Fx Benchmarks!!

[WaTaGuMp]

I think I can hear the fan on the FX from everyone testing them.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: ChrisOjeda
This is what I would say. Consider that if you buy at least 3 games a year and/or play them online (thus put in some decent time) then you must think about how the FX would do for future games. Most of the features that would give an extremely higher fps are based on directx 9.0 games/applications. While it may be neck and neck with todays ATI card, I'll bet it would leave that same card in the dust in directx 9.0 games. I read that it's Doom benchmarks were off the charts compared to ATI flagship and that was put out by ID. The only bad thing is that we don't have any games to do comparisons on that will tell us where it stands going forward. Doom will be a great game and both the FX and 350 will be out. That should be a good point in time to do a comparison that is actually meaningful. I'd be perfectly happy if the FX performed at this level with current and old games because it is fast enough. What matters more to me is the future games, after all I am a serious games and do like to play at 1600x1200 when possible. I think everyone should take all that into consideration. Both ATI's new flagshipa nd Nvidias new flagship will be out by the end of April so I hope that we can get a great Directx 9.0 game soon. The last thing to consider is general compatibility issues and support. I've owned both ATI and Nvidia products about equally since my first 200Mhz pc. I've had far more compatibility issues with ATI drivers than with Nvidia. I always choose stability as priority number one. Nothing like not being able to play a game you just purcahsed for $50. As far as driver support, I've gotten pretty great gains on Nvidia cards because of their new drivers (which has saved me some $ by letting me put off upgrading to another card).

To base your judgement and purchase on old games and legacy games would simply be foolish....

That's my $.02

so UT2003 that is only a couple months old is "legacy"

You HAVE to compare the cards to what people will play NOW when you get it home what will you play on it? WHat kind of game will you fire up? You won't go home and wait for Doom 3 will you? Your argument is moot. Not to mention the fact that the 9700Pro is a DX9 card so don't even go there about the GFFX being dominant in DX9. And Doom...is DOOM 3 DX9? DOOM 3 is OpenGL buddy so DX9 is not even an issue with it.

 

[ArmchairAthlete]

Tom's Hardware has their benchmarks on it up too. Looks like a flop with the prices I've heard it'll go for. (I heard $500, it'd have to be way cheaper to get close the the roughly $300 or less 9700 Pros can be had for). Plus it takes up a PCI slot, generates lots of heat, and is LOUD. Tomshardware says it must cost much more than a 9700 Pro to produce so prices will be higher...

The bottom line is that it looks like this card is going nowhere and I'm glad I got a 9700 Pro for about $275.

 

[ChrisOjeda]

Originally posted by: cmdrdredd

Originally posted by: ChrisOjeda This is what I would say. Consider that if you buy at least 3 games a year and/or play them online (thus put in some decent time) then you must think about how the FX would do for future games. Most of the features that would give an extremely higher fps are based on directx 9.0 games/applications. While it may be neck and neck with todays ATI card, I'll bet it would leave that same card in the dust in directx 9.0 games. I read that it's Doom benchmarks were off the charts compared to ATI flagship and that was put out by ID. The only bad thing is that we don't have any games to do comparisons on that will tell us where it stands going forward. Doom will be a great game and both the FX and 350 will be out. That should be a good point in time to do a comparison that is actually meaningful. I'd be perfectly happy if the FX performed at this level with current and old games because it is fast enough. What matters more to me is the future games, after all I am a serious games and do like to play at 1600x1200 when possible. I think everyone should take all that into consideration. Both ATI's new flagshipa nd Nvidias new flagship will be out by the end of April so I hope that we can get a great Directx 9.0 game soon. The last thing to consider is general compatibility issues and support. I've owned both ATI and Nvidia products about equally since my first 200Mhz pc. I've had far more compatibility issues with ATI drivers than with Nvidia. I always choose stability as priority number one. Nothing like not being able to play a game you just purcahsed for $50. As far as driver support, I've gotten pretty great gains on Nvidia cards because of their new drivers (which has saved me some $ by letting me put off upgrading to another card). To base your judgement and purchase on old games and legacy games would simply be foolish.... That's my $.02

so UT2003 that is only a couple months old is "legacy"

You HAVE to compare the cards to what people will play NOW when you get it home what will you play on it? WHat kind of game will you fire up? You won't go home and wait for Doom 3 will you? Your argument is moot. Not to mention the fact that the 9700Pro is a DX9 card so don't even go there about the GFFX being dominant in DX9. And Doom...is DOOM 3 DX9? DOOM 3 is OpenGL buddy so DX9 is not even an issue with it.

You obviously have more homes than your IQ. I never stated UT2003 is a legacy game. Any game out in this industry for at least several months is in fact an older game. Any game out for one year plus is legacy. That is because of that fact that hardware and software moves so fast. Look at the increase in processor speed, look at the increase in bandwidth on video cards, and look at the increase demands by a game just half a year later. Since you clearly don't have a sense of logic, and are attempting to perform a classic scarecrow attack (if you are educated in logic you will understand this is a tactic taken by someone of low intelligence who can't understand or by someone who is trying to be a snake and twist the truth) you either don't understand this industry are you are just full of crap and make decisions without any intelligence. In the past, it wasn't always possible to play games at the highest resolutions even with the top cards on the market. Many games supported resolutions that current cards would not support. Also, you failed to mention compatability issues. Check gaming forums whenever a new ATI card comes out and you will see what I am talking about. I'd only purchase at ATI card that has been out for at least a few months because of my bad experience with this firsthand (a trend that has continued). Did you say driver performance boost? No, I didn't think you would even go there. If you follow ID interviews regarding DOOM III you will have read comments regarding how impressed they are with NV30. Games don't have to be DirectX 9 to benefit from all the features of the NV30. Then again, not everyone cheats in benchmarks so that people can spend their money to find out later that in the most popular benchmarks their card is fast but in everything else it is much slower. When ATI did the benchmark cheat and did not openly inform consumers, that was a turning point when consumers realized they must do their own research and look at the big picture.

 

[Deeko]

Wow....it will be faster in DirectX 9...dude, by the time DirectX 8 is mainstream, both of these cards will be outclassed. The first big DX8 game isn't even out yet. Keep in mind that Doom3 is being designed around the 9700, too. And keep in mind that those old benches posted of the FX on Doom3 were run on the map NVTest. We will see, but your argument is too wordy & weak.

 

[cmdrdredd]

You said that the benchmarks they used were NOT representing the GFFX true performance. Why is that? I never see anyone buy a new Video Card and NOT play the games they have. Sure UT2003 is a few months old, but what else is there NOW not later to test with? That's right nothing. What do you test then? Do you wait 6-8 months for a new game to benchmark and not publish any review? Of course not.

Carmack is always impressed with specs hell everyone is. But when it comes down to performance I don't see anything the GFFX can do that the 9700Pro cannot do just as well and sometimes better. Not to mention that the RV350 will be around not to long from now. Plus by the time Doom3 ships you will likely NOT have any form of the 9700 or GFFX in your machine. Likely there will be 3 generations beyond that.

I got my 9700Pro on the first week of sales and even with the first driverset had 0 issues with the games I played. the GFFX has huge issues with the 4xs AA method among other things. Did you even read the article here on anandtech?

Let's talk about cheating in benchmarks shall we? What about the GF4 inflated scores with specific drivers when everything else did NOT go up and sometimes went down...only the nature demo in 3dmark went up any significant ammount. Nvidia released a driver update within the week that changed this after the flak they received.

IQ is a BIG BIG BIG issue with me and ATI has a clear advantage here. WHile the GFFX is nice, the 9700Pro looks better and runs faster in the tests as shown in the article. I trust Anand's word more than yours. You haven't even presented a clear argument that shows the greatness of the GFFX. The only thing you talk about is Doom3 and let me tell you...Carmack was impressed by the 9700 before release too and talked in his .plan about what he could do with it. He always does this with any new technology. SO it's no surprise to me that he hails the GFFX's engine. And did I mention it sounds like a jet engine too?

 

[lifeguard1999]

Suppose, just suppose, that the NV30 (130 nm process) outperforms the 9700 Pro by 30% as has been rumored by the Inquirer. All ATI has to do with its R350 (150 nm process) to equal the NV30 is have the GPU sped up by 30%. xbit labs in the article already showed how they could overclock the 9700 Pro by 38%.

That quote is from myself in another thread 1 month ago. Codecreatures at 1600x1200 has a 40% advantage. Otherwise in Codecreatures, it was a 25~26% advantage. Unreal Tournament 2003 @ 1600x1200 has a 22% advantage. Otherwise, the advantage is at best 13%. It looks to me like the 5800 Ultra has headroom in the drivers, but ATI is in the drivers seat [pun intended]. If the core on the R350 is at 400/425 MHz, as rumor goes, that is a 23%~30% speedup which should solidify ATI for another 6 months on the high end.

If ATI gets the 9700 to sub-$200, 9700 Pro at $300, and R350 at $400, then ATI should rake in the cash.

 

[jiffylube1024]

Originally posted by: lifeguard1999


It looks to me like the 5800 Ultra has headroom in the drivers, but ATI is in the drivers seat [pun intended].

I'm probably the only person who found that funny, but I actually found it quite amusing.

ChrisOjeda - I can understand where you're coming from, and it's true the GF FX does have a very impressive core, but your argument is flawed.

In regards to the GeForce FX, it's directX 9 capabilities clearly dwarf those of the 9700 Pro; Carmack was rightly excited. The problem is this: Doom 3 was written with the 9700 Pro in mind, specifically because Doom 3 was written to use new features found also in DX9 (there you go cmdrdredd!), and ATI went completely by the book in making the 9700 fully directX 9 compatible - no more, no less. Down the road, when a company makes a game for DirectX 9, they aren't going to shoot themselves in the foot and design something that requires a GeForce FX at minimum to run. They therefore have to "constrain" themselves to direct X9, which means fewer loops and subroutines in the vertex/pixel shader engine than the GF FX is capable of (although to call it constraining is a stretch of the truth, as any DX9 game is far more sophisticated then current DX8 games).

Originally posted by: ChrisOjeda
Any game out in this industry for at least several months is in fact an older game. Any game out for one year plus is legacy. That is because of that fact that hardware and software moves so fast.

By the same hand, any video card that is out in this industry for at least several months is in fact an older model! Any video card out for one year plus is legacy! By the time DX9 games come to the market, the GF FX will itself be a "legacy" card, by a distortion of your definition of how things age in this industry.

 

[cmdrdredd]

"The problem is this: Doom 3 was written with the 9700 Pro in mind, specifically because Doom 3 was written to be DirectX 9.0 compatible"

For the last time! Doom3 is OpenGL not DirectX!!!!!!!!!!!! ID does NOT NOT NOT use MS's API.

 

[jiffylube1024]

Originally posted by: cmdrdredd
"The problem is this: Doom 3 was written with the 9700 Pro in mind, specifically because Doom 3 was written to be DirectX 9.0 compatible"

For the last time! Doom3 is OpenGL not DirectX!!!!!!!!!!!! ID does NOT NOT NOT use MS's API.

I know that, what I meant to say is that it uses some of the features from DX9 (new pixel/vertex shader features).