Caporegime
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They've already fixed the slowdown bug.
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Catalyst 7.10
- Thread starter jzanatta
- Start date
They've already fixed the slowdown bug.
in bioshock i get around 35fps at max settings, 1680x1050, 7.9 drivers. but i get around 5-7 more fps with the 7.10 drivers...
btw this is in xp and crossfire disabled...
im still very pleased with theses drivers with Medal of Honor Airborne
btw this is in xp and crossfire disabled...
im still very pleased with theses drivers with Medal of Honor Airborne
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Caporegime
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loadsa is it true in vista the 320 and the 640 get the same amount of fps in every game due to vista using the system ram to aid the video ram so it dont matter if your GTS has half the ram your system makes up the other half using your system ram, because currently im running vista 64 bit with 4gigs of ram and im thinking of upgrading my x1900xt but i honestly dont know which card is right for me, i want a good dx10 card which consumes not a lot of power so thats why i was thinking of an 8800gts, my res is 1680 x 1050
yep thats true. it's same with 2x00 series it uses system memory also so it doesn't really matter if the card has 256 or 320 of memory because it will use system memory automaticly..
my total video memory is 2gb...
Caporegime
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so effectively there is no real reason to buy an 8800gts 640MB if im running vista with 4Gb of ram, thanks for clearing that up mate, now just gotta decide between a 320MB GTS or a 2900 Pro or maybe even a second hand card, dont wanna be spending too much over £150
depends what ddr memory u have.
ddr2 6400 or 8500 it wouldn't be that much of a problem.
if u have ddr1 then yes it would be very slow..
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Soldato
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havent tried them yet but i just hope they havent screwed with what they had done to make Enemy Territory ( free game) work in 7.9 as the drivers from 7.5 upwards totally naffed the game up for me
Caporegime
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on board mem on the 2900xt has bandwidth in the region of, maybe 130-150gb/s iirc, its massive, the 8800gtx uses around 100gb/s , onboard system mem HEAVILY overclocked, i mean right at the top end might JUST hit 10gb/s, system memory is not used at all in the same way and you can not substitute system mem for gpu mem, you get mem based on resolution you will use, roughly.
Soldato
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This man speaks the truth. Whilst DDR2/3 IS better than older DDR for bandwidth, the stuff on graphics cards and the way its setup, gives far far far higher bandwidth. If you're going to go above the onboard GDDR (Graphics DDR) memory, its better to get a higher memory card, than spend a little less, and have to resort to system memory, as the bandwidth and latency is far improved over anything memory sharing can achieve.
That's why as soon as AGP aperture/shared video memory is used, performance on a card, regardless of the GPU core drops through the floor. It's a good idea, and prevents crashes etc because of memory issues, but for actual real world 3d use, it's utterly useless, it just can't keep up with even the slowest modern video card memory. I mean, ontop of the standard latencies and bandwidth involved within the card, you then have to addon the extra latency, time and innefficiency/cpu time used up by transfering to and from system memory, via the system board. It all adds up.
For an example (don't quote me here), once you reach the memory you're losing out before you even begin any access, but as soon as you hit the memory interface - DDR single channel has 64bit interface, dual channel has 128bit, which is far below the 256bit standard on vga memory interfaces. When you stick on top of that, increased latency, lower bandwidth, and then a cripple interface in comparison, well you're not looking at optimal performance. DDR2/3 etc may have improved upon frequency, but latency and interface wise, standard DDR memory is still far far inferior to the specialist interface of the GDDR.
The crippling effect that slower interfaces have on faster modern card can be seen outside of system memory too, when sometimes 256bit version of cards have significantly higher performance than 128bit interfaced cards, even when the core design and comparative frequencies are similar. This doesn't always translate upwards though (for example to the 512bit interface) as the GPU and card in general has to be able to effectively utilise and need the provided bandwidth, but cut the bandwidth to a card that can and does utilise the improved memory link, and bam, you take a sometimes substantial performance hit.
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The info STILL has to be transferred into and out of regular ram though and then onto the gfx card when it's needed. That is a long way for it to travel and as mentioned, is MUCH slower.
Big res with lots of AA and HDR (for example) NEEDS more gfx memory to operate quickly. Fail to do that and you'll get decreased performance. Why else would manufacturers even bother to stick fast memory on cards if they could just get away with using system memory.
Matthew
Big res with lots of AA and HDR (for example) NEEDS more gfx memory to operate quickly. Fail to do that and you'll get decreased performance. Why else would manufacturers even bother to stick fast memory on cards if they could just get away with using system memory.
Matthew
Soldato
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afraid ati have given up on us.all i can do now is make sure i never buy another ati card ever again. they really don;t deserve the money with the support they give.
my recent purchase for a agp x1950pro was dire too with only driver 7.7 working on it.
LOL
What are you on?
I really wish you'd stop posting utter ****.
ATi have not given up on X19x0 cards! They are just spending 95% of their time working on the 2900XT.
And I don't blame them one bit. The drivers for my X1900XTX are cracking and im using 7.3s still.
So mav really stop posting total **** please.
I agree, most people have it in their minds that the 2900 flagship isn't worthy of being one and is the biggest mistake ATI could have made. I'm not saying this because I have the card but it is worthy of being a flagship because it isn't that bad, it just needs work and I'm glad ATI is putting themselves behind it.
Caporegime
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the problem is, 99% of people jump instantly on new drivers and if they don't do anything for them get upset. in general a new driver set will normally be fixing errors that largely tend to effect the newest cards, and not older ones, and tons of fixes for the new cards. unless you have the latest card, or its a specific fix you need mostly you don't HAVE to install new drivers.
the speed increases, obviously they benchmark and say the biggest performance increases, but honestly those increase tend to be in low res situations where there was an issue and don't hugely effect real gameplay, cept for big fixes which again, tends to be newer cards.
half the issues you get in brand new games are things that effect, lately, the 8800/2900xt, 8600/2600 and 2400/8400 and so on. both nvidia and ati have pretty much worked out all the kinks on old cards. twittering on about not having new drivers, especially when that was the only complaint and you didn't mention once that they didn't fix something you needed. your complaint was, "i don't have something new to play with".
if ati are so bad, and always have been, why do you have an ati card. get rid of it, and go post in all the "nvidia are so great" threads. hmm, ati haven't said they've stopped supporting it, just there is an issue with 7.8 and 7.9 on that card, yet all other x1900series, x1800, everything down to a 9550 which must be 4-5 years old is supported. so you've gone maybe 2 months without anything new on a pretty old card and complain about ati. even though anyone with a nvidia 8800 went a lot longer, and longer still with pretty largely unstable drivers and somehow that makes nvidia better? LOL
as for mem bandwidth, ddr2/3 haven't even increased bandwidth "that" much. because they are still on the same interfaces in general and still only get called on a certain amount.
if you have a 256mb mem buffer on your card, and you try to use 300mb even if it can use system mem it will simply be so laggy slow and unplayable you still have to drop res/aa/af to a point where its all within the cards buffer and only then does it become playable again. as said, it is in pretty large part to prevent crashes, better to run terribly than crash game, possible driver and then blue screen if you overflow. the main reason for using system mem is intergrated gfx, not having to add money/transistors/space/heat to northbridges and for 99% of intergrated gfx where you will just be watching video, system mem is more than fast enough. for 3d work its completely useless and would be till firstly, pci-e access goes directly from cpu(which is planned for the future) and when memory controllers are on cpu's and theres enough space/power to make it a lot faster. but by then gpu mem interface will have increased a lot aswell.
the speed increases, obviously they benchmark and say the biggest performance increases, but honestly those increase tend to be in low res situations where there was an issue and don't hugely effect real gameplay, cept for big fixes which again, tends to be newer cards.
half the issues you get in brand new games are things that effect, lately, the 8800/2900xt, 8600/2600 and 2400/8400 and so on. both nvidia and ati have pretty much worked out all the kinks on old cards. twittering on about not having new drivers, especially when that was the only complaint and you didn't mention once that they didn't fix something you needed. your complaint was, "i don't have something new to play with".
if ati are so bad, and always have been, why do you have an ati card. get rid of it, and go post in all the "nvidia are so great" threads. hmm, ati haven't said they've stopped supporting it, just there is an issue with 7.8 and 7.9 on that card, yet all other x1900series, x1800, everything down to a 9550 which must be 4-5 years old is supported. so you've gone maybe 2 months without anything new on a pretty old card and complain about ati. even though anyone with a nvidia 8800 went a lot longer, and longer still with pretty largely unstable drivers and somehow that makes nvidia better? LOL
as for mem bandwidth, ddr2/3 haven't even increased bandwidth "that" much. because they are still on the same interfaces in general and still only get called on a certain amount.
if you have a 256mb mem buffer on your card, and you try to use 300mb even if it can use system mem it will simply be so laggy slow and unplayable you still have to drop res/aa/af to a point where its all within the cards buffer and only then does it become playable again. as said, it is in pretty large part to prevent crashes, better to run terribly than crash game, possible driver and then blue screen if you overflow. the main reason for using system mem is intergrated gfx, not having to add money/transistors/space/heat to northbridges and for 99% of intergrated gfx where you will just be watching video, system mem is more than fast enough. for 3d work its completely useless and would be till firstly, pci-e access goes directly from cpu(which is planned for the future) and when memory controllers are on cpu's and theres enough space/power to make it a lot faster. but by then gpu mem interface will have increased a lot aswell.
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maybe for the games you play but for me the drivers are far from perfect.
come on concorde, be fair, you of all people know how many problems i've had with my X1900XT and 95% of them problems were down to drivers. they may not have given up but they certainly arent doing much about them, and definately are far from perfect.
Soldato
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I really dunno whats going on with yours :/ I don't understand why a person with pretty much the same hardware has a problem when all the drivers sets I've ever used with ATi cards have been fine!
@ Mav, what problems, what games? Maybe the card isn't up to it?
thats what im thinking now too, that the card is just not up to anything new these days. stuff like, Dirt, Lost planet, not good at all.
thats what im thinking now too, that the card is just not up to anything new these days. stuff like, Dirt, Lost planet, not good at all.
Your hardware is pre historic. What do you bloody expect.
thats what im thinking now too, that the card is just not up to anything new these days. stuff like, Dirt, Lost planet, not good at all.
Blame crappy coding/ports...not the hardware
