Radeon X800 XT or GeForce 6800 Ultra? Tough choice!

Daniel Pass 6 May, 2004 at 7:10am ET Article published in Tech

Hardware Analysis has a new editorial which takes a look at the pros and cons of ATI and NVIDIA’s latest graphics cards.

This is just one of those days when you have to pass judgment on two products that are both excellent but designed from two different perspectives. At one hand you have ATi’s Radeon X800 XT, small, quiet, low power, but with plenty of processing power. On the other hand there’s Nvidia’s GeForce 6800 Ultra, big, powerful, lots of raw processing power and plenty of new features, but also requiring more power. The Radeon X800 XT reminds me of a polished ruby, as there’s already a solid base of drivers because it is based on a previous architecture, the Radeon X800 XT will therefore be able to shine from the start, but will also not be much more than that, a polished ruby.

It’s a good read! – Submitted by: hooj

Source: Hardware Analysis

Comments

6 May 2004 ~ 9:13am primesuspect One thing that is always left out in these discussions about hardware potential is the expect lifespan of an architecture. Sure, the 6800 Ultra may have more potential when "industry support" and "driver maturity" is there, but by the time that happens, we may be one or even two generations down the line.... So, a year from now the 6800 Ultra will be as fast, maybe faster than the X800 XT, but a year from now, these may be second tier cards.....
6 May 2004 ~ 9:18am Shorty

primesuspect wrote:

One thing that is always left out in these discussions about hardware potential is the expect lifespan of an architecture. Sure, the 6800 Ultra may have more potential when "industry support" and "driver maturity" is there, but by the time that happens, we may be one or even two generations down the line.... So, a year from now the 6800 Ultra will be as fast, maybe faster than the X800 XT, but a year from now, these may be second tier cards.....

So true.

I got a Radeon 9800xt a few months ago. That's basically considered old hardware now yet at the time of purchase, it was the daddy of all.. and engineered in time for a certain game that has yet to appear....

It's always the same, no matter how early you adopt.. it's going to get old fast. My MSI K8T board is now going to be old, just a few months after it was bought..
6 May 2004 ~ 11:10am EyesOnly I would go with radeon. Seems like a safe bet and something that prolly could run on a normal computer not requiring an enormously powerfull psu to run.
6 May 2004 ~ 2:13pm Geeky1 Tough choice? Hardly. The ATi Radeon X800XT PE is the intelligent choice.
6 May 2004 ~ 2:17pm Omega65

Dan wrote:

So true.

I got a Radeon 9800xt a few months ago. That's basically considered old hardware now yet at the time of purchase, it was the daddy of all.. and engineered in time for a certain game that has yet to appear....

It's always the same, no matter how early you adopt.. it's going to get old fast. My MSI K8T board is now going to be old, just a few months after it was bought..

True enough. Also buying the highend card is usually a bad idea... except in the case of the X800 XT

Bestbuy Prices (current)

Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB $250
Radeon 9800 XT 256MB $500 (+32mhz faster than 9800 Pro)
Radeon X800 Pro 256MB $400
Radeon X800 XT 256MB $500 (+45mhz & +4 pipelines)

Time to start saving the pennies.
6 May 2004 ~ 2:52pm Geeky1 Bah. I just blew what I had left on a dual xeon board. Time to sell some stuff.
6 May 2004 ~ 3:10pm Omega65

Geeky1 wrote:

Bah. I just blew what I had left on a dual xeon board. Time to sell some stuff.

Pics Please
6 May 2004 ~ 3:14pm Geeky1 http://www.short-media.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13414
6 May 2004 ~ 3:21pm Templar

Omega65 wrote:

True enough. Also buying the highend card is usually a bad idea... except in the case of the X800 XT

Bestbuy Prices (current)

Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB $250
Radeon 9800 XT 256MB $500 (+32mhz faster than 9800 Pro)
Radeon X800 Pro 256MB $400
Radeon X800 XT 256MB $500 (+45mhz & +4 pipelines)

Time to start saving the pennies.

Wow, ATI better lower some prices.. For $500, I'm definately taking the more powerful card.
6 May 2004 ~ 3:25pm Thrax I look at it this way.

nVidia may have a solid history for drivers, but their last 18 months has been nothing but a slippery downhill slide.

ATi has a poor driver history, but their last 24 months have been miraculous.

I'll go with the company that's on the up and up.
6 May 2004 ~ 3:29pm TheBaron i dont think this is much of a decision, ati all the way (btw, temporal AA is completely badass)
6 May 2004 ~ 5:21pm Leonardo

For $500, I'm definately taking the more powerful card.

For $500, I wait a few months and pay $150 for the same card, OEM or slightly used. I've done that three builds in a row with no regrets.
6 May 2004 ~ 6:15pm ishiii oh baby
12 weeks until I am back in Canada, and this bad boy is on the list of things to buy.
Now I need to build a system around it too, cause im not about to pair a x800xe up with a 2.4B
6 May 2004 ~ 6:54pm mmonnin Those arent ATi prices. Those are BB prices. They are just trying not to lose money of the cards they have in stock.
6 May 2004 ~ 8:26pm Omega65

Leonardo wrote:

For $500, I wait a few months and pay $150 for the same card, OEM or slightly used. I've done that three builds in a row with no regrets.

$150 will get you a 9700Pro (2yr old video card). 9800 Pro are $180 (used) to $200 & up (New Oem).

X800 Pro won't be $150 until 2006 :banghead:

The 9800 Pros are good deal though :thumbup (just grabbed one)
6 May 2004 ~ 8:46pm Leonardo Point taken - I stand corrected. Someone please tell me. What game will a 9700Pro not play well today? Or, what game will a 9800Pro not play well a year from you? Nothing wrong with powerful hardware, nothing wrong with emotionally satisfying purchases - if you have bucks to burn. But, $500 for a video card? I just don't understand.
6 May 2004 ~ 8:47pm Medlock

TheBaron wrote:

i dont think this is much of a decision, ati all the way (btw, temporal AA is completely badass)

I agree! It kix @$$ that it can be enabled on R3x0 based cards. (The lower framrates of my 9700 Pro have kept me from seeing the true light, i think... :bawling: :banghead: ) I wanna see how 1) it will be on the X800 series and 2) how ATi will implement these options into the control panel.

But that article just made this ATi fanboy ( ) look at things a little differently. I was quite certain that the X800 XT would own, (for now at least, I was right) but I didn't really look at the whole picture. Oh well. Hopefully our good friends at Nvidia are not smart and don't/can't take full advantage of what it's got in that 6800.

And Leo, I think the performance and real power of these cards is what will suck enthusiasts in to buying these cards. Heck if I had some money I might go for it myself! lol Up until a few days ago I thought my 9700 pro was fast enough... Now it just isn't right.
7 May 2004 ~ 3:58am Omega65

Leonardo wrote:

Point taken - I stand corrected. Someone please tell me. What game will a 9700Pro not play well today? Or, what game will a 9800Pro not play well a year from you? Nothing wrong with powerful hardware, nothing wrong with emotionally satisfying purchases - if you have bucks to burn. But, $500 for a video card? I just don't understand.

Like you said, it's emotionally satisfying.
7 May 2004 ~ 1:10pm OverLoad i have a 5900 ultra flashed to a 5950. now when i benched the 5950 i got around 17000+ on 3dmark2001. i benched the 9800 pro and got 18000+. ??? is ati made for benching?
7 May 2004 ~ 1:11pm Geeky1 No, the ATi is just a much better card.
7 May 2004 ~ 1:17pm kanezfan i still have my 9500 pro, and i plan to keep it until games start to play like crap, which is probably another year away. farcry looks and plays great, ut2k4 plays and looks great, so no complaints from me.
8 May 2004 ~ 8:48am Medlock

kanezfan wrote:

i still have my 9500 pro, and i plan to keep it until games start to play like crap, which is probably another year away. farcry looks and plays great, ut2k4 plays and looks great, so no complaints from me.

Basically the same for me. The 9700 Pro's just got slightly higher clocks than the 9500 Pro. But my question is, where will the prices be when we do need to dump these cards? I don't know how good a purchase it would be to just upgrade to the 9800 Series when these cards are crap, because you'd probably get more "bang for your buck" out of the X800 Series.
8 May 2004 ~ 11:59am Omega65 The 9500 Pro/9700 Pro/9800 Pro (& XT) are basically the same 8 pipeline chip just different clockspeeds.

The X800 is a major step up. Of course you could just look at the 9700/9800 Pro as the new Value line of GPUs
8 May 2004 ~ 10:53pm mmonnin Looks like I am going to need about $580 for a new vid card. 500 for the card, 50 for TAP at CompUSA and tax.