The (RV410) X700 Pro (assuming it's the 128MB version and not the less prevalent 256MB version) was a fairly decent mid-range, desktop discrete replacement product from ATI during their R4xx generation, offering similar performance to a 9800Pro (R350) without anti-aliasing (AA) and anisotropic filtering (AF) enabled, while yielding to the 9800Pro and 9800XT (R360) with AA and AF enabled in higher resolutions.
The X700 and X800-series offered a slightly better feature-set than the previous R3xx generation, with support for Shader Model 2.0b and 3Dc compression, but these capabilities have yet to be widely used, with most developers moving to the SM3.0 inflection point, however the X700 only used a 128-bit memory interface, versus the 256-bit interface on the 9800Pro/XT, so it's relative performance is not bad given it has less bandwidth. The X700's slightly higher fillrate and significantly higher vertex throughput are telling. The 128MB framebuffer on the X700 could also cause some slowdown in higher resolutions in more recent games designed to saturate 256MB cards, so the 9800XT may see further gains there, but at 1024x768 this shouldn't really be an issue.
The X700XT was unceremoniusly axed late last year due to yield and heat concerns, while ATI were under considerable pressure from nVIDIA in the mid-range with their excellent 6600GT. Luckily for ATI, their 0.11 micron cost reduction X800XL (R430) came online early 2005, undercutting 6800GT prices with similar performance, while their X850 XT(PE) took the high-end performance crown. These parts took flak away from the mid-range contest, while lower yield 8-pipeline X800's were positioned to compete with the 6600GT during spring 2005.
The significant delays to ATI's R5xx range, R520 (X1800XL/XT) in particular, which was originally due to launch in the May-June timeframe, have resulted in some great mid-range deals in the past few months. While losing the high-end crown to nVIDIA's GeForce 7800GTX in June, ATI found themselves with excess X800 inventory and in August took an inventory writedown of ~$70 million which paved the way for the mid-high performance, high value X800GT/GTO/GTO
2 SKU's. nVIDIA's seeming delays with their own 0.09 micron 7600 mid-range replacement (now due Feb-March 2006 apparently) has resulted in the 6800GS to shore up their mainstream line. The 6800GS is a good performer, offering 6800GT or better performance levels, while retailing for ~$200 US.
2005 has been a boon year for nVIDIA, with their margins now in the 40 percentile range, while ATI have suffered with margins and high-end discrete marketshare, while still increasing volume. 2006 should be more evenly matched. Ultimately, the consumer has won this year, with some amazing deals from both IHV's, even though the MRSP for enthusiast products is climbing ever higher, especially with multi-card solutions (SLI and Crossfire) entrenched as an ultra-high-end niche market.
Eder said:
On a slightly more reasonable note, can anyone tell me what are the best AGP video cards around nowadays and how much they go for?
In the UK at least, the mid-high AGP retail supply is rapidly drying up and while there was some hope earlier in the year of a final high-end AGP release, with ATI roadmaps from the first quarter suggesting an AGP X1800 variant, things have evidently changed. It was thought that one of the Add-In-Board (AIBs) vendors, such as BFG, XFX, HIS, Sapphire, Asus, etc would produce an AGP 7800GT(X) or X1800, although that has yet to occur. I would wager that we may see some mainstream AGP variants from boths IHVs next year, say an AGP 7600 and X1700, but both ATI and nVIDIA appear determined to transition their products over to PCI-E, especially at the high-end. Although understandable, this is unfortunate if you're stuck in AGP limbo and looking for a higher performance graphics card.
As far as current AGP options go, there are AGP variants of the 6600(GT) and X700, while at the higher performance threshold in rough order from lowest to highest performance, there are the X800SE/GT, 6800LE/6800, X800/GTO/PRO, 6800GT, X800XL/XT(PE)/X850Pro, 6800Ultra, X800GT02, X850XT(PE).
In the UK, you can currently get a second-hand AGP 6800GT or X800XT for about £150, which is fairly easonable, but if you have to buy new are still going for £200-250+, which is not worth it IMO -- better upgrading to PCI-E and getting a 7800GT or X1800XL for about £250. Unfortunately, as I mentioned above, AGP supply is disappearing here in UK, inflating remaining stocks, while there are cracking PCI-E deals, such as the 6800GS and X800GTO2 (which unlocks to 16 pipelines and generally overclocks to X850XT speeds) for ~£140. US prices should be lower and there may be even better deals stateside, although I'm not sure what the market is like in Brazil.
scheherazade said:
...the lastest drivers re-do the memory handling when running certain opengl applications, and the ati cards are as good as the nvidia's (on those applications).
Ati's latest drivers, REALLY are something impressive. *if* he was using those, his claims are entirely realistic...
Yes, although these gains are only applicable to the X1000 range and only then to the X1800 and X1600, not the X1300, as these cards have the new ring-bus programmable memory controller.
While R520's delays have allowed the Catalyst driver team to improve R3xx/R4xx peformance, especially in OpenGL, it was found that some of these optimisations and Hi-Z workarounds actually degraded R5xx performance. The initial Catalyst 5.11 hotfix implemented new memory-mapping and bandwidth utilisation improvements in R520 when only 4xAA was used in OpenGL, while the final Catalyst 5.11 (8.183) comprised additional improvements that offer considerable gains across the board in OpenGL, with up to 50% gains in Doom3/Quake4 at 1600x1200 with 4xAA/8xAF and higher resolutions, making ATI very competitive in OpenGL, which was an area where ATI were previously trailing against nVIDIA. The upcoming Catalyst 5.12 should offer more improvements and features, while resolving such issues as the FEAR bug (renaming the fear.exe file to something else results in performance gains).
nVIDIA's recent 7800GTX 512MB counterpunch still offers higher performance than the X1800XT in most situations, but comes at a huge price. X1800 Crossfire looks to be very competitive and R580, due early 2006, with its considerably increased shader throughput and dynamic branching superiority, should reclaim the performance for ATI. Then nVIDIA will respond with 90nm G70 and then ATI with R600 and so it continues...
Cheers,
BrynS
