7800GS AGP reviews...

[CKXP]

Originally posted by: Com80787
I think I am still missing your point RussianSensation.

The 7800GS is for those who are still stuck with an AGP board. Let's say someone has - for example - an Athlon 64 754 and AGP mobo with Radeon 9700. How would you come out ahead in the long run getting a 6800GS or 7800GT?

Let's say the user dumps the 9700 and gets the 7800GS for $300. That's it. No more expenses. (maybe can get $50 for the 9700 too)

OR the user can dump his mobo and get a 7800GT and decent PCIe board for $70+ more. That board is going to be GARBAGE in 18 months. Unless 18 months from now that user is going to stick with socket 754 for some reason and his outdated 7800gt. In other words you blew $70+ so you could do nothing more than have a PCIe version of essentially the same card rather than AGP. It reminds me of the people who dumped AGP 4X boards to do nothing more than get an AGP 8X board. What a waste.

As far as the 6800GS - once you throw in the PCIe board the expense is at least $270 for 6800GS and mobo. OR you can spend $30 more for a 20% performance increase with the 7800GS which is a great deal IMO.

I just don't see how a user moving from AGP to PCIe in either case is anything other than a waste.

moving to a better upgrade path is a waste??? AGP is a dead end...the G70 series was launched in June 05 with the GTX, 8 months later the only AGP featuring the G70 architecture comes about, and it's not a high-end card. NV and ATI has made it obvious they're devoting their future GPU's to PCIe...you can stay with AGP and nothing is wrong with that, but don't expect to see anything better than the 7800gs AGP anytime soon.

 

[Munky]

Originally posted by: Com80787
I think I am still missing your point RussianSensation.

The 7800GS is for those who are still stuck with an AGP board. Let's say someone has - for example - an Athlon 64 754 and AGP mobo with Radeon 9700. How would you come out ahead in the long run getting a 6800GS or 7800GT?

Let's say the user dumps the 9700 and gets the 7800GS for $300. That's it. No more expenses. (maybe can get $50 for the 9700 too)

OR the user can dump his mobo and get a 7800GT and decent PCIe board for $70+ more. That board is going to be GARBAGE in 18 months. Unless 18 months from now that user is going to stick with socket 754 for some reason and his outdated 7800gt. In other words you blew $70+ so you could do nothing more than have a PCIe version of essentially the same card rather than AGP. It reminds me of the people who dumped AGP 4X boards to do nothing more than get an AGP 8X board. What a waste.

As far as the 6800GS - once you throw in the PCIe board the expense is at least $270 for 6800GS and mobo. OR you can spend $30 more for a 20% performance increase with the 7800GS which is a great deal IMO.

I just don't see how a user moving from AGP to PCIe in either case is anything other than a waste.

I'm not really seeing your point either, but the 7800gs != 7800gt. You may get similar performance if you OC it to 450mhz or higher, but that's a big IF. The only possible way I see the 7800gs worth getting is if a user intends to keep his s754 system for another 12-18 months waiting for K10, and having a 16 pipe card can let him play modern games at decent settings. But who would seriously consider keeping s754 for that much longer?

And anyone still using an AXP or a older P4 would be better off going for a new build because the CPU will become an increasingly worse bottleneck the longer you keep it.

 

[SoundTheSurrender]

Originally posted by: munky

Originally posted by: Com80787
I think I am still missing your point RussianSensation.

The 7800GS is for those who are still stuck with an AGP board. Let's say someone has - for example - an Athlon 64 754 and AGP mobo with Radeon 9700. How would you come out ahead in the long run getting a 6800GS or 7800GT?

Let's say the user dumps the 9700 and gets the 7800GS for $300. That's it. No more expenses. (maybe can get $50 for the 9700 too)

OR the user can dump his mobo and get a 7800GT and decent PCIe board for $70+ more. That board is going to be GARBAGE in 18 months. Unless 18 months from now that user is going to stick with socket 754 for some reason and his outdated 7800gt. In other words you blew $70+ so you could do nothing more than have a PCIe version of essentially the same card rather than AGP. It reminds me of the people who dumped AGP 4X boards to do nothing more than get an AGP 8X board. What a waste.

As far as the 6800GS - once you throw in the PCIe board the expense is at least $270 for 6800GS and mobo. OR you can spend $30 more for a 20% performance increase with the 7800GS which is a great deal IMO.

I just don't see how a user moving from AGP to PCIe in either case is anything other than a waste.

I'm not really seeing your point either, but the 7800gs != 7800gt. You may get similar performance if you OC it to 450mhz or higher, but that's a big IF. The only possible way I see the 7800gs worth getting is if a user intends to keep his s754 system for another 12-18 months waiting for K10, and having a 16 pipe card can let him play modern games at decent settings. But who would seriously consider keeping s754 for that much longer?

And anyone still using an AXP or a older P4 would be better off going for a new build because the CPU will become an increasingly worse bottleneck the longer you keep it.

Maybe some people don't like to blow money every year for a pc? I was thinking about upgrading, but I honestly am not impressed by the numbers the new video cards are pushing out along with the s939 stuff. I still can keep my pc for another year. It may not be super smooth, but its not going to be jolty either.

 

[NoStateofMind]

Let me make this PERFECTLY CLEAR. Anyone who owns an AGP board would upgrade to a PCIe board IF money was not a factor. I know that if I had the cash, PCIe would already be in my sig. No matter how you spin it, it is still cheaper and less of a hassle for us AGP owners to buy A CARD then it is to buy 3 or more componants at once.

 

[DeathReborn]

Originally posted by: PC Surgeon
Let me make this PERFECTLY CLEAR. Anyone who owns an AGP board would upgrade to a PCIe board IF money was not a factor. I know that if I had the cash, PCIe would already be in my sig. No matter how you spin it, it is still cheaper and less of a hassle for us AGP owners to buy A CARD then it is to buy 3 or more componants at once.

QFT

It's more economical to buy 1 component instead of 3+ as you may need an improved PSU to go with a PCI-e card. Some people are quite happy with a 754 system or even a cherished Athlon XP or P4 (pre-prescott) and just want the most out of what they've got.

 

[Cookie Monster]

Originally posted by: PC Surgeon
Let me make this PERFECTLY CLEAR. Anyone who owns an AGP board would upgrade to a PCIe board IF money was not a factor. I know that if I had the cash, PCIe would already be in my sig. No matter how you spin it, it is still cheaper and less of a hassle for us AGP owners to buy A CARD then it is to buy 3 or more componants at once.

True. I would have to upgrade almost everything in my old P4 "northwood" to go to PCI-e.

The 7800GS might possibly the last stand of the AGP before PCI-e truly takes over.

 

[Cookie Monster]

 

[Cookie Monster]

Off topic: Is the 3.0ghz northwood faster than 3.0ghz prescott? (due to a bigger L2 cache?)

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: Wreckage

Originally posted by: djmihow
I can't even find where you guys claim they sold these radeons for 200 dollars. if it was a short sale, how is that relevent to a retail starting price of a 7800GS? thats a shady comparison.

It was more like 250 and it was after rebate. (Micro Center I think). They went out of stock in about a day. (Common for Micro Center deals like that). When the GS shows up at Newegg, ZipZoomFly, Monarch, etc. It will be easy to make a price comparison between the 2 cards.

i got one . . . it was $200 after $50 MIR and it was available for the ENTIRE month of January - even the Backorders were filled.

that's 'why'

and Cookie Monster, the Prescott is actually about the 'same' pweformance as the NW processor . . . it actually has larger the L2 cache.

 

[RossCorp]

for all of you who seem determined to magically change the world to pci-e overnight, i've got something for ya.....(i giving you the finger!)....PC Surgeon nailed it. That's why I bought a 6800gs, unlocked, oc'd a bit, and now I can stretch not having to upgrade until the new amd's start shipping in a year or so. With a cheap 6800 Ultra and my p4 3.2@3.5 (and it is a prescott ) i can enjoy everything that's out now, and for at least a year.
So in a year when I upgrade, I'll talk to you about how great pci-e is and how it changed my life :wink

 

[beggerking]

Agreed.. but I don't think now is a good time to buy either...since

7800GS is so expensive for its performance

and

Windows Vista is coming out soon...DX10....don't know if any hardware today will run well on them..

I say wait a bit...

 

[redfoot12]

I bought a 7800 GS yesterday and when I installed it, it didn't work. I took that as a sign to screw paying $350 right now for the card, get a 6800 GS, and wait to upgrade everything 8-12 months from now.

 

[Dman877]

A little OT from where this thread went, but if AT re-reviews the 7800GS, I'd like to see it benched at 375/1.2 and 375/1.0. It seems kind of odd to me that a 7800GT with 4 more pipes and 25 more mhz on the core only needs 1000 mhz of memory bandwidth and the GS has 1200 mhz. Please correct me if I'm confused here but doesn't fewer pipes + lower mhz require less memory bandwidth?

 

[SoundTheSurrender]

Originally posted by: Dman877
A little OT from where this thread went, but if AT re-reviews the 7800GS, I'd like to see it benched at 375/1.2 and 375/1.0. It seems kind of odd to me that a 7800GT with 4 more pipes and 25 more mhz on the core only needs 1000 mhz of memory bandwidth and the GS has 1200 mhz. Please correct me if I'm confused here but doesn't fewer pipes + lower mhz require less memory bandwidth?

I'd like to see them try it @ 1280 x 1024 and 1024 x 768, showing 1600 x 1200 is useless to me.

 

[imported_JamesDax]

I'd like to see it tested with an AthlonXP 3200+ and some socket 754 Semprons. As well as see them tested at manufactures stock speeds and oc'd.

 

[RussianSensation]

Originally posted by: Com80787

OR the user can dump his mobo and get a 7800GT and decent PCIe board for $70+ more. That board is going to be GARBAGE in 18 months. Unless 18 months from now that user is going to stick with socket 754 for some reason and his outdated 7800gt. In other words you blew $70+ so you could do nothing more than have a PCIe version of essentially the same card rather than AGP. It reminds me of the people who dumped AGP 4X boards to do nothing more than get an AGP 8X board. What a waste.

You are getting 7800GT which is about 30% faster than 7800GS and future upgrade path for PCIe. I would say that is worth a slight increase in price. We continue to see gpu dependency in future games suggesting that there is no large need for A64 6000+ cpu speeds so that A64 3200+ for S754 should easily handle another major gpu upgrade.

PC Surgeon I understand your point since I have an AGP board myself and S478 cpu. However, you are buying X850XT performance for at least $100 more. I just couldn't live with that and this is the primary reason why 7800GS is a failure. If this was a card that could carry you over for another 2 years, I could understand. But it simply lacks the horsepower. The reason why I didnt buy the X850XT is because I don't play games right now. But if i was, I would have been over that deal long time ago and for those who missed it, that's just unfortunate.

Also, this interesting article points out another interesting dilemma:
We really do need 2 gigs of ram for latest games

FEAR - "The system with only 1GB of RAM demonstrated disappointing delays, especially in the very beginning of the game level, when the action takes place in an open space. Note that the performance of a system with 1GB of RAM dropped below 20fps in 8% of all cases. In other words, it is really hard to enjoy playing F.E.A.R. with the highest image quality settings if your system has only 1GB of RAM."

So how many AGP users have 2x1 gig sticks exactly? And what does 4x512 give us?

For example, a lot of Socket 939 mainboards refuse to raise the clock generator frequency over 240-250MHz when they are equipped with a full set of four memory DIMMs. By simply removing a pair of DIMMs from the system you can immediately raise the stability bar beyond 300MHz.

With DDR2 2x1gigs cheaper than DDR1 ram, I am personally going to wait for AM2, especially since I dont see any upcoming games worthy of an upgrade besides Oblivion.

 

[SoundTheSurrender]

I found a review that uses a AMD XP processor.

http://ckturbo128.proboards4.com/index....dware&action=display&thread=1138544120

Looks good, and it looks like I don't need a 64bit processor yet!

 

[imported_Com80787]

"You are getting 7800GT which is about 30% faster than 7800GS and future upgrade path for PCIe. I would say that is worth a slight increase in price. "

How are you getting an upgrade path? So you dump a 754 AGP board and get a $70+ 754 PCIe board. You call that an upgrade path? Or do you have insider information that AMD is going to revive socket 754?

Of course if you are suggesting people still on 754 and old vid cards dump the mobo, AND the cpu, AND get a 7800GT that's a ton of cash to be putting down all at once. Cash that person probably doesn't have or they would be away from 754 and AGP already.

 

[SoundTheSurrender]

Originally posted by: Com80787
"You are getting 7800GT which is about 30% faster than 7800GS and future upgrade path for PCIe. I would say that is worth a slight increase in price. "

How are you getting an upgrade path? So you dump a 754 AGP board and get a $70+ 754 PCIe board. You call that an upgrade path? Or do you have insider information that AMD is going to revive socket 754?

Of course if you are suggesting people still on 754 and old vid cards dump the mobo, AND the cpu, AND get a 7800GT that's a ton of cash to be putting down all at once. Cash that person probably doesn't have or they would be away from 754 and AGP already.

Its not just that people don't have cash, they just don't like spending money if they can still get use out of their pc like me. If I can get a 7800GS and still play games @ 1024 x 758 a little bit higher is awesome.

 

[imported_Com80787]

Originally posted by: djmihow

Originally posted by: Com80787
"You are getting 7800GT which is about 30% faster than 7800GS and future upgrade path for PCIe. I would say that is worth a slight increase in price. "

How are you getting an upgrade path? So you dump a 754 AGP board and get a $70+ 754 PCIe board. You call that an upgrade path? Or do you have insider information that AMD is going to revive socket 754?

Of course if you are suggesting people still on 754 and old vid cards dump the mobo, AND the cpu, AND get a 7800GT that's a ton of cash to be putting down all at once. Cash that person probably doesn't have or they would be away from 754 and AGP already.

Its not just that people don't have cash, they just don't like spending money if they can still get use out of their pc like me. If I can get a 7800GS and still play games @ 1024 x 758 a little bit higher is awesome.

Exactly that reason too. My A64 3000 754 still has TONS of life in it. Tossing it for a 939 would be a waste IMO. My current CPU gives me all the speed I need. Unlike some people I don't get the urge to toss otherwise good hardware when all games are not running at 100+ FPS maxed out. My Radeon 9700, however, is starting to hurt. A 7800GS will give me at least 18-24 months of good life & good (IMO) performance. At that point I will do a more extensive system upgrade - new CPU, mobo, and vid card.

 

[RollWave]

Originally posted by: munky

Originally posted by: Com80787
I think I am still missing your point RussianSensation.

The 7800GS is for those who are still stuck with an AGP board. Let's say someone has - for example - an Athlon 64 754 and AGP mobo with Radeon 9700. How would you come out ahead in the long run getting a 6800GS or 7800GT?

Let's say the user dumps the 9700 and gets the 7800GS for $300. That's it. No more expenses. (maybe can get $50 for the 9700 too)

OR the user can dump his mobo and get a 7800GT and decent PCIe board for $70+ more. That board is going to be GARBAGE in 18 months. Unless 18 months from now that user is going to stick with socket 754 for some reason and his outdated 7800gt. In other words you blew $70+ so you could do nothing more than have a PCIe version of essentially the same card rather than AGP. It reminds me of the people who dumped AGP 4X boards to do nothing more than get an AGP 8X board. What a waste.

As far as the 6800GS - once you throw in the PCIe board the expense is at least $270 for 6800GS and mobo. OR you can spend $30 more for a 20% performance increase with the 7800GS which is a great deal IMO.

I just don't see how a user moving from AGP to PCIe in either case is anything other than a waste.

I'm not really seeing your point either, but the 7800gs != 7800gt. You may get similar performance if you OC it to 450mhz or higher, but that's a big IF. The only possible way I see the 7800gs worth getting is if a user intends to keep his s754 system for another 12-18 months waiting for K10, and having a 16 pipe card can let him play modern games at decent settings. But who would seriously consider keeping s754 for that much longer?

And anyone still using an AXP or a older P4 would be better off going for a new build because the CPU will become an increasingly worse bottleneck the longer you keep it.

My 3.0 GHZ P4C with 2 gigs of ram and a x800xt is running QUITE nicely. I'm guessing if I wanted to buy a 7800GS this system would still last for quite some time without the CPU being the bottleneck. The GPU is becoming the limiting factor with all of these crazy games with the hi-res graphics.

 

[imported_Com80787]

Originally posted by: rnp614

Originally posted by: munky

Originally posted by: Com80787
I think I am still missing your point RussianSensation.

The 7800GS is for those who are still stuck with an AGP board. Let's say someone has - for example - an Athlon 64 754 and AGP mobo with Radeon 9700. How would you come out ahead in the long run getting a 6800GS or 7800GT?

Let's say the user dumps the 9700 and gets the 7800GS for $300. That's it. No more expenses. (maybe can get $50 for the 9700 too)

OR the user can dump his mobo and get a 7800GT and decent PCIe board for $70+ more. That board is going to be GARBAGE in 18 months. Unless 18 months from now that user is going to stick with socket 754 for some reason and his outdated 7800gt. In other words you blew $70+ so you could do nothing more than have a PCIe version of essentially the same card rather than AGP. It reminds me of the people who dumped AGP 4X boards to do nothing more than get an AGP 8X board. What a waste.

As far as the 6800GS - once you throw in the PCIe board the expense is at least $270 for 6800GS and mobo. OR you can spend $30 more for a 20% performance increase with the 7800GS which is a great deal IMO.

I just don't see how a user moving from AGP to PCIe in either case is anything other than a waste.

I'm not really seeing your point either, but the 7800gs != 7800gt. You may get similar performance if you OC it to 450mhz or higher, but that's a big IF. The only possible way I see the 7800gs worth getting is if a user intends to keep his s754 system for another 12-18 months waiting for K10, and having a 16 pipe card can let him play modern games at decent settings. But who would seriously consider keeping s754 for that much longer?

And anyone still using an AXP or a older P4 would be better off going for a new build because the CPU will become an increasingly worse bottleneck the longer you keep it.

My 3.0 GHZ P4C with 2 gigs of ram and a x800xt is running QUITE nicely. I'm guessing if I wanted to buy a 7800GS this system would still last for quite some time without the CPU being the bottleneck. The GPU is becoming the limiting factor with all of these crazy games with the hi-res graphics.

Very true. In fact if you go to the firingsquad review (the one that a previous poster cherry picked negatives out of.... as if to suggest they despised the 7800gs... you know the one that gave the 7800GS an 89% positive rating) they show CPU scaled benchmarks. The performance difference between the CPU speeds is negligible.

 

[Hacp]

huge rippoff Nvidia. Get the 7800GT for around 280 AR and the PCI-E 754 mobo for 60 bucks. You will get better performance. Nvidia can introduce the 7800GTX to the AGP market just fine, but it decided no to and left us with this crap.

 

[Hacp]

Originally posted by: Com80787
"You are getting 7800GT which is about 30% faster than 7800GS and future upgrade path for PCIe. I would say that is worth a slight increase in price. "

How are you getting an upgrade path? So you dump a 754 AGP board and get a $70+ 754 PCIe board. You call that an upgrade path? Or do you have insider information that AMD is going to revive socket 754?

Of course if you are suggesting people still on 754 and old vid cards dump the mobo, AND the cpu, AND get a 7800GT that's a ton of cash to be putting down all at once. Cash that person probably doesn't have or they would be away from 754 and AGP already.

How do you get an upgrade path? Well, 1 year down the road, when the new direct X 10 gpus come out for PCI-E only, then it is an upgrade path isn't it? You have lost all credability with that post thank you.

 

[CKXP]

Originally posted by: Hacp

Originally posted by: Com80787
"You are getting 7800GT which is about 30% faster than 7800GS and future upgrade path for PCIe. I would say that is worth a slight increase in price. "

How are you getting an upgrade path? So you dump a 754 AGP board and get a $70+ 754 PCIe board. You call that an upgrade path? Or do you have insider information that AMD is going to revive socket 754?
Of course if you are suggesting people still on 754 and old vid cards dump the mobo, AND the cpu, AND get a 7800GT that's a ton of cash to be putting down all at once. Cash that person probably doesn't have or they would be away from 754 and AGP already.

How do you get an upgrade path? Well, 1 year down the road, when the new direct X 10 gpus come out for PCI-E only, then it is an upgrade path isn't it? You have lost all credability with that post thank you.

i think his argument is with the upgrade path that s754 offers(by the way which is far from dead)...i agree with some members that it is easier to upgrade a GPU, than it is to upgrade a CPU, and motherboard as well. i also agree with Hacp and RussianSensation that PCIe is the only real GPU upgrade option. you can be buy a 7800gs AGP and ride it out for a year or so and that's fine, but what option will you have after that year or so is over?

edit: for spelling