Radeon 2600Pro has worse performance than a 3yr old x800?!

[JEDI]

i got the 2600 pro for $25 at best buy.

i thought the higher the model #, the better the performance? (unless it's a SE model with 64bits)

 

[mwmorph]

The midrange has stagnated for a long time now. 2600PROs are about as fast as the X1650XT and the 8600GT is only about as fast as the 7600GT. Instead the high end has taken over the former midrange card's price points with 8800GSes coming in at $110 AR and 3870/0s coming in the $100-$200 range.

 

[Lithan]

8800gs isn't high end any more than 9800xt was high end (I think it was the 9800xt... it was a 64bit mem 9800pro that performed HORRIBLY). It's just the top number scheme. It's at the bottom of that scheme. Which makes it third tier, or fourth/fifth depending on what you think about the new gts.

No dual gpu solution in this series>8800ultra/8800gtx/gts > 8800gt > 8800gs
which matches up with
9800gx2>9800gtx>9800gts(not released yet)>9600gt>9500gt(not released yet)

Basically the naming schemes so damn convoluted now that you can only rely on benchmarks and/or price to tell you what cards are high end, midrange and low end. 8800gs falls towards the bottom of midrange.
The general flow of benchmarks suggests for nvidia
9800x2>8800ultra>8800gtx/8800gts>8800gt>(high end ends here imho)9600gt>8800gs/8800gts(g90)(midrange ends here)>8600gts>8600gt>7600gt (9800gtx results arent here yet)


Basically all you need to know about ati right now is that it loses everything. But really, you expected a $25 card to be an upgrade for a $300 card... even if it was 3 years old. That seems naive.

 

[BlueAcolyte]

You need to look at 3 things when you buy a graphics card.

HD 2- the series. Each series generally has better performance than the last.
6- the model. For Nvidia and ATi, 4 means low end, 6 is midrange, and 8/9 is high end.
0
0
Then the naming conventions differ. For ATi, you have GT/30, PRO/50, and XT/70. Nvidia has GS, GT, GTS, GTX.

 

[Lithan]

That's how it's SUPPOSED to work, but that fails more often than it succeeds.

8800gt WAY better than g90 gts

And which is most important?

7900gtx Demolishes the 8400 cards, does that mean that model conventions are more important than series?

The way VGA cards are named these days it seems pretty clear that the manus WANT to make it as complex as possible so they can sell crappy cheap to produce cards to people who think they are high end. Hell, the convention "XT"? That's switched from good to bad and back again three to four times in the past couple generations. Look back a little further and the same thing happened with "pro"

 

[SniperDaws]

Originally posted by: Lithan
That's how it's SUPPOSED to work, but that fails more often than it succeeds.

8800gt WAY better than g90 gts

And which is most important?

7900gtx Demolishes the 8400 cards, does that mean that model conventions are more important than series?

The way VGA cards are named these days it seems pretty clear that the manus WANT to make it as complex as possible so they can sell crappy cheap to produce cards to people who think they are high end. Hell, the convention "XT"? That's switched from good to bad and back again three to four times in the past couple generations. Look back a little further and the same thing happened with "pro"

Do you mean G80 GTS ?

 

[BlueAcolyte]

The model conventions are more important than series. Until you get 3 generations ahead or so.

 

[IL2SturmovikPilot]

I'd never take Toms VGA CHarts seriously,lack of driver updates,as well as inaccuracy on some of its benchies keep me from using it,though i wouldn't be surprised if the HD 2600Pro 64-bit DID perform worse than a X800.

 

[bigsnyder]

The 2600Pro should be a 128bit card. The 2400s are usually 64bit. I find it amazing you found a 2600pro at best buy for $25 of all places. Great find!

 

[AzN]

Originally posted by: Lithan
8800gs isn't high end any more than 9800xt was high end (I think it was the 9800xt... it was a 64bit mem 9800pro that performed HORRIBLY). It's just the top number scheme. It's at the bottom of that scheme. Which makes it third tier, or fourth/fifth depending on what you think about the new gts.

No dual gpu solution in this series>8800ultra/8800gtx/gts > 8800gt > 8800gs
which matches up with
9800gx2>9800gtx>9800gts(not released yet)>9600gt>9500gt(not released yet)

Basically the naming schemes so damn convoluted now that you can only rely on benchmarks and/or price to tell you what cards are high end, midrange and low end. 8800gs falls towards the bottom of midrange.
The general flow of benchmarks suggests for nvidia
9800x2>8800ultra>8800gtx/8800gts>8800gt>(high end ends here imho)9600gt>8800gs/8800gts(g90)(midrange ends here)>8600gts>8600gt>7600gt (9800gtx results arent here yet)


Basically all you need to know about ati right now is that it loses everything. But really, you expected a $25 card to be an upgrade for a $300 card... even if it was 3 years old. That seems naive.

What are you talking about 9800pro having 64bit bus? R300 had 256bit memory bus and 8 fragmented pipes.

8800gs is a good midrange card. 75% of the full G92GTS.

 

[IL2SturmovikPilot]

Originally posted by: bigsnyder
The 2600Pro should be a 128bit card. The 2400s are usually 64bit. I find it amazing you found a 2600pro at best buy for $25 of all places. Great find!

Here they are: http://www.newegg.com/Product/...HD+2600Pro&name=64-bit

 

[AzN]

Originally posted by: JEDI
i got the 2600 pro for $25 at best buy.

i thought the higher the model #, the better the performance? (unless it's a SE model with 64bits)

2600pro should perform good as 9800pro but it's 3-4 generations behind modern GPU.

 

[AzN]

Originally posted by: Lithan
That's how it's SUPPOSED to work, but that fails more often than it succeeds.

8800gt WAY better than g90 gts

And which is most important?

7900gtx Demolishes the 8400 cards, does that mean that model conventions are more important than series?

The way VGA cards are named these days it seems pretty clear that the manus WANT to make it as complex as possible so they can sell crappy cheap to produce cards to people who think they are high end. Hell, the convention "XT"? That's switched from good to bad and back again three to four times in the past couple generations. Look back a little further and the same thing happened with "pro"

Kind of like 8800>9600gt :laugh:

 

[Lithan]

Originally posted by: Azn

What are you talking about 9800pro having 64bit bus? R300 had 256bit memory bus and 8 fragmented pipes.

8800gs is a good midrange card. 75% of the full G92GTS.

I was actually talking about a hatcheted version of the 9800pro, maybe it was the 9800se, one of those damn remakes of the 9800pro was god-awful. And TONS of people bought it thinking it was an improvement, and the RMA's poured in. Newegg spent months burning through all the open boxes they had of those suckers.

 

[Lithan]

Originally posted by: Azn


Kind of like 8800>9600gt :laugh:

lol wat?
http://www.fudzilla.com/index....view&id=5831&Itemid=34

http://translate.google.com/tr...ws/0801/1205247_1.html


http://vr-zone.com/articles/64_Shader_Processors:_NVIDIA_Geforce_9600GT/5575-6.html

Gotta say Im partial to the first one, kinda sums it all up nicely.

Do you mean G80 GTS ?

Why yes, yes I do.

 

[s44]

A lot of these benchmarks are useless in the long run, because they don't update for improvements with newer drivers. I believe the 2600s got a serious driver boost fairly early on that isn't reflected in these charts. It's still not great, though.

 

[Lithan]

That would make sense. It's hard to find last gen vs current gen reviews long after release though. If Toms would update their chart it'd be nice... probably no more than an afternoon or two's work either.

 

[mwmorph]

Originally posted by: Lithan

Originally posted by: Azn

What are you talking about 9800pro having 64bit bus? R300 had 256bit memory bus and 8 fragmented pipes.

8800gs is a good midrange card. 75% of the full G92GTS.

I was actually talking about a hatcheted version of the 9800pro, maybe it was the 9800se, one of those damn remakes of the 9800pro was god-awful. And TONS of people bought it thinking it was an improvement, and the RMA's poured in. Newegg spent months burning through all the open boxes they had of those suckers.

The 9800SE had 128mb of vram on a 128bit bus.

 

[bigsnyder]

Originally posted by: IL2SturmovikPilot

Originally posted by: bigsnyder
The 2600Pro should be a 128bit card. The 2400s are usually 64bit. I find it amazing you found a 2600pro at best buy for $25 of all places. Great find!

Here they are: http://www.newegg.com/Product/...HD+2600Pro&name=64-bit

Ok, never saw those before since all these HD2600s are 128-bit, I never noticed them. Thanks for the correction.

 

[superstition]

Isn't a 64-bit 2600pro just a 2400 with a new name?

 

[Lithan]

Originally posted by: mwmorph

Originally posted by: Lithan

Originally posted by: Azn

What are you talking about 9800pro having 64bit bus? R300 had 256bit memory bus and 8 fragmented pipes.

8800gs is a good midrange card. 75% of the full G92GTS.

I was actually talking about a hatcheted version of the 9800pro, maybe it was the 9800se, one of those damn remakes of the 9800pro was god-awful. And TONS of people bought it thinking it was an improvement, and the RMA's poured in. Newegg spent months burning through all the open boxes they had of those suckers.

The 9800SE had 128mb of vram on a 128bit bus.

That's probably it then. I just remember they released it right around the time the 9500 Nonpro was released... everyone bought it but a couple guys got the 9500, figured out it could be modded to a fullfledge 9700pro (with slightly slower mem chips). And the lulz ensued. I think the 9800se was like $220 at the time, the 9500 was <$160 and the 9700 pro still sold ~ $275.

 

[mwmorph]

Originally posted by: Lithan

Originally posted by: mwmorph

Originally posted by: Lithan

Originally posted by: Azn

What are you talking about 9800pro having 64bit bus? R300 had 256bit memory bus and 8 fragmented pipes.

8800gs is a good midrange card. 75% of the full G92GTS.

I was actually talking about a hatcheted version of the 9800pro, maybe it was the 9800se, one of those damn remakes of the 9800pro was god-awful. And TONS of people bought it thinking it was an improvement, and the RMA's poured in. Newegg spent months burning through all the open boxes they had of those suckers.

The 9800SE had 128mb of vram on a 128bit bus.

That's probably it then. I just remember they released it right around the time the 9500 Nonpro was released... everyone bought it but a couple guys got the 9500, figured out it could be modded to a fullfledge 9700pro (with slightly slower mem chips). And the lulz ensued. I think the 9800se was like $220 at the time, the 9500 was <$160 and the 9700 pro still sold ~ $275.

What you're thinking of is the 9550 or 9500pro

The 9800s came about a year after the 9700s and were in SE, Pro and XT trim

SE came in at 128mb, 128bit and 4 pixel pipelines but some came with 256bi buses and could be modded into Pro
Pro came in 128mb and 256mb and 256bit and could be modded to XT
and XT came in 256mb and 256bit and used a different bios that enabled some tweaks in the core

The 9500 had 4 pixel pipelines, 64 or 128mb or VRAM and a 128but bus and the 128mb could be modded into the 9700 to enable 4 more pixel pipes and 128bit more bus.
The 9500pro had 8pixel pipelines, 128mb or VRAM and a 128 bit bus so could not be modded
The 9550Pro had 128mb VRAM and a 128 bit bus and could b modded into the 9600 but eve the 9600se/9600pro was slower than the 9500/9500pro
The 9550SE had 12mb and 64 bit and could be modded into the 9600SE