2900xt owners\benchmarks thread

Tom|Nbk · 31 May 2007 at 23:33

AndrewJ said:
So is it worth buying one of these or not?

Yes & No.

Vogon · 1 Jun 2007 at 08:06

I would say definatly no.
Hotter, noisier, and normal AA modes wih a major performance hit
Either get a GTS or GTX now, or hold on until the next round in September.

Dutch Guy · 1 Jun 2007 at 12:45

AndrewJ said:
So is it worth buying one of these or not?

It depends on what you find important in a videocard.

If you hate noise and already think your leccy bill is too high get a 8800GTS, if you want to have a little more speed (in certain games) with the possibility of a speed increase thru drivers get a HD2900XT

gols · 1 Jun 2007 at 13:41

Well I got my one of these yesterday and it seems to work ok (I've only run Oblivion with it so far, looks good) but.... I'm not sure I can put up with the noise levels coming out of this thing. When I first start up my computer it is nice and quiet (like my 1900GT) and then about half way through loading windows it will spin up quite a lot and it stays at this level all the time in 2D mode. When playing Oblivion it spins up even more and becomes VERY loud.

Anyone know if there will be a way to sort this out in future? I'm pretty miffed that they actually advertise it on OCuk as 'SILENT'...

EDIT- another thing, when I run the AMD GPU clock tool it only shows temps for LM64 local temperature, nothing for ASIC temperature? EDIT2- opps didn't enable reading on that one.

AndrewJ · 1 Jun 2007 at 16:38

Dutch Guy said:
It depends on what you find important in a videocard.

If you hate noise and already think your leccy bill is too high get a 8800GTS, if you want to have a little more speed (in certain games) with the possibility of a speed increase thru drivers get a HD2900XT

I run an Antec Nine Hundred on high with all fan bays used so noise isn't a major issue, also I run a 600watt Seasonic S12 psu with 12v x2 rails with 18amp on each.

fornowagain · 4 Jun 2007 at 15:15

Don't think this has been posted before, Bit-tech link

Some of the single card XT scores aren't so good (old drivers as well), but crossfire scales really well. Much better than SLi. I've picked the same resolution with mid AA values from each game, it scores better/worse in others.

fornowagain · 4 Jun 2007 at 15:16

Chronictank · 4 Jun 2007 at 16:06

fornowagain said:
Don't think this has been posted before, Bit-tech link

Some of the single card XT scores aren't so good (old drivers as well), but crossfire scales really well. Much better than SLi. I've picked the same resolution with mid AA values from each game, it scores better/worse in others.

Would be interesting to see how oc'd versions in x-fire compare

fornowagain · 6 Jun 2007 at 14:08

Gotta love ViperJohns work, legend.

Schnippzle · 6 Jun 2007 at 14:12

Might seem like a bit of a n00bish question, but why have the fans over just two those ram coolers and not the others, or are they not part of the memory of the card as they look different?

Boogle · 6 Jun 2007 at 14:19

Schnippzle said:
Might seem like a bit of a n00bish question, but why have the fans over just two those ram coolers and not the others, or are they not part of the memory of the card as they look different?

The fans are over the voltage regulation modules - they run hot.

Schnippzle · 6 Jun 2007 at 14:33

Ah right cool, cheers pal =D

E.D.I.T.: Would it not be possible to fit a 50 or 80mm fan instead to cover memory coolers next to them?

Dutch Guy · 6 Jun 2007 at 15:09

Schnippzle said:
E.D.I.T.: Would it not be possible to fit a 50 or 80mm fan instead to cover memory coolers next to them?

That wouldn't help as only a few memory chips would get extra cooling and you will be limited by the hottest one anyway.

Clairvoyant · 6 Jun 2007 at 15:54

gols said:
I'm not sure I can put up with the noise levels coming out of this thing. When I first start up my computer it is nice and quiet (like my 1900GT) and then about half way through loading windows it will spin up quite a lot and it stays at this level all the time in 2D mode. When playing Oblivion it spins up even more and becomes VERY loud.

Just a question, but do you have a good air flow, cool air coming in, hot air going out.

That does help.

fornowagain · 7 Jun 2007 at 12:13

Lasso: External 2900XT Crossfire

While we thought this Computex is the most uninteresting year for graphics cards where there are no very interesting stuffs being showcased but luckily Lasso save the day. Lasso is a codename for AMD external graphics technology and the latest revision is able to support Crossfire on the Radeon HD 2000 series. In the current revision, there are 2 PCIe x16 slots on the Lasso board with a chipset onboard that offers 48 PCIe lanes so theoretical you can have 3 PCIe x16 slots running at full 16x bandwidth for Crossfire + Physics setup or 4 PCIe x16 slots running at 8x bandwidth in Quad Crossfire setup. For the current setup, there is a pair 2900XT 1GB GDDR4 cards linked up by 2 long Crossfire bridges inside a case with 500W PSU made specially for Lasso. However, there is no guidance from AMD yet to which when Lasso will be announced.

SS-89 · 7 Jun 2007 at 12:40

fornowagain said:
Lasso: External 2900XT Crossfire

Snip

Very interesting however im guessing that will cost top dollar.

Gerard · 7 Jun 2007 at 13:52

That lasso setup looks interesting but would there not be latency issues associated with an external graphics chip? Also at the front near the fan, whys it look like someone just slapped a load of selotape on the front to seal the fan into what looks like a duct? :confused:

fornowagain · 7 Jun 2007 at 13:54

Gerard said:
That lasso setup looks interesting but would there not be latency issues associated with an external graphics chip? Also at the front near the fan, whys it look like someone just slapped a load of selotape on the front to seal the fan into what looks like a duct?

Its connected with a PCIe cable, so I'm guessing not. Can't find out much about it

http://www.pcisig.com/specifications/pciexpress/pcie_cabling1.0/

Gerard · 7 Jun 2007 at 14:12

Suppose it does give an extra upgrade path to some people, obviously depending if it can be hooked up to any system, shuttles for example. Looks like a kind of gimmicky product as well though, just looks like something thats made for show and will probably never be available. Or if it does come available its likely to have a retarded price tag attached. Not really suprising considering you're getting a partial motherboard, 2 cards, a psu and an enclosure.

Dutch Guy · 7 Jun 2007 at 14:23

Gerard said:
That lasso setup looks interesting but would there not be latency issues associated with an external graphics chip? Also at the front near the fan, whys it look like someone just slapped a load of selotape on the front to seal the fan into what looks like a duct?

I have a crap monitor at work but it looks like there are no fans on the GPU heatsinks and that the casefans at the front are ducted to pass air over the GPU heatsink.