The old Pentium 3 enhancements option

[swaaye]

yeh i've got a mobility radeon HD2600 in my laptop. Its actually really good. Handle's much higher settings much smoother than my nVidia GeForce 7600 LE.

Well compared to that it's probably better yeah but HD 2600 isn't that great. A desktop 7600GT is probably faster, and a GeForce 8600GT is definitely faster. The first mid/low-end DX10 chips were rather disappointing... One thing very nice about them though is their HD video acceleration features.

[bb1]

I did like those HD features...

Until I realized it would entail new widescreen monitor (sexy 24"  ), new mobo (with PCIe 2.0, new processor for that mobo, and depending on how much of a push I make new memory as well.

CHING CHING BABY!

[TheJamsh]

Well compared to that it's probably better yeah but HD 2600 isn't that great. A desktop 7600GT is probably faster, and a GeForce 8600GT is definitely faster. The first mid/low-end DX10 chips were rather disappointing... One thing very nice about them though is their HD video acceleration features.

7600 scored FAR lower that the HD 2600. four times the texture memory, faster etc etc. What i like about it is its a very compatible card. No graphics issues yet except with 3DS max 7. But thats out of date anyway...

I dont really see the fuss of HD. It just makes things look less real and too sharp. And its expensive. Just wait a few years until some green-ray thing comes out or whatever, and HD will be cheaper to run.

Plus im on a laptop, not much of a portable computer if i strap a 24" to it eh?

[Vid]

7600LE(Light Edition) will perform a good bit lower than a 7600GT, although I never knew a LE existed.

The 7600GT and 2600 will trade blows, but the 7600GT will get a pretty easy win, but it should not be a huge win.
However there's no telling what was lessened on the LE version, so it could be a lot weaker.  I just never knew they had a 7600LE.

Why are lots of new builders buying 4670s, 4870s, and the like, if nvidia produces a better card at the same cost point?  I see quite a few more ATI cards in build specs on technology sites than I do geforce cards.

[bb1]

Green ray would be a step backwards since blue has the lowest nM of all lasers in the visible spectrum

[TheJamsh]

well to start with the LE only has 128mb of memory. pretty poxy compared to my radeons 512

[GSH]

That's still plenty more memory than BZ2 uses.

-- GSH

[TheJamsh]

well i dont know. all i can tell you is my FPS is higher on the laptop.

[Zero Angel]

Green ray would be a step backwards since blue has the lowest nM of all lasers in the visible spectrum

Cool, so future lasers might be UV lasers? And then x-ray lasers, and then gamma lasers! We'll probably live to see that too!

[VSMIT]

...and then gamma lasers!

If you survive, let me know.

[GSH]

FPS depends on *far* more than the amount of RAM on your graphics card. The amount of RAM only becomes a factor when an app tries to use more textures than fit on the graphics card in a given frame. When that happens, it has to keep swapping textures in/out of the graphics card ram. That's definitely a slowdown. But, a slowdown that's VERY unlikely to be seen on BZ2 and any graphics card over 32-64MB.

-- GSH

[bb1]

I'd rather have the GTX 1gb than a 4890 2gb, if only for the huge 512bit buffer on the GTX.

If ATI could squeeze a 512bit buffer on their GDDR5... The skies will open and the birds will sing.

[Vid]

I thought the GTX only has a 448bit buffer?

[bb1]

Only on the 260. It is actually the 512 bit memory from the 280+ with a few defective or underperforming blocks cut off or disabled.

[swaaye]

There's nothing wrong with ATI's current lineup. Their lineup before the 38x0 series was the issue. Radeon 2400, 2600 were very meh and 2900 was a furnace and slow compared to 8800 usually.

NV's options below 8800 were poor back in '07 too, but still better than ATI's 2400/2600 for games. 8600GTS was significantly less than half as fast as an 8800 series card and was slower than the cheaper 7900 options. But then they brought out the 9600GT which was great, and 8800GT/8800GTS 512/9800GT/9800GTX that are all based on G92 and great. The GTX 260 and 28x are awesome boards in many ways but too expensive compared to ATI's top stuff. They probably cost quite a bit more to build than a ATI 48x0 due to the huge GPU and the 512 bit bus.

The current landscape has ATI and NVIDIA on equal footing basically except ATI is much more aggressive with their prices. ATI has sweet options at every price point.

I'd rather have the GTX 1gb than a 4890 2gb, if only for the huge 512bit buffer on the GTX.

If ATI could squeeze a 512bit buffer on their GDDR5... The skies will open and the birds will sing.

GDDR5 on 4870/4890 give ATI an effective 512-bit performance because it's quad data rate. The physical 256-bit bus gives ATI a much cheaper board (a lot fewer traces), and it may not even be possible to put a 512-bit bus on their GPU because it's a good bit smaller than NV's GTX 2x0 GPU. You need room for all those pads on the GPU packaging. This cost savings is a win for both ATI and us (see prices.)

I think the only disappointing aspect of 48x0 is that they use a lot of power when idle. A lot more than a GTX 2x0 card.