is not referenced? In Anand's tests, 4890 and 275 seem fairly equal. Fallout 3 and GRID are the only ones that consistently work better on the 4890. Neither is "crushed" by the other.

That's pretty much sums up my feelings on the two cards. One is faster in a few games, the other is faster in a few different games. But on the whole, they're roughly equal.

 

[SSChevy2001]

Originally posted by: thilan29
You can go below 550MHz on the core? I thought the lowest was 550?

EDIT: Just tried it...can only go to about 325 core and 200 mem or I get purple squares and it locks up.

Yeah you can go below 550mhz on the core, but there's little to no difference in powersaving. The lowest I can go with my safely is 200/200mhz, but I normally run 550/200mhz instead.

 

[SlowSpyder]

Originally posted by: Creig

Originally posted by: ShawnD1
Oh come on, let's not get silly. Radeon 4890 is $195 on newegg. GTX 275 is $205 and many of them come in COD 5. So basically it's $10 apart.
Ironically you an still buy a Radeon 4850 for $190 and GTX 260 for $285. When comparing the prices I usually just look at the cheapest one and say that's the price of the card. They might cost a little more if you have a certain brand preference.

Well, I provided a link to a current thread in the Hot Deals section where a 4890 OC could be had for an end price of $125. I haven't seen any GTX275 deals that get close to that. What's so silly about it? Just because the GTX275 and HD4890 are close in price on Newegg doesn't mean there aren't other e-tailers out there that have better deals.

Originally posted by: ShawnD1
Also, doesn't it seem weird that in a debate about performance, Anandtech is not referenced? In Anand's tests, 4890 and 275 seem fairly equal. Fallout 3 and GRID are the only ones that consistently work better on the 4890. Neither is "crushed" by the other.

That's pretty much sums up my feelings on the two cards. One is faster in a few games, the other is faster in a few different games. But on the whole, they're roughly equal.

Yea, it seems people continue to gloss over that. The GTX275 and 4890 are very close to equals (even though some people feel that the 48x0 series aren't meant to compete with the GTX2x0 cards). I'd say the 4890 and GTX275 are both very close to the GTX280, in fact often faster. But the 4890 can be found for outstanding prices compared to the others. $125 for a factory overclocked 4890 is just an incredible deal.

 

[evolucion8]

The prices for the HD 4890 are so good that sometimes the upgrade itch starts to bother me a bit, but unless if I can sell my card and I'm not interested in Crossfire yet, its barely an upgrade, specially that all my games runs maxed at my LCD resolution.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: evolucion8
The prices for the HD 4890 are so good that sometimes the upgrade itch starts to bother me a bit, but unless if I can sell my card and I'm not interested in Crossfire yet, its barely an upgrade, specially that all my games runs maxed at my LCD resolution.

CrossFireX is fun; you can max out 19x12 with 4xAA/16xAF with a lot more *fluidity* then you are getting now

4870[O/C'd] + 4890 is very close to true 4890 CF
- and you get to laugh at the next generation of GPUs
[-untill they come down in price 😛]

 

[SlowSpyder]

Originally posted by: evolucion8
The prices for the HD 4890 are so good that sometimes the upgrade itch starts to bother me a bit, but unless if I can sell my card and I'm not interested in Crossfire yet, its barely an upgrade, specially that all my games runs maxed at my LCD resolution.

Yea, I'm in the same boat. I was perfectly happy with my 512MB 4870 when I had a 22" monitor, but now that I have this 26" 1920x1200 I think I want a 1GB card. With the 4890's so cheap and what I can get for my 4870 it'd be a cheap upgrade. The only thing holding me back is next gen is right around the corner.

 

[soccerballtux]

Originally posted by: apoppin

Originally posted by: evolucion8
The prices for the HD 4890 are so good that sometimes the upgrade itch starts to bother me a bit, but unless if I can sell my card and I'm not interested in Crossfire yet, its barely an upgrade, specially that all my games runs maxed at my LCD resolution.

CrossFireX is fun; you can max out 19x12 with 4xAA/16xAF with a lot more *fluidity* then you are getting now

4870[O/C'd] + 4890 is very close to true 4890 CF
- and you get to laugh at the next generation of GPUs
[-untill they come down in price 😛]

With my new Crossfire supporting board I'm dying to get 2x 4870's, but I've convinced myself to hold out for the 5-gen and get the top line of that and then go Crossfire in a year or so.