ABIT RX600XT-PCIE
Testing ABIT RX600XT-PCIE
The system has been assembled, debugged, all the games, patches, benchmarks and tools have been installed. We took the readings of system tests, and from the results it is clear that all is OK - the test configuration demonstrates the expected performance, shows no conflicts, and all the system devices run in their rated modes. That is, the software and hardware proved to be an ideal fit. We can now start testing the video cards. What to compare, actually? Where is the the point of departure which will allow comparing AGP and PCI-E video cards on two absolutely different systems? It is like comparing Apple and PC, which some used to like in be past to make the public laugh, but they no longer do so.
All seems to be very simple - you get a Radeon X600XT-PCIE video card (on the RV380 core), acquired by the courtesy of ABIT, there is a Radeon 9600XT AGP (RV360), with the only difference in them is in some differing parts of the GUI. But all is not as simple as it seems.
First, for X600XT video cards ATI has changed the memory latency timings through raising them essentially as compared to Radeon 9600XT (730 versus 600Mhz), and ABIT raised them even more - up to 760Mhz. That is, the X600XT will be in any case faster than its AGP counterpart.
Secondly, the system itself built on the i915P/i925X chipsets is very different from the previous i865P/i875. If we look at the factors of the new system memory application, use of the PCI-Express X16 graphic bus, changed processor socket, and Matrix RAID separately, we can hardly notice any difference, but merging all these technologies we get not merely a "noise level", but an entirely new system which should be regarded as a whole, a set of new functionalities.
That is, it is very difficult to perform a "direct and pure" comparison of AGP and PCI-E video cards made on kindred cores on different platforms, so in this transition period we have to compare systems as "old versus new". And the results of comparison of PCI-E versions of cards produced on the same system can be regarded absolutely relevant already.
The situation was resolved through using other PCI-E video cards from the most popular sector, middle-end, that arrived during tests, which will help us position the first mid-end PCI-E cards made by NVIDIA and ATI. Nevertheless, results for Radeon 9600XT AGP produced on the i865P system were included into most tests.
First, the synthetics:
The very first test did not bring any surprises. All is predictable enough. We can very well see the anticipated leap of ABIT RX600XT from the seemingly similar Radeon 9600XT, but the increased memory frequencies plus the more powerful system played their part.
All the synthetic results are well predictable and ideally fit the theoretical forecasts. In real games, all is different...
Gaming benchmarks
With the first engine of a real game, GeForce PCX5900 shows results lower than ABIT RX600XT-PCIE, which are essentially lower.
History repeats in Aquamark 3 as well, albeit not in that fatal manner.
For UT2003, we traditionally give results for the three integrated demos - normally, results are "astray", but this time the "picture" was evident - GeForce PCX5900 takes a small lead over ABIT X600XT, with the old AGP-version Radeon 9600XT going closely behind, and PCX5750 closing the list.
In UT2004, we used our own demo "Demo-3Dnews003.demo4" (put it into the "demos" directory) where a serious action was written, worth showing ;-)
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Again a similar picture - today's mid-end card by ATI is well on par with the yesterday's hi-end. It's high time to change the grid of reference for partitioning the markets :-).
At GunMetal (Pixel Shaders 1.1), NVIDIA cards demonstrate quite a good showing.
Like GunMetal, the faithful HALO defended the desecrated honor of PCX5900 a bit.
"Half-Life 2" is not optimized stolen demo. Its results are no more than optional.
The "Tomb Rider: Although "Angel of Darkness" is part of the honorable list of games financed by NVIDIA, the game proved to be a nightmare for the company.
FireStarter also degrades the recent Hi-End (PCX59000) to the level of common Middle of today.
Both in the "quality" mode and without it, but at the "worship" game FarCry the situation is the same - X600XT wins in the middle-end sector for PCI-E solutions.
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