General GFX card questions...

[xirokx]

First of all whats the difference in ATI Gfx cards between:

1. His excalibur
2. Power colour
3. Connect 3D
4. Asus
5. MSI
6. ATI ---> is this the best as they actually make em?

If you had to rate them 1 - 6 with one being the best what order would you put them in?

4.PowerColor ATI Radeon X1800 ***CrossFire Edition*** 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-052-PC)

5.PowerColor ATI Radeon X1800 XT 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-048-PC)

As number 4 is "crossfire" its more expensive but what is crossfire? Does this mean its hooks up with the crossfire mobo to give you great performance?

Is "crossfire" Sli's equvilant? which one is better crossfire or SLI??

6. 256mb , 512mb we see this all the time in graphics card is there really that much diff between the 2?

On the eye is there a lot of diff?
Does it mean your games wont freeze or crash?

Please explain further if poss?

How much better is the x1900 256mb than the x1800 256mb or x1800 512mb, does it matter if its from any of the 6 names mentioned at the very top of this thread?

Has ATI out performed Nvidia now? Whats the best gfx card floating around atm?



Thanks for your help most appreciated...

 

[Pulsedriver]

Hi mate,

Basically, Crossfire is ATI's equivelent to Nvidia's SLi technology.
It allows you to use 2 cards at once, providing great performance, but really, unless your using super high resolutions (1900x1200 etc) some would say its overkill.

A Crossfire card is a 'master' card, which has an extra chip onboard allowing it to link up (with a dongle) to another non-master card, basically meaning, if you wanted to use Crossfire, then you'd have to have a master card for it to work, you couldnt just buy 2 Ati cards and expect them to work together.

Memory wise, it's safe to assume new games will start using the 512mb provided on the latest cards.


Out of all the makes you've listed, they are just partner companies, They all use the same card, but some decide to customise;

Some would add a games bundle, others would supply just the basics, but at less cost... So depends if you want games with the card etc
Sometimes they add a different cooler, or tweak the card, particularly people like XFX + BFG for NVidia, as they tend to supply overclocked cards straight from the factory.
Also, the warranty, some offer 2 years, others offer 3 years warranty.


IMO there is no 'best' card at the moment;

The X1900XTX is ATi's top offering, and the 7900GTX is Nvidias.

The general consensus is they are both pretty much as good as each other. So really, whichever one fits your price range best!

Hope this answers your questions,

Sean

 

[paradigm]

A Crossfire card is a 'master' card, which has an extra chip onboard allowing it to link up (with a dongle) to another non-master card, basically meaning, if you wanted to use Crossfire, then you'd have to have a master card for it to work, you couldnt just buy 2 Ati cards and expect them to work together.

Not for long, i'm pretty sure that a newly announced development was going to allow two identical cards to run together in crossfire without the need for a "master" card.

 

[smids]

Not for long, i'm pretty sure that a newly announced development was going to allow two identical cards to run together in crossfire without the need for a "master" card.

RD580 chipset + Cat 6.5 (May) drivers expected to sort that one .

 

[xirokx]

How much better is the x1900 256mb than the x1800 256mb or x1800 512mb

How future proof is the x1800 256mb and 512mb