ATI Radeon X800 PRO...thoughts?
 

Well, I am getting ready to update my vid card and ran into this thing. I am looking for the best on the market so I was wondering your opinions on this card. Is it the best? If not, what is better?

The X800 Pro is an excellent videocard. It's well worth the $400 price tag.

It's not the best, but it's top of the line without a doubt. It makes mincemeat out of the Radeon 9800XT and GeForce FX 5950 Ultra.

The only videocards superior to the Radeon X800 Pro are the GeForce 6 6800 Ultra/6850 Ultra and the Radeon X800 XT/Platinum Edition. They're all $500, with the GeForce 6 6850 Ultra actually being more than $500.

-Lasereth

Is it worth the extra power to go ahead and get the XT versoin then? Or would it be best to get the Nvidia GeForce top of the line? As far as I can tell, the two companies seem fairly well matched. So if it came between ATI and Nvidia who would you put your money on?

The extra $100 definitely gets you a gain in power, but to me, $500 is too much for a videocard. $400 is about the max I'd pay unless I had a lot of extra money.

If I had to go with ATI or NVIDIA with prices being the same, I'd go with NVIDIA, simply because I like their drivers. ATI's X800 XT Platinum Edition is currently the best videocard on the market, but NVIDIA's GeForce 6 6850 Ultra hasn't been benchmarked yet.

I'll probably buy a GeForce 6 6800 GT when they come out for $400. They're the X800 Pro's competition. Either card is fine, it's simply personal choice. I've always had an NVIDIA videocard, so I feel better buying one. If ya wanna buy an ATI videocard, go for it...they're awesome as well.

-Lasereth

id go for one of the X800 variants, they are way smaller, cooler running, and consume way less power. They also seem to be faster...

Thanks for the info guys

Both the x800 and GF 6800 are insane cards. However, keep in mind that nvidia recommends a 480W power supply unit and two dedicated molex cables to power the 6800.

Ow. That hurts to think about.

Marcus: I personally prefer ATI cards, but that's just a bias. In looking at the benchmarks, they are usually very similar to nVidia. I don't really know why I prefer ATI. Maybe I'm an elitist bastard. Yeah, that's probably it.

Either way you go, though, you'll be fine. I wouldn't recommend spending the extra $100 for the XT or the 6850, because the performance increase isn't (in my opinion) worth that much. On the other hand, you would have some serious bragging rights.

hehe, well bragging rights are nice, I wonder how good these beasts will handle Doom 3?

A Radeon 9600 Pro, GeForce FX 5600 Ultra or a GeForce 4 TI series videocard will run Doom 3. The graphic options won't be set high, but I know that low-end cards will run it fine. When people say that Doom 3 is gonna require upgrading, they simply mean upgrading if ya wanna run it at the highest settings. A Radeon 9700 Pro, 9800 Pro, or GeForce FX 5900 Ultra will run it damn good. These new cards will slaughter it.

-Lasereth

*runs to store* sweeeet

lol

I'm waiting for my X800 Pro from Newegg.com

But I paid $475 for mine. They're suppose to be $399 :confused:

Guess that's what happens when you can't wait.

If its not too late to send it back, you should check out cdw.com. They are selling the X800 XT for $459 and the X800 Pro for $389

http://www.cdw.com/shop/products/def...spx?EDC=643489
http://www.cdw.com/shop/products/def...spx?edc=646747

This company is a shitfactory. Resellerratings.com gives it a 3 out of 10 review after 280 people reviewed it. I wouldn't buy from them, especially a videocard that costs $400!

-Lasereth

Their lifetime rating isn't too bad. There's only been 7 reviews in the last six months to calculate that 3.21/10, so it's very hard to judge. People are more likely to post negative comments about a store than good ones, unless it is exceptionally good.

That said, I too would still be a bit iffy about ordering from them.

As long as they send the actual product it really wouldn't matter to me if I'm saving $200

Hoooooly shit. I just found this link on ExpectNothing! Hot damn. I don't give 2 craps if it's old or not, but it is awesome. You gotta have QT to watch it though. Damn good graphics.
http://www2.ati.com/misc/demos/ATI-X...-Demo-v1.0.mov

Right-click and save as plz thx k thanks bye.

The last two ATI products I had crapped out after 6 months and have been difficult to install. Going Nvidia for now on. So far, I have not had the problems Nvidia as I had with ATI, definately easier to install.

I keep thinking about an x800 but I notice that this thread is now 2 months old and the prices haven't moved at all.

[edit to note that CDW has a 2+ week backorder on the x800 Pro]

Anyone have any ideas when we'll see a drop in price on these babies?

Don't count on it anytime soon until a supposed "x900" or 6900 comes out. That could be a while, seeing as how there are several different versions, a 6900 would have to be better than a top-o'-the-line 6800 (but not noticably). That's just about the only thing that drives down technology prices, new technology.

Big ol' waste of money if you spend anything over $200 on a video card.

X800 Pros are above $300. Wait few months till it drops down to $200-250 (unless you have money to turn).. but damn, for $300+, you might as well buy a faster processor (or more RAM) AND a good $200 video card. You'd get a lot more out of your system with that.

Another good reason to go with NVIDIA is SLI. Buy a normal 6800 now, and a year from now buy a second one which would be cheap and then just jam it in right next to it and use them both. But this is only an option with PCI Express motherboards though :p

It's gonna be way longer than a few months until they're down that cheap! :) I'd say at least a year, possibly more. Videocards don't go down in price as fast as people like to think.

A $200 videocard plus a system upgrade is a great idea, though. If your system is already decent (Athlon XP 2000+, 512 MB RAM) then a $300+ videocard would benefit more than the extra money saved from an expensive videocard. Today's games are hugely dependent on the videocard rather than the processor.

-Lasereth

You also have to consider what you'll use it for.

I don't think there's one single game that needs anything above an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro (which is about $200). Doom 3 runs at 1024x768 High Quality with that card. The difference between Ultra/High Quality on Doom 3 is minimal.

It'll be a while I think before another game comes out that really demands anything above that. I bought a 9600 Pro in November for $150 and that thing is STILL top notch. It can run Doom 3 with ease (not maxed out, but that game is designed to look great on any resolution/texture quality).

Any other game prior to Doom 3 ... I can pretty much run maxed out. I haven't encountered a single game yet that the 9600 can't handle.

So if that boost from Doom 3 High Quality to Ultra Quality is REALLY worth an extra $200, then I'd say go for it.

Oh, I agree that it's overkill, but it's worth the money to those that pay it. You'll get a kick ass videocard for $300 or $400 even though a Radeon 9600 Pro will get the job done. $300 is a ripoff to those that want the game playable, but to those that want the best, it's a deal for the power you get. I'll probably get a Radeon 9800 Pro soon. If I don't, it'll be a dork-overkill 6800 GT. :)

-Lasereth

I have a gaming system (demo) at work, which until yesterday had a 9800 pro. It had a 3D Mark '03 score of some 5700. We put in an x800 pro, and had a score of 8500. You can also see the difference in games like Farcry, where you can set the details to high at 1280x1024, and still get excellent framerates.

On the other hand, we're getting a version of the FX6800 at the end of the month, that'll be selling for 200 Euros. Lots of strings attached, but bottom line is that it's way faster than an 9800XT for the same price as a 9800 pro.

update: we changed the system from a 3.2 Ghz P4 (with issues) to an Athlon64 3400+. 3DMark score jumped to 9700. Wow.

I think the main difference I've noticed in ATI's latest offering is IQ. Some games show a humongous difference in IQ if you use an X800. Especially when you can max out factors like resolution, AA, and AF, and still get not only playable but damn good framerates.