Latest greatest gfx card?

Dcully

In the past i knew exactly what was the best gfx card on the block all the ins and outs etc.
Then i just didnt bother keeping up to speed on them as they were/are arriving so fast.
Anyways what is the beast out there right now?
I currently have a 9800 pro.
Last time i looked it was the ATI X800 and nvidia equivalent.

Optikus

nVidia equivilent being the 6800 ultra.. the best you can get.

Ciaran500

Currently its the ATI X800XT PE and Nvidia 6800Ultra that are the cutting edge of graphics cards.


There performance is pretty even across the board with one or the other pulling ahead in certain games.

neokenzo

Most places does not have the X800XT PE at the moment. Its out of stock almost everywhere.

grimloch

have you ever seen it in stock?

CivilServant

Dual 6800 Ultras would be the greatest atm. Scores around 9k in 3dmark05, and should let you play doom3 comfortably! You would need an nforce 4 SLI mobo, which will be out shortly. So that'd be €500 per card and €200 for the mobo.

You're looking at roughly €1200. Then you have the rest of the system to build. Oh almost forgot the beefy PSU you'd need to run dual 6800 Ultras. Let's see, 4 molex connectors...?! :eek:

Optikus

CivilServant wrote:

Dual 6800 Ultras would be the greatest atm. Scores around 9k in 3dmark05, and should let you play doom3 comfortably! You would need an nforce 4 SLI mobo, which will be out shortly. So that'd be €500 per card and €200 for the mobo.

You're looking at roughly €1200. Then you have the rest of the system to build. Oh almost forgot the beefy PSU you'd need to run dual 6800 Ultras. Let's see, 4 molex connectors...?! :eek:

Why on earth would you want to play doom3... seriously just get the demo and play it tens times would be the same as playing the whole game.

kaimera

I was under the impression the 6800GT was a better buy than the Ultra, coming close to the Ultra in benchmarks and then being better for o/cing.

grimloch

CivilServant wrote:

€200 for the mobo.

for an nforce 4? do you have a link or something to that?

id be guessing theyd be a little more

Optikus

Kaimera wrote:

I was under the impression the 6800GT was a better buy than the Ultra, coming close to the Ultra in benchmarks and then being better for o/cing.

It cheaper and you can flash the BIOS to that of a GT, thats why it is indeed a better buy.

CivilServant

grimloch wrote:

for an nforce 4? do you have a link or something to that?

id be guessing theyd be a little more

Google is your friend.


@Optikus - Chill dude, I wasn't endorsing the game. I'm also one of the non believers! Give me HL2 + Ati anyday.

Optikus

CivilServant wrote:

Google is your friend.


@Optikus - Chill dude, I wasn't endorsing the game. I'm also one of the non believers! Give me HL2 + Ati anyday.

Like music to my ears.

ViperVenoM

Optikus wrote:

Why on earth would you want to play doom3... seriously just get the demo and play it tens times would be the same as playing the whole game.

lol!

ohh so true!

tman

grimloch wrote:

for an nforce 4? do you have a link or something to that?

id be guessing theyd be a little more

http://nvidia.com/object/IO_16486.html

2 gigs of ram, an AMD FX-55 and 2 x800xt pes...
*fap*

Ave

Um ATI dont do SLI.

MrPinK

Ave wrote:

Um ATI dont do SLI.

That hasn't stopped Alienware from designing a dual ATI system. Their Video Array System can combine any two matching PCI-E cards.

tman

Ave wrote:

Um ATI dont do SLI.

heh. i'm such a dumbass :rolleyes:

Ave

MrPinK wrote:

That hasn't stopped Alienware from designing a dual ATI system. Their Video Array System can combine any two matching PCI-E cards.

And I'm sure it will perform admirably.

Not...

OfflerCrocGod

Ave wrote:

And I'm sure it will perform admirably.

I'm sure it will cost both testicles and your right arm.

ViperVenoM

out of curiosity

when and what are the next cards?

im not scrapping my 9800xt just yet, but when are we gonna see the next cards beating the old ultras and xt pes?

BloodBath

The x800xt pe is still king of the hill margainly over the 6800 ultra.

If you want to get a cheap x800xt with video in and video out buy yourself a HIS x800pro vivo on Jes for 460e. They all flash to x800xt's and with the good cooling they usually have no trouble of reaching xt or xt pe speeds.


BloodBath

astrofool

Well the PE is basically banking on HL2 being its game, right now the 6800 series is a far more attractive purchase than an x800.

Doom 3 runs excellent on most current gen cards. There aren't actually that many 6800 pci-e cards in the channel atm. I'm guessing that their next refresh will be native PCI-E (with an agp bridged version), have a few tweaks and a little more speed. It'll be interesting to see what ATI reply with beyond a clock speed increase, they really need a new architecture.

SLI will happen with the next gen stuff, not this gen really, bar maybe the 6600 series.

BloodBath

Well the PE is basically banking on HL2 being its game, right now the 6800 series is a far more attractive purchase than an x800.

Doom 3 runs excellent on most current gen cards. There aren't actually that many 6800 pci-e cards in the channel atm. I'm guessing that their next refresh will be native PCI-E (with an agp bridged version), have a few tweaks and a little more speed. It'll be interesting to see what ATI reply with beyond a clock speed increase, they really need a new architecture.

SLI will happen with the next gen stuff, not this gen really, bar maybe the 6600 series.

Eh the x800xt pe is better in most direct 3d games. Nvidia have them completely dominated with the mid and lower range cards but Ati still hold the crown for the top card. Take a look at the top 100 3dmark 2003 and 2005 scores. 80% of them are x800's. Now I know that's a synthetic benchmark but it's some way accurate to real world performance. Since most games are Direct 3d i'd sooner go with the X800 tbh.


BloodBath

astrofool

3dmark is a useless way of measuring a video card's performance. Only an idiot would buy a card based on it's 3dmark score. So much cheating and optimising goes on with it.

BloodBath

3dmark is a useless way of measuring a video card's performance. Only an idiot would buy a card based on it's 3dmark score. So much cheating and optimising goes on with it.

I'm not just basing it on 3dmark performance, I was using that as an example. Look at benchmarks for most Direct 3d games and the x800xt is usually ahead especially with high resolutions with AA and AF which is what your going to want after spending 500e on a graphics card.


BloodBath

jesus_thats_gre

Sorry Bloodbath but the X800XT is been consistently beaten by the Ultra in normal resolutions, i.e. anything up to 1280x1024. Granted, at 1600x1200 the X800 pips the 6800 but generally the 6800 is the better buy, i.e. how many people have a deent enough monitor to run at 1600x1200 at a decent refresh rate.. I know you have one but feck all people do.


At that, you would be insane to buy either the X800XT or 6800 Ultra now. The all new ATI GPU will be launched not long after Christmas and no doubt Nvidea will release a revised version of their current chip in order to compete.

Considering the X800 is just an evolved 9700 and the 6800 is a brand new chip supporting the like is PS3, I would go for the 6800. If only because I have an 18inch TFT and games will only run at 1280x1024.

ViperVenoM

jesus_thats_gre wrote:

The all new ATI GPU will be launched not long after Christmas and no doubt Nvidea will release a revised version of their current chip in order to compete.

now thats what i wanted to hear! i was wondering about the status of the next lot of cards..

jesus_thats_gre

The new GPU is also being used in the next Xbox and was supposedly signed off two months ago for manufacturing.. Cannot remember where I saw it..

http://www.msfn.org/comments.php?shownews=10000 is basically the gist but a less reputable source

The Xbox chipset is being named the R500 while the next Radeon (anyone XI800?) is named R520..

ViperVenoM

d'oh im sensing a christmas present here if i cant think of out else :rolleyes:

StRiKeR

just as well I hold off my post, heh heh, and so nice to see others think the same I do, doom3 is boring I agree, HL2 is really taking off tho, and nVidia is sitting above ATi when it comes to HL2 without a doubt.

both cards are indeed very fast and the different in performance is very little so far, but I would recommend nVidia due to the newer technology it has which ATi hasn't!

at the end of the day, all them benchmarks results isn't that much of an issue when you actually playing the game, tbh who's gonna be playin a game at over 100 fps? once it can play it smooth, its fine, and I have no problem running doom3 far cry at ultra quality!

when it comes to upgrade just remember one thing, if you are a big fan of nVidia or ATi, dont just stick with them because you have it or it was good and expect the newer cards from ATi or nVidia will be better for sure, check out what they have to offer, newer design of the whole engineering, what new technology they have added to the card, dont be just going by which card can run faster at benchmarks, thats not really that important!

and definately dont be recommending it or gonna get the same make of cards because you already have one of thier products!

I had ATi before but I switched to nVidia!

I know some people only recommend what they have and they dont recommend what they haven't got to others, simply it just sounds to me they dont want others have something better! I even heard people recommend others not to get something because they think its over kill! but they actually looking to buy one!

Irish Angel

StRiKeR wrote:

at the end of the day, all them benchmarks results isn't that much of an issue when you actually playing the game, tbh who's gonna be playin a game at over 100 fps? once it can play it smooth, its fine, and I have no problem running doom3 far cry at ultra quality!

when it comes to upgrade just remember one thing, if you are a big fan of nVidia or ATi, dont just stick with them because you have it or it was good and expect the newer cards from ATi or nVidia will be better for sure, check out what they have to offer, newer design of the whole engineering, what new technology they have added to the card, dont be just going by which card can run faster at benchmarks, thats not really that important!

have to agree on that, its so true!

jesus_thats_gre

Irish Angel wrote:

have to agree on that, its so true!

are you a girl?

neokenzo

I dont know much about nVidia but arent their card more expensive?

neGev

As far as I know, both ATi and nVidia's cards are quite evenly priced all along the spectrum.

StRiKeR

neokenzo wrote:

I dont know much about nVidia but arent their card more expensive?

yes there is, nVidia has a quantro which cost well over a €1000, I had one of those couple of years ago, beats alot of GFX on the market, also 3DLabs makes very fast GFX, again very pricey, but they not made for desktop use, meanly professional!

astrofool

those pro cards are generally more expensive because they've had more extensive testing for defects, and also have a few app specific features turned on. They are usually slower than the retail ones due to having to be rock stable and can be a cycle behind tech wise. The 3dlabs one is not a good gaming gpu, mostly for high end CAD stuff.

Also its quadro not quantro.

ViperVenoM

neokenzo wrote:

I dont know much about nVidia but arent their card more expensive?

looking on overclockers..the most expensive XT PE ive found is £399 whereas the mose expensive Ultra ive found is £422..so a bit i guess, but if you have £400 to spend on a video card you could probably afford £422 :rolleyes: ...im sitting tight for the next ones though

halenger

Went for the 6800GT myself. If I wasn't in the business I'd probably have gone for a 9800 Pro or something due to the price but trade discount n all makes a huge difference.

I'm happy with the 6800. I don't really care about best but it can handle what's out there and that's what I wanted. And it'll last me a while so also glad of that.

There is a 6800GT PCI-Express card already on pricelists. Cheaper than the normal GTs also, significantly, but only 128mb ram. I've not seen stock of them thuogh.

Dual SLI looks like quite an interesting way forward but not sure how it'll pan out. Time will tell, as always.

TacT

CivilServant wrote:

Dual 6800 Ultras would be the greatest atm. Scores around 9k in 3dmark05, and should let you play doom3 comfortably! You would need an nforce 4 SLI mobo, which will be out shortly. So that'd be €500 per card and €200 for the mobo.

You're looking at roughly €1200. Then you have the rest of the system to build. Oh almost forgot the beefy PSU you'd need to run dual 6800 Ultras. Let's see, 4 molex connectors...?! :eek:

That's just wrong and exaggerated as the numbers are not out yet for you to provide factual information on it and the only thing I'll correct you on for now is the 4 molex connectors -- that's a load of rubbish. The PCI-E 6800U take one molex connector each, unlike the AGP version which requires two each so; it would be no different from having one 6800U agp card as long as you can afford the two PCI-E cards and mobo/psu to get the job done.

Considering the GT PCI-E SLI capable cards are coming in at £130 a pop I find your figures to be completely mis-informed and inaccurate. Also, where did you get this magical €200 per motherboard figure from or is it just a guess?

My estimate for a SLI system base on 2x GT PCI-E cards:
€100-150 for mobo
€100-150 for psu (if you need it..)
2x PCI-E GT cards -- €375
SLI connector -- €10-25 MAX

I make that as a maximum of €700 for a med-high range SLI based system but it's possibly doable for less.

jesus_thats_gre

The new Nforce 4 boards are being released in three levels.

Courtesy of Anandtech.com

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2248&p=2

nForce4 - the basic value chipset for 939 and754. This is the chipset that you will likely find in Socket 754 and low-end Socket 939 boards selling for less than $100. The nF4 is targeted at value boards, but it still includes on-chip gigabit Ethernet capabilities, support for 10 USB, full nVidia "any drive" Raid capabilities, support for nVidia Firewall 2.0, and support for the nTune Performance Utility. Four SATA drives are supported at current 1.5GB/s speeds plus four PATA (IDE) devices. The big disadvantage of the vanilla nF4 chipset is that it only supports 800 Hyper Transport. In addition, the HT bus is locked on the basic nF4 to prevent overclocking of the Hyper Transport. This means that the basic nForce4 is not a good choice for the enthusiast, who is better served by the Ultra and SLI chipsets.

nForce4 Ultra - the mainstream nF4 designed for boards that will sell in the $100 to $150 price range. In addition to nF4 features, you will find full support for an unlocked 1000 Hyper Transport, support for 3Gb/s SATA drives, and nVidia's secure networking engine, which is called ActiveArmor.

nForce4 SLI - the high-end version of the nF4 is designed for boards that will sell at $150 or more. The nF4 SLI is the only version to support programmable PCI Express lanes, which allows the use of either a single or dual Video Card. A single GPU is supported by an x16 PCIe slot, which can be reprogrammed to two x8 PCIe slots to support two video cards in SLI mode. All features are, otherwise, the same as nForce4 Ultra.

So a decent SLI board will be close to 200 euro..

StRiKeR

excuse my spelling, it has been a couple of years since I had one and I havent look at them since!

I did mention that they are for professional, not desktop, in that I meant not games, and I do more rendering than I would play games, so they would be very fast for me, but the 6800 series does good enough for me, so I just not gonna bother throwing out another €1000 or more again!

I completely agree with halenger, thats what i was trying to point out on my first post in this thread, if it can handle whats out there, who cares which card does better in benchmarks, coz thats not gonna affect you when you're playing the game, I think its better to have a card that support newer technology rather than having a card that doesn't if you are upgrading!

CivilServant

TacT wrote:

That's just wrong and exaggerated as the numbers are not out yet for you to provide factual information on it and the only thing I'll correct you on for now is the 4 molex connectors -- that's a load of rubbish. The PCI-E 6800U take one molex connector each, unlike the AGP version which requires two each so; it would be no different from having one 6800U agp card as long as you can afford the two PCI-E cards and mobo/psu to get the job done.

Considering the GT PCI-E SLI capable cards are coming in at £130 a pop I find your figures to be completely mis-informed and inaccurate. Also, where did you get this magical €200 per motherboard figure from or is it just a guess?

My estimate for a SLI system base on 2x GT PCI-E cards:
€100-150 for mobo
€100-150 for psu (if you need it..)
2x PCI-E GT cards -- €375
SLI connector -- €10-25 MAX

I make that as a maximum of €700 for a med-high range SLI based system but it's possibly doable for less.

I got the numbers from anandtech which Jtg pointed out.

Also you say my numbers are inaccurate, which numbers might they be? Dual 6800 Ultras have been show to reach 9k in 3dmark05 no problem. 9259 to be precise.

6800 Ultras will still need the same power as dual molexes but with pci-e, more power is delivered through the pcie power connector. You can get pcie connector to dual molex converter as some psus don't have the pcie dongle. But you still need a beefy psu to power dual ultras.

Nukem

where are you gettin the GT's for 375euro and mobos for 100-150?????

Boro

Two GT's for €375? €187.50 each? Sounds like a tad cheap - there wouldnt be the words "fell off the back of a lorry" involved anywhere would there?

McClane

Whats Wrong with Doom 3 ?

For the kids here (anyone who thinks gaming started with Half-Life or Quake 3) then listen up.

1. Doom 3 had a lot of faults in the level designs like a panel sliding away to leave a Imp or something else ready.
2. The fact you couldn't have a flashlight and a gun out at the same time was questionable and a lot of people say stupid.
3. The Gameplay was repeatitive but it did change now and again.

And not one of those points matter. Id were making a remake of Doom, they weren't inventing a new fps game to revolutionise. They weren't continuing the Doom story they were making a remake with better graphics etc.

As far as most people i know go, and i'd think most of the people here know. Doom is the greatest game of all time. I still play it and Quake. If you were looking for a new style fps shooter that was along the lines of Farcry etc then i can understand why you were disappointed.

I however was looking for a remake of Doom and i got it and it was and is an excellent game. Lights off and volume up it just rocks. Yes its repeatitive, yes the AI looks like it was taken from Mario sometimes and yes the level designs (apart from Hell which was too short) are pretty crap.

You've gotta take it for what it is, its Doom.

TacT

Boro wrote:

Two GT's for €375? €187.50 each? Sounds like a tad cheap - there wouldnt be the words "fell off the back of a lorry" involved anywhere would there?

http://www.leadtek.com/3d_graphic/winfast_px6600gt_tdh_1.html

2 of those will set you back €375.
Civil - I was referring to the pricing numbers but I suppose if you must have two 6800U then the figure might get nearer to what you were estimating earlier, I'm just saying it doesn't have to be that expensive and you can build a SLI system for closer to the €700 mark. Nobody knows what the motherboard prices are yet, myself included.

Prior Of Taize

I think its painfully obvious by now that iD software excel in graphics and nothing else...they bring out the prettiest games and everyone else worries about everything else...

BloodBath

I think its painfully obvious by now that iD software excel in graphics and nothing else...they bring out the prettiest games and everyone else worries about everything else...

Doom 3 yes but their older titles were ground breaking, not just in the graphics department. The original wolfenstein was the first proper fps followed by doom that caused the fps market to explode. Quake was great as well and played great. The new wolfenstein was a very good game as well. One of the best multi player ww2 games and single player was decent too.


BloodBath