Legit Reviews

So I've decided to put my water cooling rig on the back burner due to case restrictions. (radiator wouldn't fit). So that leave me with a several hundred dollar budget left over for computer upgrades. Given my X850XT is reaching the end of it's top tier lifespan I'm looking to change out to a newer card.

The X1900XTX seems to be the cards to get. I understand there are quite a few deals going on with the X1900XT right now but I've not seen any benchmark comparisons between the XT and the XTX. Also, I know next to nothing about the Crossfire edition. I am assuming it's a XT card with the nessicary firmware to do Crossfire?

That leads me to the following questions:

1.) X1900XTX vs X1900XT is there a huge performance diffrence?

2.) Should I get the Crossfire edition card now and get another X1900 later?

3.) Of the X1900XTX's which card is best? I'm a fan of Sapphire and will likely be using Omega drivers regardless of the cards vendor.

4.) I'm running an Althlon 3700+ San Deigo. Will the card out perform the proc?

That's a real shame about your water cooling blues, you really couldn't live with an external radiator?

In answer to your questions:

1. The official line was that, due to R580's architecture, the benefits of core clock speed increases per MHz would be greater than that seen with other architectures. Though in practice you are only seeing a 5% improvement over the XT! Also the XT would most likely overclock to XTX standards anyway.

2. The crossfire card has a chip that allows image compositing to be done then sends the stitched together frame to the VDU. I presume you have some idea of how the basics of SLi/Crossfire works, so will know what i mean there. But yes, it basically is a X1900XT with an extra chip.

You are going to be paying a premium for the crossfire card though, so if you are definitely getting crossfire and have the extra cash now, then you may as well get the master card now. Else get the 'cheaper' X1900XT and save up for the crossfire master card.

3. The actual difference between the cards is very small, usually a fraction of a frame per second, so you may as well buy from a preferred vendor, or one that offers a better bundle for the money.

4. Currently most high end cards are limited by the CPU's to some degree, even super FX's. But I should think that your CPU will be adequate for the card.

Dan

Thanks Dan. Given that my monitor is a 24" Dell widescreen LCD w/ a native resolution of 1920x1200 I've been very keen to get a card that would let me run games like F.E.A.R. and Prey at the monitors native resolution without having to sacrafice to much in the way of detail. Fortunatly my mainstay game, BF2, runs fantastic (30-45fps) at 1920x1200 w/ all detail on my X850XT.

When you say there's a fraction of a FPS I assume you're refering to between cards of the same chipset (XT vs XT, not XT vs XTX). Also, getting an XTX card doesn't seem like a smart thing to do if I'm going Crossfire in the future as the Crossfire specs state the cards will automatically clock to the slower of the two GPU's. Or did I read that wrong?

No thats right, it does throttle down the XTX and yeah i was meaning XT vs XT etc.

Thats a nice monitor youve got there

Dan

NOOOOOOOOO!!!!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814161014

i hope im not too late.

the BEST X1900XT on the market.

1 reason. kick ass GPU cooler. and HIS will allow you to overclock to a certain limit and stay within the warranty.

So the only diffrence is core clock speed? Do you know of any websites that have done testing of both the XT and XTX in ulta high resolutions. Toms Hardware (which I'm hesistant to trust) seems only to run at resolutions up to 1600x1200, a bit shy of my 1920x1200.

the XTX will overclock higher.
people have modded their XT to use a XTX bios, but that does nothing

It seems the XTX uses better chips.....
The problem is that overclocking these cards is not worth it unless you watercool

Get a XT card.....if your going to get Xfire! Get a XTX if you need/must to overclock

I'm interested in the real world, stock, performance diffrences. Are they marked? I'm going to be running a single card solution for a while and would like the best bang for the buck. Right now that HIS card's looking like it.

get the HIS card........the cooler alone makes it worth it

only get a XTX if you MUST overclock

running stock, the difference is ~5fps @ most

The XT is best bang for buck.....by a long shot ;)

Just ordered my HIS. Hopefully it'll be as nice as my Sapphire has been. Glad I bought that 600w OCZ GamerXstream that Nate recommended. I'm gonna need it.

Now, what to do about cooling my system. That ThermalTake passive cooler just isn't going to work much longer.