Flip-Chip 5600U finally here

[tapir]

Finally, the 400/800 clock Flip-Chip version of the 5600 Ultra is available. I just spotted a Gainward model at googlegear, a little expensive at $230, especially considering the 9700 cards at ~$220/$250 which will probably slaughter this one. Still, didn't know if any nVidia fans who were looking for this had seen it.

LinkLink

 

[Pete]

I think the PNY for $250 @ CompUSA is also the new one.

 

[AmdInside]

Its not a bad price for a mid-level card. I would rather have the Gainward. PNY's support is horrible.

 

[chsh1ca]

Originally posted by: AmdInside
Its not a bad price for a mid-level card. I would rather have the Gainward. PNY's support is horrible.

That's true. Thing is, its no longer a mid-level card. The competition has four models out that are faster already, two of them almost a year old.

 

[videoclone]

i want one .. do they give these things away free

 

[Pete]

I don't consider $200 for a 5600U a good price if you can buy a 9700 for $20 more, or a 9800 for $60 more.

 

[modedepe]

Originally posted by: Pete
I don't consider $200 for a 5600U a good price if you can buy a 9700 for $20 more, or a 9800 for $60 more.

I agree

 

[nRollo]

nVidia themselves has a better option out for just a few coins more: the 5800 regular. It's a LOT better than a 5600 anything, selling for $258 new now, and offers approximately 9700 np performance, better when OCd.

You'd have to be nuts to buy a 5600 for $230- $250.

 

[DahDee]

I thought I saw somwhere a review of the 5600 Ultra (flip chip) that said it is a little monster, overclocks like crazy and kills the 5800 (in terms of value), which has apparently been replaced by the 5900 series. It's my understanding that the 5600 Ultra competes/compares well with the 9600 Pro, while the 5900 series competes with the 9800 series. Any of this true?

Edit: P.S. -- Best Buy also has the new PNY 5600 Ultra, for $249.99. Saw it there yesterday. I agree that's steep for this card. Seems to me that if it's supposed to compete with the 9600 Pro then it should be priced that way (<$200). I imagine the price will drop accordingly pretty quickly.

Edit 2: Well, this is a different review than the one I saw earlier, but it is a review of the flip-chip/revised 5600 Ultra. Pretty decent scores/remarks, although they didn't like the $299 pricetag being tossed around at the time of the review back in May:

http://firingsquad.gamers.com/hardware/e-vga_e-geforce_fx_5600_ultra/default.asp

Edit 3: Here's a review of the Gainward:

http://www.digit-life.com/articles2/gffx/gffx-10.html#p5

Excerpt:

"It's obvious that this card is unequaled when the AA and/or anisotropy are enabled (except the tests based on shader technologies). Remember that it's stupid to use modern accelerators without these quality improving functions enabled. "

I've had my eye on that Gainward for a few days and am really trying to talk myself into going with it over a 9600 Pro. Sapphire does make a 9600 Pro Ultimate, however, that is at Newegg for $199.....

 

[Pete]

Um, what review was that? The 5600U is a 5800 with the same core and memory clock speed, but half the (flexible) pipelines. The 5800 should be faster in just about any situation, much as the 9500P is much faster than the 9500.

Rollo is right, a $270 5800 is better nVidia option, and it comes with some good games. I'd still opt for a $256 9800, though.

 

[DahDee]

I'm just not sure folks understand how much improved the new 5600 Ultra is over the old one. There's apparently a big difference in stock performance and an even bigger difference in overclocking. I think once prices on the new Ultra drop under $200 it will be a very tempting option.

 

[DahDee]

Originally posted by: Pete
The 5600U is a 5800 with the same core and memory clock speed, but half the (flexible) pipelines.

It's my understanding that the flip chip 5600 Ultra is *not* a re-tooled 5800. Can anyone point me to more "official" info in this regard? Thanks.

 

[nRollo]

thought I saw somwhere a review of the 5600 Ultra (flip chip) that said it is a little monster, overclocks like crazy and kills the 5800, which is apparently to be removed from the FX line (replaced by the 5900 series) or at least revamped (but I think replaced by the 5900).

You'd be wrong about that one, check out the article you linked to:

GeForce FX 5600 has four pixel pipelines with only one texture unit per pixel pipeline. This effectively gives the GeForce FX 5600 half the texturing performance of GeForce FX 5900, assuming equal clock speeds.

The 5800 has the same 4 pipelines/2 texture units per as the 5900, so it also has double the texturing performance of the 5600.

The 5800s measured multitextured fillrate is 2800 mtexels, much higher than the theoretical of any card in the article you linked
That's double the performance of the 5600.

Also, while the 5600 has DDR1, the 5800 has DDR2, and as far as OCing goes I've never seen a review of a 5800 that said it would not OC to 500/1000. (my own does the same)

Anyway, the main difference is multitextured fill rate, and since all games these days are multitextured, this is a HUGE difference. I reiterate, you'd have to be on crack to buy a 5600 instead of a 5800. The 5600 can't match a 9500 Pro at anything, the 5800 can match a 9700Pro at non AA/AF, and a ~9700 at 4X/8X.

 

[DahDee]

Thanks for the info, Rollo!

Edit: P.S. -- Rollo, I agree that the reviews I just found do not support what I thought I'd heard about the 5600 Ultra vs. 5800; also, what I think the mystery review said was that the 5600 Ultra was a better value than the 5800, not necessarily a faster card.

 

[nRollo]

No problem Dah Dee.
Pete is right though- I've had a 9700Pro and a 5800, and of the two I'd buy the 9800np at the reputable vendor he linked you to.
The 5800 is a very nice card, but the efficient AA/AF of the 9800 make it the better buy. (especially if you're looking at a long term investment)

Good luck with it.

 

[Pete]

Originally posted by: DahDee

It's my understanding that the flip chip 5600 Ultra is *not* a re-tooled 5800. Can anyone point me to more "official" info in this regard? Thanks.

Well, nVidia can't afford to design a brand new chip for each market segment--there's simply not enough time or manpower to do so. They must reuse their basic design elements for each chip (both between generations and among a single one--the 5800 is, somewhat simplistically, basically a hot-rodded GF1) to stay price competitive, as does ATi. Just like a 9600 is basically half a 9800 and a 9500 is literally half a 9700, so the 5600 is half a 5800, and the 5700, half a 5900. Sorry, I don't have a direct link to those exact words, but you could try searching around the Beyond3D 3D Tech & Hardware forum, or maybe see if Anand mentioned it in his 5600 preview.

The 5600 (NV31) is a 2x2/4x1 chip, and the 5800 (NV30) is 4x2/8x1. Note that the flip-chip 400/400MHz 5600U is functionally equivalent to the wirebond 350/350MHz 5600U, just built on a different process that allows for higher speed.

 

[CorCentral]

I just finished my well needed upgrade with a PNY 5600U purchased from BestBuy for $250. (3 days ago) . I agree that it's about $50. too steep for this card but it was the last component in my new system & I wanted a new version of the Nvidia family of cards .

I do agree with some of the comments about the 5800 being about $25. more & a faster card but it's the "OLD/LOUD" version of the 5800 series & this Pentium is quiet unlike my Old Athlon 1.2 T-bird with the EXTREMELY LOUD HSF . One of the reasons I jumped ship & went with my new Intel 2.66 . I wanted this system SILENT (see my sys. Rigs)


When it comes down to it though , this PNY 5600U beats my 2.5-3 year old Elsa GeForce2 GTS 32mb/DX7 card anyday

 

[nRollo]

I do agree with some of the comments about the 5800 being about $25. more & a faster card but it's the "OLD/LOUD" version of the 5800 series

You'd be wrong about that one:
New/Quiet $258

 

[5150Joker]

Originally posted by: Rollo
nVidia themselves has a better option out for just a few coins more: the 5800 regular. It's a LOT better than a 5600 anything, selling for $258 new now, and offers approximately 9700 np performance, better when OCd.

You'd have to be nuts to buy a 5600 for $230- $250.

Why would anyone buy a POS 5800 card when they could get a 9700np?

 

[chilled]

Also the NV36 (5700), successor to NV31 (5600) is right around the corner (September), supposedly with the following specifications:

Number of transistors: 82 million;
Rendering pipelines: 4;
Core-clock: Roughly 500MHz;
Memory clock: Around 325MHz;
Memory bus: 256-bit;
Initial tape-out: May 2003;

The graphics chip is expected to be made using IBM?s 0.13 micron fabrication process in East Fishkill, New York, facility. This seems to be the first chip made by IBM for NVIDIA.

Source (XbitLabs)

I would

 

[nRollo]

Joker:

Why would anyone buy a POS 5800 card when they could get a 9700np?

1. Perhaps they have hardware incompatibilities with ATI?
2. Perhaps they know of driver issues with ATI and their favorite game?
3. Perhaps they play some games that have alpha textures they would like to use AA on?
4. Perhaps because they want to play games at non AA/AF settings faster than a 9700np?
http://www.vr-zone.com/reviews/Inno3D/FX5800/page8.htm
5. Perhaps because they can OC the 5800 to Ultra levels and have a card that's faster than a 9700Pro at many settings, including some 4X/8X? See above.

A better question might be:

Why do you use a POS 9700Pro, Joker?

I just ordered a Sapphire 9800Pro retail on newegg, partly just to annoy goofs (I won't mention any names) who like to put other people down because of trivial things like their hardware choices. Yep, I thought about a POS 9700Pro, but after reading the reviews and seeing how much higher performance I could get with a 9800, I thought I'd better get that so I don't "hurt my eyes" with those "lower" settings and performance.

Another good question might be why do you use a POS Augigy Gamer Joker?

I have one of those, it's good enough for my 3 year olds pc, but I much prefer my Audigy 2? I just hate using old tech junk, don't you?

Can't wait for the nV40/R4 series......

 

[ginfest]

Rollo it's senseless to respond to this guy "Joker" -a quick read thru the Rage3D forums will show his true colors.
Not sure if he's one of the ATI guys masquerading as a "regular" user or just trying to stir up trouble but he does at least tone down his comments here.
Perhaps he knows that the AT community won't tolerate the stuff he posts over there?

Anyway, I still have my self-imposed limit of $300.00 in my pocket ready to spend but I'm still researching what's my best choice.
I've been leaning to a 9800np because the 5900 is IMHO overpriced but keep reading about different driver problems. The answers always seem to be that it's the OS, mainboard, power supply, badly coded games that cause the problems but never the hardware or drivers.
Almost went with the new version 5600 the other night any NV offering of similar or less cost can't keep up with the hardware/features of the 9800. The games that I play function great with the NV drivers and I haven't had problems in a long while so I'm kinda hesitant to change brands.
Tough choice and even tougher to get good info with the current flood of FUD going around.


Mike G

 

[nRollo]

I think you scared him Ginfest......

 

[walk2]

I found the PNY 5600-Ultra 128MB for $189 on Pricewatch.

Be careful of that Gainward model, they use the word "Ultra" in the name but it is NOT a 5600-Ultra, it's the standard 5600 chip (325/350mhz I believe).

 

[merlocka]

Well shucks. I was just gonna order a 5600u but they seemed too expensive.

But I did find a 5800 from googlegear for $229.00 shipped.

It's a Chaintech A-FX80, Newegg is selling the retail version for $337.