do you think there's a lot more to come from the 2900?

Squakingcow · 30 May 2007 at 17:39

Somehow I get the feeling that the 7.5's are going to be a less buggy version of the betas/ alphas that are being used for the 2900Xt now, with support for all the cards+ the rest of the HD range.

I'm begging to doubt that we'll see any performance increase with these, and that'll be left for the 7.6's :rolleyes:

Cyber-Mav · 30 May 2007 at 20:16

Dead Dog said:
as title, i'm going to order today, do i get the leadtek 8800gts 640 or pay that little bit more and go for a 2900 and maybe hope it'll improve with new drivers.

cards maxxed out as it is. only thig to expect from new drivers is better game compatability and bug fixes.

but lets wait for 7.5's and see what happens/.

paradigm · 30 May 2007 at 20:18

Cyber-Mav said:
cards maxxed out as it is.

How do you work that out then?

Unless you know every optimisation for the R600 core, and the most efficient way of implementing them, then surely there are ALWAYS gains to be had.

We are on very early drivers here.

Tom|Nbk · 30 May 2007 at 20:18

paradigm said:
How do you work that out then?

Unless you know every optimisation for the R600 core, and the most efficient way of implementing them, then surely there are ALWAYS gains to be had.

We are on very early drivers here.

Same way he works most stuff out, pulls it right out his arse.

LoadsaMoney · 30 May 2007 at 20:22

Don't expect anything from the 7.5's.

Cyber-Mav · 30 May 2007 at 20:39

Tom|Nbk said:
Same way he works most stuff out, pulls it right out his arse.

spoken like a true fanboi.
unless you have proof you can;t go around saying stuff like that.

paradigm · 30 May 2007 at 20:41

Cyber-Mav said:
spoken like a true fanboi.
unless you have proof you can;t go around saying stuff like that.

I suppose you had proof for what you said, yes? Link please.

Just for the record, I hate fanboyism, I just go for the best I can get at the time.

Cyber-Mav · 30 May 2007 at 20:45

paradigm said:
I suppose you had proof for what you said, yes? Link please.

Just for the record, I hate fanboyism, I just go for the best I can get at the time.

many sites have shown that the 2900 has reached its physical limit in performance, shown using fillrate tests. its just not got enough left in reserves to give more speed.

but wait for next drivers, proof will be there. at most they got ability to sort out speed in vista a bit and in certain games to get them performing as they should but end result will not be a card thats twice as fast as a 8800gtx as it shows on paper.

Dead Dog · 30 May 2007 at 20:47

I'm sure i can wait till the next ones now(don't quote me on that!)
I think the 1950 will be good enough until dx10 is really needed.

As for me and nv & ati I just get what I think is the best or best value card at the time i've had a mix of both and will be leaving my 6800gt for this 1950.
At least ati have a dx10 card now
I think it's biggest problem is it arrived much later than the 8800 series and everyone expected it to be 4,5,6 months better than the 8800 so it kinda should have been the 'next big thing', the next ones are due aug/sept I believe so thats 3 or so months and everyone is expecting them to be better, iron out flaws, perform better ect, this was expected of the 2900, and whilst it isn't a bad card it isn't awesome theoretically speaking it should have the same performance stats as the ultra given the time scale, which according to the link to the review in this thread trounces all over the 2900 and thats before aa is applied which allegedly kills 2900 performance. But then it is a shed load cheaper than the ultra.

Delvis · 30 May 2007 at 20:50

My my people, less of the bashing towards eachother chrikey =P

I see it as currently the Nvidia based cards are better 'in general', yes the ATI card beats the nvidias in some instances, but the Nvidia one seems to be a better performer in general.

Quite frankly my x1900xtx still gives me ample performance, yes i would like more frames etc in games like stalker, but everyone knows that has its own issues.

I'm just going to keep watch on new driver releases, and see what all the review sites say

evilcrowuk · 30 May 2007 at 20:53

Cyber-Mav said:
many sites have shown that the 2900 has reached its physical limit in performance, shown using fillrate tests. its just not got enough left in reserves to give more speed.

but wait for next drivers, proof will be there. at most they got ability to sort out speed in vista a bit and in certain games to get them performing as they should but end result will not be a card thats twice as fast as a 8800gtx as it shows on paper.

Care to post up some links showing the HD2900 cant get improved performance through driver optimization, all the reviews i have seen on the card nowhere is there anything about the card already reaching its full potential, again links please. If you cant put up then shut up... :rolleyes:

Cyber-Mav · 30 May 2007 at 21:00

evilcrowuk said:
Care to post up some links showing the HD2900 cant get improved performance through driver optimization, all the reviews i have seen on the card nowhere is there anything about the card already reaching its full potential, again links please. If you cant put up then shut up...

fair enough mate, no replies from me till cats 7.5 are out. till then ill start preparing my string of "i told you so's"......

LoadsaMoney · 30 May 2007 at 21:06

May as well start now Mav, the 7.5's are not the Magic Drivers they are all hoping for.

Cyber-Mav · 30 May 2007 at 21:08

LoadsaMoney said:
May as well start now Mav, the 7.5's are not the Magic Drivers they are all hoping for.

you are the corruptor..... :mad:

paradigm · 30 May 2007 at 21:14

No-one said anything about the 7.5's being the performance increasing driver that "we all want". I'd be more than happy just to have stable vista running at the moment, the framerates are good, certainly not great, but definately good.

I think that there is a fair amount of performance to be had out of vista yet, not only is the support in the drivers for the card still young, the OS as a whole and the new driver architecture is young, both with much room for improvement on implementation.

Look how long it took ATi to get full performance out of the 9800PRO, heck, they were still optimising for the R350 core when the R360 was released, and even then a few good months after.

I certainly don't expect miracles with 7.5's, but do expect increases in the future.

Tom|Nbk · 30 May 2007 at 21:20

Seriously guys don't expect miracles with the 7.5s, being the first set.

paradigm · 30 May 2007 at 21:23

As I said, the drivers are still young. Bug fixes and vista stability would be a godsend however.

LoadsaMoney · 30 May 2007 at 21:27

R.I.P ATi, lets have a big round of applause for AMD for taking em down.

Should have left well alone. :mad:

Squakingcow · 30 May 2007 at 21:29

One of the main things that stopped me going for the 8-series was that I didn't want to be left driverless when the 9-series comes out (like the 7-series).

And unfortunatly I think we'll have to wait a little longer for the 'miricle' driver :rolleyes:

Although if EATM is all it's cracked up to be, they've had that in the drivers for a while apparantly, just only accessable via registary hacks. They could easily get that in the 7.5's, but that depends if it's as good as it's supposed to be :rolleyes:

Boogle · 30 May 2007 at 21:29

Cyber-Mav said:
many sites have shown that the 2900 has reached its physical limit in performance, shown using fillrate tests. its just not got enough left in reserves to give more speed.

I'm sure you have proof of this... somewhere.
Meanwhile I'll post some proof that disproves your little statement there: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/r600-architecture_18.html#sect1

The 2900XT has more fillrate than the 8800GTS, its direct competitor. Additionally the two cards (and the GTX) constantly switch places depending on the test being performed. Based on these theoretical tests it would be ludicrous to be able to say something like the 2900XT has hit its peak straight after launch. No GPU has ever performed at top efficiency at release, not one. Not even the original Voodoo.