What to get.. Radeon 9800 Pro or FX 5800 Ultra?

  • Thread starter ThePunkerGuy
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ThePunkerGuy

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They are both about the same price, and i need to buy a video card in the next week.. which should i get the 9800 Pro of the FX 5800 Ultra? I don't mind the "loud" nvidia fan .. my computer already sounds like a trane so i am sure i cannot hurt it anymore than it is! I like playing games such as BF1942 and such at 1024X768 with as much AA and AS as the card will allow without jerking up.. so which card should i get? Got any links to good reviews/comparisons to these two cards? Thanks.
- Mike
 
ive got a Geforce fx 5800 Ultra, From what i here there hard toget now, however, i am Able to Run UnrealTournament 2003 on full Graphics, including 1600x1200 with 16x AA and 8x AF (Vertical Sync Off) and it runs well, however make sure u got a agp 8x motherboard, because when it was on my old 4x one it was runnin crap, but on AGP 8x its Superb.
 
look buddy 9800 pro or even 9700 pro
i play bf1942 with 1600x1200x32bit 8 antrstopic and 2x aa
xp1900/512mbsdram and powercolor radeon 9700 non pro
i flashed the bios then just changed the clocks of core and mem
too bad memory chips are only 3.6ns which can go only 1000/3.6 = 277mhz memory x2ddr = 554effective clock for memory
right now my memory is runing at 288 very stable ran3dmark03 4 times (4650 score) (hows that for sdram?) played bf1942 like hell :) and my core is 270@375 no artifects at all stable. :). tough i am sure if u get one the sapphires atlantis 9700 they come with 3.3ns memory for non-pro and pros with 2.8
but in generall go for 9800 pro only a f00l would go for fx
 
Originally posted by ste_w
... however make sure u got a agp 8x motherboard, because when it was on my old 4x one it was runnin crap, but on AGP 8x its Superb.

Sorry To butt in here, but to my knowledge of recent trial and error. the Geforce FX Ultra does not run "c**p" on 4x AGP. The reason why i know this is because i used Ste_w's Geforce FX Ultra on my Computer system because he was having trouble with it on his... i mean real trouble on performance inwhich we found out that he had an 'Outdated' Motherboard 4x AGP. So all i would suggest is that if you are considering a GeforceFX, is your motherboard fairly recent? as in 6-8months old possibly? I have a EliteGroup K7S5A which ive heard people are having alot of difficulties with this motherboard (except me :D) which is about 6months old running an AMD Athlon XP1600+ CPU so as you can see its not really up to date and yet it can run Geforce FX Ultra fine and dandy. So id just thought id like to clarafy that 4x AGP does not make the Geforce FX Ultra run "c**p". Although, of course 8x AGP does help ;)

Hope this helps you at all in your decission

Sincerly Alex :cool:
 
According to benchmarks I've seen, generally the Radeons will leave the FXs sputtering in the dust when running games with full AA and AS. :D
 
However, relating to your choice of decission, if you dont HAVE to buy a graphics card next week, you could always wait and see what the N35 chip has to offer which is aparently set a launch date of Mid-May which i found out on the Hardware news here on NTFS a few days ago

N35 News Link

Who knows if Nvidia will keep this launch date this time :p hehe
 
Thought you like to see this graph of the Geforce FX Ultra and the ATI Radeon 9800 Pro. This graph is just one of many graphs relating to the comparison between the two cards. This is a graph from Unreal Tournament 2003 with Full Screen Anti-Analysing of 4x etc etc. (says on the image :p)

Hope this helps also :D

image037.gif
 
From what I've seen on FPS benchmarks, where the FX shines is in higher resolutions, where it is able to maintain roughly the same FPS no matter if the game is running at 800x600 or 1600x1200. The ATI Radeon 9800 Pro considerably goes down FPS-wise at higher resolutions.

Still, I don't think that the FX right now is good enough to buy. If you have to buy today, get the 9800 Pro. If you can wait, see what the N35 does.

Melon
 
Originally posted by ste_w
ive got a Geforce fx 5800 Ultra, From what i here there hard toget now, however, i am Able to Run UnrealTournament 2003 on full Graphics, including 1600x1200 with 16x AA and 8x AF (Vertical Sync Off) and it runs well, however make sure u got a agp 8x motherboard, because when it was on my old 4x one it was runnin crap, but on AGP 8x its Superb.

hmm... you are running @ 1600x1200 with 16xAA and 8xAF for ut2k3 ? and it runs well ?

seems quite interesting considering nv30 performance with AA and FSAA takes a large hit with AA and FSAA turned on... and 16x AA is letting you play well ?

btw... frame rate difference with agp 8x and agp4x == a total difference of perhaps 3-4 fps in most all cases... hence I can't see how agp4x to agp8x can possibly give you such a performance boost as you are claiming :)
 
Originally posted by melon
From what I've seen on FPS benchmarks, where the FX shines is in higher resolutions, where it is able to maintain roughly the same FPS no matter if the game is running at 800x600 or 1600x1200. The ATI Radeon 9800 Pro considerably goes down FPS-wise at higher resolutions.

Still, I don't think that the FX right now is good enough to buy. If you have to buy today, get the 9800 Pro. If you can wait, see what the N35 does.

Melon

in RAW benches with no AA and FSAA... the nv30 performs at the same or slightly better level than the radeon 9700pro and at the same level or slightly worse than the 9800pro...

once AA and FSAA are turned on... the 9700pro and 9800pro perform with a smaller frame rate loss than the nv30...

getting either the 9800pro or the 5800ultra is good enough... if you can find the 5800ultra.. the 9800pro is freely available on the shelfs of bestbuy and other places... and I would recommend you get that above the 5800ultra... the performance is better


2 reviews that you might find interesting...

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1812

http://hardocp.com/article.html?art=NDM5

read through it ALL...
 
I'd say go for the 9800 Pro, it's faster, newer, cooler running, and it's fan is no louder than a 9700 Pro's fan.
 
Originally posted by Goatman
I'd say go for the 9800 Pro, it's faster, newer, cooler running, and it's fan is no louder than a 9700 Pro's fan.

the fan on the 9800pro is quiter than that on the 9700pro due to redesigns ie the fan angle and the cooler itself...

this applies to the reference ati 9700pro v/s 9800pro boards only...

other manufacturers use different designs...

gf FX 5800ultra sellers also are using interesting designs to cool the behemoth (it is a HUGE card) so it is not that loud in some cases...

but as a solution I am with you... the 9800pro would be a better choice...
 
So ThePunkerGuy, its now next week. Have you made a decission yet at all? :happy: I am intreged to hear what you have choosen to buy .... keep us informed :happy:

Sincerly Alex :cool:
 
What about the comparison between the N35 Chip with the ATI Radeon 9800 Pro? Does anyone know the differences between the two boards? Who knows, Nvidia might be able to pick themselves up to a better card than the ATI at the moment with this new chip. From what weve heard, there is going to be quieter fan (which is a good start :happy: ), more RAM instead of fast RAM that equals to the RAM on the ATI Card (sorry if ive got any of this wrong.. im writing this out from memory :rolleyes: ). So maybe the N35 COULD possibly either compare or beat the ATI 9800 Pro but i guess we will have to wait and see for reviews and stuff :p
 
Buy the 9700 Pro. Overall its better than a FX 5800 and send me half of the money you save over buying a 9800 pro or the FX 5800.

PS lotsa luck actually finding a FX 5800 or a 9800 Pro. They are in short supply.
 
Just been looking around the net and ive found some more infomation about the N35 Chip Geforce FX

The NV35 will presumably run at a slower core/memory clock speeds than the NV30, but it doesn't mean it will be inferior to its predecessors, a fact pointed out by the Inquirer.

While clockspeeds on the new chip haven't yet been finalized, we've heard 450 / 850 (core/memory clock) suggested as the likely final numbers, or something close to them. If true, this means NV35 will run a 10% slower clock and a 15% slower memory core than its predecessor, and in raw numbers, ends up looking a lot like the original GeForce FX 5800 (which, if you recall, didn't require such mammoth cooling solutions either).

This isn't the first time Nvidia has released a next-generation card running slower than the previous. The GeForce3, if you'll recall, ran a slower clock then the GeForce2 Ultra, yet proved itself a far superior solution in the end, and we'll be surprised if something similar doesn't happen with NV35 compared to NV30. Even with a slower memory clock, NV35 is going to offer far more bandwidth than NV30 ever did — along with slowing down the memory and switching back to DDR I, Nvidia is copying ATI and using a 256-bit interface to power their latest creation—which, we're told, will be called the GeForceFX 5900 Ultra with a projected retail price of $499. There will also be a GeForceFX 5900, which will retail for a price of $399. We've been told the two cards are identical in core speed, but the 5900 Ultra will carry an additional 128 meg of RAM (for a total of 256).

Ordinarily at this point we'd say something about how having a card named the 5800 Ultra and the 5900 Ultra is a bit confusing, given how massive the differences between NV30 and NV35 truly are. While ATI's Radeon 9700 and 9800 both use an identical naming scheme, the 9700 is still a card people actually would want to own. In the end, it’s a moot point for Nvidia — since no one could buy GeForceFX 5800 Ultra's there's precious little worry they'll end up confused with the 5900 version.

At this point, with Nvidia's 5900 Ultra likely to take over or at least compete for the driver's seat, ATI has some interesting options. If the 5900 Ultra isn't that much of a stretch over the 9800 Pro, or merely competes with it they can elect to do nothing and things continue on as they have. If NV35 does present a threat to the Great White North's dominance of the video card market it's got two choices — either raise the clockspeed on the existing Radeon 9800 Pro or release the card in a MAXX dual-processor version.

The idea of a Radeon 9800 MAXX isn't as far-fetched as it might seem as the architecture of the chip is designed to be linked in up to a 256 GPU system. While I don't think we'll be seeing any 256 chip solutions from ATI, a dual-solution with 256 meg of RAM total (128 for each processor) could boost current Radeon 9800 performance by an approximate 50-70%. Such a card would be expensive, but it'd also likely stuff Nvidia quite nicely.

Of the two options a speed boost is by far the more likely, but until we see final NV35 benchmarks we won't even be able to hazard a guess as to how much of a performance kick ATI might want or need to give the 9800. With its .13 micron process there should definitely be some headroom left in the R350 design but with NV35 looking much better than its predecessor, it may not be enough. ATI may be left playing second-fiddle again, at least until R400 and NV40 square off.


:happy:
 
Searching Further on, i came across this article:

******* NV40 Chip :eek: **********

NV40 - 350 million transistors
0.09 microns
Core @ 800MHz
16MB DRAM
8 Pixel Rendering Engines
16 Vertex Shader Engines
DDR-II
512MB
Mem @ 1.4GHz
44.8GB/s bandwith
DX9.1 or DX10 features
2nd half of 2004 (After the olympic games!!)

20030505-02.jpg



I cant wait for this Chip, or something ATI makes around that time :D

:happy: :happy: :happy:
 
rumours will abound...

it is useless to speculate about products that have not taped out yet.. or are waiting for new technologies to mature in order for them to implement them...

:)

nv35 speculation is more appropriate since it has already taped out and will be released shortly...

some things it will do better than the nv30... but some things it may do worse... or the same... it is not like it is a whole brand new core...

the memory configuration is designed to use ddr... and a memory bus of 256bit width v/s the 128 design of the predecessor...

also some of the improved or more efficient ideas implemented into the nv31 and nv34 will probably be used in the nv35... hence giving it a nice boost in performance in some IQ areas as well...

on the whole it is unlikely to be a tremendously large improvement...

nv40 speculation is unwarranted @ this time... note the platform for its use... 0.09 micron process :)

I'd rather wait a while to get more info on this..
 
if funds allowed, i'd already have the 9800pro myself (which is as good a recommendation as any)

ive seen ample benchmark comparisons between the 5800 ultra and the 9800pro, and the 9800pro has always been better at the higher detail, higher resolution stuff etc.
 
Originally posted by jonifen
if funds allowed, i'd already have the 9800pro myself

:p lol, i think everyone who had the right funds would have a ATI Radeon 9800Pro :p

I know i would ;)
 

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