The Contenders
There are a lot of cards out there with the potential to be included in an article such as this. We've tried hard to pick the cards with the most potential for greatness, as well as references that were popular and represent what our readers may want to upgrade from. Our reference set contains 3 NVIDIA cards and 2 ATI cards:
ATI Radeon X800 GTO
ATI Radeon X1800 GTO
NVIDIA GeForce 6600 GT
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS
NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT
We didn't include any X700 series cards, as the phantom X700 XT was the only card with any potential to do well. The bottom line is that none of the products that made it to market in the X700 series were worth the money. The X800 GTO, on the other hand, was incredibly popular due to the ease with which it could be overclocked. Most people were also able to unlock the disabled pipelines on the card without issue. For our tests, we are looking at a baseline X800 GTO, as it is difficult to gauge how much individual users were able to squeeze out of the part. While the X1800 GTO wasn't quite as versatile as the X800 GTO, its existence served to fill in the large gap between X1600 performance and X1900 level performance. Now that the X1900 GT is on the scene, it's a little less necessary. We've included it here because it's a good ATI counterpoint to the 6800 GS and fills in the lower end of the X1800 lineup.
As for NVIDIA, the 6800 GS was a reasonably priced, good performing product introduced near the end of the 6 series life cycle. The card wasn't nearly as popular as the X800 GTO, but it's performance mark does a very good job of representing older NVIDIA hardware: it's performance is higher than a vanilla 6800 and nearly that of a 6800 GT. The 7800 GT, aside from being a pretty popular card, can also still be found for between $250 and $300. While we wouldn't venture to say that it's worth the price, the performance of the 7800 GT at launch was highly acclaimed, and availability was much better than it's big brother. And finally, with the popularity of the 6600 GT, we wouldn't think about excluding it. With no real competition at it's price point for most if its life, the 6600 GT was a very popular card.
On to the current generation cards we are including.
ATI Radeon X1600 XT
ATI Radeon X1900 GT
ATI Radeon X1900 XT
NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT
NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GT
On the low end of the range we've got the 7600 GT and X1600 XT. While we initially proposed a $200 price point during the conception of this article, both of these cards can be found for well under $200USD. There are a handful of overclocked 7600 GT parts available for between $175 and $220, while we don't really see a wide variety of different X1600 XT parts. Half way up to the top end (due to the recent price cuts) the X1900 GT falls just about in the middle of everything. The X1900 GT can be had for about $60 more than the 7600 GT and is about $60 less than our overclocked 7900 GT part. For our upper midrange target, we've got the 7900 GT and the X1900 XT. Both of these parts weigh in at nearly $300USD with the 7900 GT coming a little under and the X1900 XT a little over. The X1900 XT isn't as available as we'd like right now, but it can be found for about $330.
We want to end up with results that show not only what the best options are for midrange buyers right now, but whether it makes sense for owners of the older cards we've tested to upgrade at this point or wait until something faster and cheaper comes along.
Here's a breakdown of the prices on the currently available cards we tested:
| Card | Price |
| ATI Radeon X1600 XT | |
| ATI Radeon X1800 GTO | |
| ATI Radeon X1900 GT | |
| ATI Radeon X1900 XT | |
| NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT | |
| NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT (Factory Overclocked) | |
| NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT | |
| NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GT | |
| NVIDIA GeForce 7900 GT (Factory Overlocked) |
With that in mind, we'll move on to the test setup and performance numbers.
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Sharky974 - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
I tried comparing numbers for SCCT, FEAR and X3, the problem is Anand didn't bench any of these with AA in this mid-range test, and other sites all use 4XAA as default. So in other words no direct numbers comparison on those three games at least with those two Xbit/FS articles is possible.Although the settings are different, both FS and Anand showed FEAR as a tossup, though.
It does appear other sites are confirming Anand's results more than I thought though.
And the X1900GT for $230 is a kickass card.
JarredWalton - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
The real problem is that virtually every level of a game can offer higher/lower performance relative to the average, and you also get levels that use effects that work better on ATI or NV hardware. Some people like to make a point about providing "real world" gaming benchmarks, but the simple fact of the matter is that any benchmark is inherently different from actually sitting down and playing a game - unless you happen to be playing the exact segment benchmarked, or perhaps the extremely rare game where performance is nearly identical throughout the entire game. (I'm not even sure what an example of that would be - Pacman?)Stock clockspeed 7900GT cards are almost uncommon these days, since the cards are so easy to overclock. Standard clocks are actually supposed to be 450/1360 IIRC, and most cards are at least slightly overclocked in one or both areas. Throw in all the variables, plus things like whether or not antialiasing is enabled, and it becomes difficult to compare articles between any two sources. I tend to think of it as providing various snapshots of performance, as no one site can provide everything. So if we determine X1900 GT is a bit faster overall than 7900 GT and another site determines the reverse, the truth is that the cards are very similar, with some games doing better on one architecture and other games on the other arch.
My last thought is that it's important to look at where each GPU manages to excel. If for example (and I'm just pulling numbers out of the hat rather than referring to any particular benchmarks) the 7900 GT is 20% faster in Half-Life 2 but the X1900 GT still manages frame rates of over 100 FPS, but then the X1900 GT is faster in Oblivion by 20% and frame rates are closer to 40 FPS, I would definitely wait to Oblivion figures as being more important. Especially if you run on LCDs, super high frame rates become virtually meaningless. If you can average well over 60 frames per second, I would strongly recommend enabling VSYNC on any LCD. Of course, down the road we are guaranteed to encounter games that require more GPU power, but predicting what game engine is most representative of the future requires a far better crystal ball than what we have available.
For what it's worth, I would still personally purchase an overclocked 7900 GT over an X1900 GT for a few reasons, provided the price difference isn't more than ~$20. First, SLI is a real possibility, whereas CrossFire with an X1900 GT is not (as far as I know). Second, I simply prefer NVIDIA's drivers -- the old-style, not the new "Vista compatible" design. Third, I find that NVIDIA always seems to do a bit better on brand new games, while ATI seems to need a patch or a new driver release to address performance issues -- not always, but at least that's my general impression; I'm sure there are exceptions to this statement. ATI cards are still good, and at the current price points it's definitely hard to pick a clear winner. Plus you have stuff like the reduced prices on X1800 cards, and in another month or so we will likely have new hardware in all of the price points. It's a never ending rat race, and as always people should upgrade only when they find that the current level of performance they had is unacceptable from their perspective.
arturnowp - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
I think another advantage of 7900GT over X1900GT is power consumption. I'm not checking numbers of this matter so I am not 100% sure.coldpower27 - Saturday, August 12, 2006 - link
Yes, this is completely true, going by Xbitlab's numbers.
Stock 7900 GT: 48W
eVGA SC 7900 GT: 54W
Stock X1900 GT: 75W
JarredWalton - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
Speech-recognition + lack of proofing = lots of typos"... out of a hat..."
"I would definitely weight..."
"... level of performance they have is..."
Okay, so there were only three typos that I saw, but I was feeling anal retentive.
Sharky974 - Friday, August 11, 2006 - link
Not too beat this to death, but at FS the X1900GT vs 7900GT benchmarksX1900GT:
Wins-BF2, Call of Duty 2 (barely)
Loses-Quake 4, Lock On Modern Air Combat, FEAR (barely),
Toss ups- Oblivion (FS runs two benches, foliage/mountains, the cards split them) Far Cry w/HDR (X1900 takes two lower res benches, 7900 GT takes two higher res benches)
At Xbit's X1900 gt vs 7900 gt conclusion
"The Radeon X1900 GT generally provides a high enough performance in today’s games. However, it is only in 4 tests out of 19 that it enjoyed a confident victory over its market opponent and in 4 tests more equals the performance of the GeForce 7900 GT. These 8 tests are Battlefield 2, Far Cry (except in the HDR mode), Half-Life 2, TES IV: Oblivion, Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, X3: Reunion and both 3DMarks. As you see, Half-Life 2 is the only game in the list that doesn’t use mathematics-heavy shaders. In other cases the new solution from ATI was hamstringed by its having too few texture-mapping units as we’ve repeatedly said throughout this review."
Xbit review: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/pow...">http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/pow...
Geraldo8022 - Thursday, August 10, 2006 - link
I wish you would do a similar article concerning the video cards for HDTV and HDCP. It is very confusing. Even though certain crds might state they are HDCP, it is not enabled.tjpark1111 - Thursday, August 10, 2006 - link
the X1800XT is only $200 shipped, why not include that card? if the X1900GT outperforms it, then ignore my comment(been out of the game for a while)LumbergTech - Thursday, August 10, 2006 - link
so you want to test the cheaper gpu's for those who dont want to spend quite as much..ok..well why are you using the cpu you chose then? that isnt exactly in the affordable segement for the average pc user at this pointPrinceGaz - Thursday, August 10, 2006 - link
Did you even bother reading the article, or did you just skim through it and look at the graphs and conclusion? May I suggest you read page 3 of the review, or in case that is too much trouble, read the relevant excerpt-