HD 2900 XT now with "matured" drivers

truebluecfc · 3 Aug 2007 at 21:22

If only the 2900xt was released earlier, but it is a good card with great driver support if i had to buy today i would choose it but it took so long to come out many people bought GTS's me including.

willhub · 3 Aug 2007 at 21:43

SS-89 said:
Stalker doesnt run like crap on my 2900xt so unless you have the card i would refrain from making off the cuff comments like that.

Everything max in game except grass shadows yealds me an average fps of 70 on the timedemo i constructed and doesnt dip below 30fps. See the cat 7.8 thread, i believe fornowagain tested it too and got an average of 100fps on his 8800gtx.

What time demo did you construct?

SS-89 · 3 Aug 2007 at 21:45

Its in the cat 7.8 beta thread, i found it personally better than the other timedemos as they were skewed due to the amount of times it looks up at the sky.

Shocky-FM · 3 Aug 2007 at 21:48

SS-89 said:
Stalker doesnt run like crap on my 2900xt so unless you have the card i would refrain from making off the cuff comments like that.

Everything max in game except grass shadows yealds me an average fps of 70 on the timedemo i constructed and doesnt dip below 30fps. See the cat 7.8 thread, i believe fornowagain tested it too and got an average of 100fps on his 8800gtx.

Well i'll believe reviews over some fanboy on a forum anyday.

willhub · 3 Aug 2007 at 21:50

Shocky-FM said:
Well i'll believe reviews over some fanboy on a forum anyday.

Should never trust reviews, half of em are all crap now adays.

Shocky-FM · 3 Aug 2007 at 21:53

willhub said:
Should never trust reviews, half of em are all crap now adays.

More reliable then fanboys defending there cards.

LoadsaMoney · 3 Aug 2007 at 21:56

What drivers were used there.

willhub · 3 Aug 2007 at 22:03

Shocky-FM said:
More reliable then fanboys defending there cards.

You seriously believe that lol? Those results are low compared to everyone else...

Shocky-FM · 3 Aug 2007 at 22:03

LoadsaMoney said:
What drivers were used there.

7.6 I think with latest nvidia driver 162.18, I havent seen anything regarding stalker in ATI's release notes so I'm guessing nothings changed unless there doing stealth increases which I doubt.

tamalero · 4 Aug 2007 at 01:38

Shocky-FM said:
7.6 I think with latest nvidia driver 162.18, I havent seen anything regarding stalker in ATI's release notes so I'm guessing nothings changed unless there doing stealth increases which I doubt.

7.8 betas are the ones who get the huge increase in framerate, you're pretty much trying to count fishes in a pond without trying to get inside of it.

Trusty · 4 Aug 2007 at 01:50

Shocky-FM said:
7.6 I think with latest nvidia driver 162.18, I havent seen anything regarding stalker in ATI's release notes so I'm guessing nothings changed unless there doing stealth increases which I doubt.

The 2900xt hasnt been in contest until the 7.7's were released, they should do that review again but with the 7.7's and 7.8's. Me thinks the 2900XT would win by a far margin!

Cyber-Mav · 4 Aug 2007 at 03:30

Tainted said:
Hey all,

Now that the HD 2900 XT has been out for awhile and hopefully it's drivers are more matured how is it competing with the 8800 GTS 640mb?

What's everyone buying now? Thinking of buying one.

noise is still and issue, heat is still high and power consumption is still over 100w more than a gts. no driver will fix those issues.

Tom|Nbk · 4 Aug 2007 at 03:56

Cyber-Mav said:
noise is still and issue, heat is still high and power consumption is still over 100w more than a gts. no driver will fix those issues.

Correction it uses 40-50w more power than a GTS. Also these issues don't bother some people. If you can afford a high end rig you can afford decent cooling and the electric bill to come with it.

Cyber-Mav · 4 Aug 2007 at 04:46

Tom|Nbk said:
Correction it uses 40-50w more power than a GTS. Also these issues don't bother some people. If you can afford a high end rig you can afford decent cooling and the electric bill to come with it.

funny, many review sites show it to have around 90w more power consumption than a GTX. so unless a gts sucks up more power than a GTX that 40-50w margin is just a blag?

eracer2006 · 4 Aug 2007 at 04:48

Tom|Nbk said:
Correction it uses 40-50w more power than a GTS. Also these issues don't bother some people. If you can afford a high end rig you can afford decent cooling and the electric bill to come with it.

Doesnt bother me one bit.

Your not a gamer if you fret about power consumption.

Cyber-Mav · 4 Aug 2007 at 04:56

think of others though and not just enthusiast gamers.
its one question tom has avoided answering all the time. i asked him to post a question to ati since he is on the beta team,

" why does the 2900xt consume 95w more power than a 8800gtx yet still result in lower performance than the 8800gtx" :confused:

only answer i get is "its a different architecture" that makes no sense, if he was honest he would reply saying "2900 an inefficient card which can;t compete in the performance per watt comparrisons"

but insted all we see is bickering and side tracking. is one honest answer too much to ask?

guess its just me that has to accept that no matter how crap a product is if some people buy it (usually out of mistake) someone will defend it all the way.

eracer2006 · 4 Aug 2007 at 05:20

it is a different artitechture, so how does it not make sense ?

Tom|Nbk · 4 Aug 2007 at 05:25

Cyber-Mav said:
funny, many review sites show it to have around 90w more power consumption than a GTX. so unless a gts sucks up more power than a GTX that 40-50w margin is just a blag?

It's a real shame you always want to clash with me, but It's ok since I enjoy making you look foolish

(not exactly hard as many would agree)

Ok first up power consumption:

Do the maths the difference between the GTS 640mb and HD2900XT = 48w . Spot on with what I said.

, go do your homework.

Cyber-Mav said:
think of others though and not just enthusiast gamers.
its one question tom has avoided answering all the time. i asked him to post a question to ati since he is on the beta team

" why does the 2900xt consume 95w more power than a 8800gtx yet still result in lower performance than the 8800gtx"

only answer i get is "its a different architecture" that makes no sense, if he was honest he would reply saying "2900 an inefficient card which can;t compete in the performance per watt comparrisons"

I wouldn't post such a question to ATi anyway as I test software for them and don't deal with the hardware team only the software side of things.

I personally couldn't care about performance per watt you keep bring up nor do most people so it seems moot that you keep bringing it up (look's like now the drivers are improving it's hard for you to nit pick), the 2900 does have an inefficient architecture (VLIW), this is common knowledge and you'll see me pulling no punches about that. VLIW has a few advantages when compared to the G80 architecture, which is also very complex they both are out standing architectures, the 2900s is less efficient but once programmed right It can perform outstandinly well, this all depends on how well the compiler in the driver can organise said instructions.

read about VLIW here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VLIW

Cyber-Mav said:
guess its just me that has to accept that no matter how crap a product is if some people buy it (usually out of mistake) someone will defend it all the way.

I can't see how buying a 2900 is a bad mistake you get what you pay for and decent drivers to boot. It's not GTX level but it's beat it a few times aslong as slaying the GTS in the process, it works out great bang for buck if you can put aside the small niggles of the card. I really hope you can wake up some day and the green fog clears for you Mav. Seems its all going to your head a bit.

J.D · 4 Aug 2007 at 05:45

Cyber-Mav said:
think of others though and not just enthusiast gamers.
its one question tom has avoided answering all the time. i asked him to post a question to ati since he is on the beta team,

" why does the 2900xt consume 95w more power than a 8800gtx yet still result in lower performance than the 8800gtx"

only answer i get is "its a different architecture" that makes no sense, if he was honest he would reply saying "2900 an inefficient card which can;t compete in the performance per watt comparrisons"

but insted all we see is bickering and side tracking. is one honest answer too much to ask?

guess its just me that has to accept that no matter how crap a product is if some people buy it (usually out of mistake) someone will defend it all the way.

Why do you care so much?. This has been too long now Mav, the same carp over and over and over again. Do you never get tired of it and think to yourself, bugger it?.

If it was someone else then I'd be happy to discuss this but I know what you're all about. Petty as hell.

HAHAHA. I don't own the x2900 and I'm not going to buy it either. My next card is looking to be Nvidia. I can easily say and recommend the X2900XT to anyone.

Oh, My x2 is generating more heat and using more power than Conroe would. I think I need to change right now!!!!!! :rolleyes:

. Aye, right. So I would. You are really being quite silly about this. The X2900 is a better card than the 640mb GTS. The proof is there to be seen and this is from someone who isn't an owner or even thinking about being one.

Yes, it has more power draw but so has my CPU over the Conroe. It really doesn't matter unless it's hampering your overclock max or draining your money through electricity bills?. None of these will happen. If you can afford to spend £200+ on a graphics card I think you can spend the money on a half decent PSU.

The noise I wouldn't see a problem with as when I'm gaming my speakers and sub make some noise and with headphones on that wouldn't be an issue either.

Just look at the pathetic attempts to fail a card that is showing great progress. The ATI/AMD driver team are doing an excellent job with driver releases. Where are Nvidia's driver team at?.

Shocky-FM said:
8800GTS still has more consistant performance, 2900XT just seems to fall apart in some games for some reason. Until thats fixed I wouldn't recommend the 2900XT to anyone, I wouldn't want to be answering questions afterwards on why stalker runs like crap on their 2900XT.

Shocky-FM, for someone with a nice rig, your last few posts make it seem as if someone built and overclocked that for you?. How do you not know of the performance increase and the x2900 taking the lead?. It's not really what you'd call a secret lol.

Try and do some researching before making totally stupid and untrue comments. You just make yourself look silly. Go and recommend the 640Mb GTS. It won't be long before everyone knows you talk carp and won't listen to you.

Shocky-FM said:
Well i'll believe reviews over some fanboy on a forum anyday.

Go and believe the (old) reviews while the rest of us know the truth. You will be a tower of misinformed information. Now pass me that left handed screwdriver please?.

---

I really don't understand the hatred towards this x2900 card by some people. I can't ever remember everyone screaming that the 7 series was weak in comparison to the x1800/x1900 series?.

I've already stated that before the release of the 8800 series that I've used ATI for a long time and preferred them. I had a 7600GT OC to replace my x800XT PE but it lasted 3 weeks as it was a downgrade IMO and bought the X1900 instead.

Even though I've favoured ATI throughout the the years I haven't had nothing but praise for the GTS and GTX models. They deserve it. Now the X2900 has arrived and in it's current state it's the better card than the GTS and that's a FACT. Why do people fight it because it's ATI (AMD)?. Why is there no praise for the card?. An ATI user throughout the years can easily say that a 8800GTX is a powerhouse of a card but can Nvidia users ever praise the x2900?. It seems if the majority cannot and I think this is where these irrelevant posts are coming from.

Read lots of new benchmarks using newer drivers and then see where you stand on the GTS/X2900 front. I can plainly see what I'd be buying for around the same amount of cash. Coming here and asking is doing nothing but going to give the poster mixed views about what the better card is. If they want dead quiet and less power draw then the GTS at a performance hit is the better buy and if they don't care then most definitely it will be the X2900.

Give people the right information instead of defending purchases or the company brand as it's useless.

Cyber-Mav · 4 Aug 2007 at 12:12

J.D said:
Oh, My x2 is generating more heat and using more power than Conroe would. I think I need to change right now!!!!!! . Aye, right. So I would. You are really being quite silly about this.

excellent, you have raised some proper replies here which make sense and i can agree with. however.....

you say your X2 is generating more heat and using more power than a conroe, well that is perfectly acceptable, the reason is that the X2 has been out for a lot longer than conroe has.

the 2900 on the other hand was over 6 months late to the table and what did it show? increased power consumption and heat.

J.D said:
Yes, it has more power draw but so has my CPU over the Conroe

right again another brilliant point. (im not being sarcastic here your helping me somewhat in clearing some things up.)

if the 2900 had come out before the 8800 then id have nothing to write about. but being 6 months late to the game without a product thats 10% better than the current best on the table is just being silly.
your x2 HAS a reason for more power consumption, cuz its older tech. then 2900? how old tech is that now?