eVGA 7900GTX vs. Sapphire X1900XTX

[jack bauer]

Does the 512mb really make a lot of difference over the 256mb cards? ie. X1800XT 256 vs. 512

 

[jack bauer]

Originally posted by: Dainas
Ultimately I'd say go with the X1900XT, it performs better where its vital anyways (HDR+AA and high-resolution gaming with 2XAA+anis).... well enough to make the price difference for the 7900GTX rediculous.

Why would they make a new age video card as good as the 7900GTX and you CAN'T use AA and HDR at the same time, why???

 

[thilanliyan]

The Geforce 6 & 7 series doesn't have the hardware capability. That's how it is. Probably with NVidia's 8 series they'll have that capability.

Oh and the HDR + AA incapability of NVidia cards is for certain types of HDR.

 

[jack bauer]

Originally posted by: thilan29
The Geforce 6 & 7 series doesn't have the hardware capability. That's how it is. Probably with NVidia's 8 series they'll have that capability.

Oh and the HDR + AA incapability of NVidia cards is for certain types of HDR.

How's that 1800XT working for you? Maybe I should just save my money, get one of those and buy another card in a year - year 1/2?

 

[Cookie Monster]

Originally posted by: jack bauer

Originally posted by: Dainas
Ultimately I'd say go with the X1900XT, it performs better where its vital anyways (HDR+AA and high-resolution gaming with 2XAA+anis).... well enough to make the price difference for the 7900GTX rediculous.

Why would they make a new age video card as good as the 7900GTX and you CAN'T use AA and HDR at the same time, why???

Well, really not even the X1900XTX can play modern games well with 16x12 HDR 4xAA and 16xAF. It would kill itself e.g oblivion.

NV pretty much thought it was a feature that wasnt important because not many games have the option to HDR and AA. (some of the games that support it are e.g Farcry but its WAY too old, and no replay value. well for me anyways, Serious Sam2 is really about blowing enemies to bits and not really a game where visuals make a difference, oblivion would be great but its a system hog and it puts F.E.A.R to shame at this apsect of the game)

From what ive seen, heard, read you cant go with either one. Some people here exaggerate issues, but really your not going to notice a difference unless your mind is already convinced.

Let me make it easy for you:
1)EVGA 7900GTX
2)X1900XT plus Zalamn vf900 or Accelro X2
3)7900GT 256mb plus Zalamn vf900 or other 3rd party cooler as it is noisey.
4)X1800XT 256 plus Zalamn vf900 or Accelro X2
5)X1800XT 512 plus Zalamn vf900 or Accelro X2

Your going to buy a A8N32 SLI deluxe.

Why not just buy a 7900GTX? EVGA offers lifetime warranty. No noise to worry about. No heat issue or changing coolers. Similiar performance to a X1900XT let alone a X1900XTX. IQ is up to the person really. Some say ATi is better, some say NV.

And if your buying that motherboard, grabbing an NV card will be better off.

 

[jack bauer]

that was great advice, thanx

 

[CKXP]

Originally posted by: jack bauer
Is the X1900XT really as loud and hot as people say? Loudest card ever? Temps up to 95C???

http://www.techreport.com/onearticle.x/9780 noise test: x1900xtx vs. 7900gtx

 

[Cookie Monster]

Originally posted by: CKXP

Originally posted by: jack bauer
Is the X1900XT really as loud and hot as people say? Loudest card ever? Temps up to 95C???

http://www.techreport.com/onearticle.x/9780 noise test: x1900xtx vs. 7900gtx

:Q

edit - You cant hear the 7900GTX AT ALL if you play it at the same time. You can actually here the fan on the ATi stock cooler chaning twice. Second time it changes, man its loud.

 

[Bobthelost]

If you're not swapping the cooler out on the 7900GTX (which would be rather stupid anyway unless you're going watercooling) then XFX is just as good as eVGA, i think they let you overclock (but not overvolt) within the warranty too, and again it's a lifetime warranty.

Correct me if i'm wrong video gurus

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: Praxis1452

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

Originally posted by: Praxis1452
well oc's usually use aftermarket cooler :-D

And then what happens to your warranty. Hey!! A Paradox!!

I mean, if I was going to overclock an X1900XT/XTX and was going to change the stock cooler and throw my warranty out the window, then I would probably go all out with a water cooling system. Might as well as these cards run in the 90C range and thats supposed to be fine, though I have never seen confirmation from ATI that this was a perfectly safe operating temperature. I'm sure one of you could provide this info.
To me, 90C is smoking hot whether or not the card can run there safely. I would rather it run somewhere in the 50 to 60C range under a waterblock and be confident that it is running nice and "cool". But that's just me. The cooler, the better for o/c'ers.

Hey cmon :-D anybody who volt mods loses their warranty... with nvidia if I'm not mistaken. eVGA will allow you to use aftermarket coolers but they have to... I mean cmon look at those wimply coolers. The ATI cooler is a beast loud but only so because htye have so much heat. So both have ups and down.

Yeah, I would say they could have made the 7900GT cooler a bit beefier, and use a bit of a larger, slower rotating fan to dumb down the noise, but people are getting great o/c's with the stock coolers. The 90nm process really seemed to cool these puppies down quite a bit. I mean, even the 7800GTX on 110nm got away easily with a single slot cooling solution.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: jack bauer
Does the 512mb really make a lot of difference over the 256mb cards? ie. X1800XT 256 vs. 512

There are a good number of reviews that address your exact question. Comparing Identical cards (E.G. x800xl 256 vs. x800xl 512) to see "when" this would make a difference. The answer is, it really depends on the games you play and at what resolutions. The differences can safely be called minimimal if at all.

For example, Doom3 at "ULTRA" settings needs more than 256MB of memory for textures. But nobody notices any gain in image quality over just "HIGH" settings.
If you are concerned about memory size, temps, noise, warranty to be intact because you don't need to put an aftermarket cooler on, then go with a 7900GTX. You have your 512 mem, quiet, cool, and great performance. The 7900GT is a great deal IMHO, but if the memory size concerns you too much, go with the GTX.

 

[RussianSensation]

I always tend to think the sweet spot for graphics is around $300. So get X1800XT 256/512mb or 7900GT and overclock them. If you do want a high end card get X1900XT not XTX.

X1800XT & o/c Review
X1800XT vs. X1900XT vs. 7900GTX (Oblivion)
X1800XT vs. 7900GT OC vs. X1900XT/X vs. 7900GTX - a lot of graphs and different settings benched.

HQ means 6AA adaptive ATI, High Q 16 AF and 8AA/16AF for Nvidia with transparency AA.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: CKXP

Originally posted by: jack bauer
Is the X1900XT really as loud and hot as people say? Loudest card ever? Temps up to 95C???

http://www.techreport.com/onearticle.x/9780 noise test: x1900xtx vs. 7900gtx

Nice find! I can actually hear the hard drive noise over the GTX. The XTX sounds exactly like a hair dryer on stage 2. Stage 3 is, well, judge for yourself.

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Originally posted by: jack bauer
Is the X1900XT really as loud and hot as people say? Loudest card ever? Temps up to 95C???

If you use ATI Tool you can adjust the fan speed for a wide variety of settings. I have my card overclocked to 700/800 and keep the fan at 27% as long as the temps stays under 80C (it hangs aroung 68C in 2D mode for me... this is with the stock cooler, btw). So, at regular 2D desktop viewing, the fan isn't bad at all. My min/max of temps on ATI Tool says "66.1 | 82.8". I don't know how accurate this is though, since I know I've seen it hit 90C before under heavy load.

When I game, I either have the speakers turned up or am wearing headphones, so when the fan kicks in to high-speed, I can't say it bothers me at all. But, yes, out of all of the cards I have ever owned, it has been the loudest (and I just moved from an SLI setup).

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster
Well, really not even the X1900XTX can play modern games well with 16x12 HDR 4xAA and 16xAF. It would kill itself e.g oblivion.

I play Oblivion at 16x12 with HDR + 4xAA and 16xHQAF with the XTX. While I wish it was a constant 30+fps in the forests, it is not. It is, however, very playable, and looks amazing with all of the LOD mods.

 

[Munky]

I'm gonna answer some questions:

1. 512mb of mem does make a difference in these cards, depending on the game and resolution. Look at this page for some test results:
http://www.behardware.com/articles/599-...800-gtx-512-mb-the-new-king-of-3d.html

2. The x1900's do run hotter and louder than the 7900gtx. But they are also overall faster in modern games, and have more features. So you have to decide for yourself on what's more important.

3. The vf700 is not enough to cool the x1900's. I tried it, and the temps reached 90C. I'm currently using a vf900, and I still get 86C load temps, but I'm willing to live with that since these are the same temps that the stock cooler gets, but the vf900 is MUCH quieter. You can also get an Accelero X2, which also cools decently and is very quiet.

 

[Alaa]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003
The XTX sounds exactly like a hair dryer on stage 2. Stage 3 is, well, judge for yourself.

u can cook on its core,u can use it as a hair dryer and u can play games with it..wut else do u want more than that..say thnks to ATi..

 

[CP5670]

Strictly from my point of view, these are the advantages of both cards:

7900 GTX:

• faster by varying amounts in all the games I play and settings I use (seems to be faster in everything except BF2, Oblivion and DX9 COD2, none of which I care about; performance hit caused by HQ mode may even this out though)
• better OpenGL performance in general
• no movie crashes in Freespace 2 (ATI drivers newer than 6.2 have problems with this game)
• real HDR in SCCT
• much quieter cooler
• supersampling AA modes
• possibly more overclocking headroom if voltmods are used

X1900 XTX:

• significantly better AF quality (which is my main beef with the GF7 cards)
• smaller performance hit with AA
• possibly faster in upcoming games
• possibly better triple buffering support (through Tray Tools; DXTweaker is the only option for Nvidia cards and it doesn't work with some games)
• smartshader feature (not too familiar with this, but it apparently creates some nice looking bloom effects in older games)
• software voltage controls
• VIVO support (I may have a use for this, and I don't think the 7900 cards have it)
• 10-bit HDR output (don't know if it makes any perceptible difference)
• about $50 cheaper (more for the XT)

I hate hard decisions. Although I'm leaning towards one of the X1900s at this point. Monarch recently had a 7900 GTX coupon that brought the price down to $450 with no rebates, at which price I would have bought it, but the coupon had just expired by the time I found it.

Regarding the noise issue, is anyone here using an X1900 on a DFI board? One thing that is important to me is how much air they blow onto the DFI fan. Now that it's getting warmer around here, I am finding that whenever I play a game, my current cards spew enough heat onto that fan to make it speed up and cause an annoying high pitched noise. It looks like the X1900s have their voltage regulators, which are supposed to get quite hot, right above that fan, while the 7900GTX's exhaust would pass over it. (I set the fan threshold to 63C and it still speeds up during games; don't really want to go much above that)

 

[Munky]

I'm using a x1900xt with a DFI NF4 board, and it does make my chipset fan speed up under load. I did replace it with a Evercool copper HSF that cools better than the crap stock chipset cooler and is not as loud, but it still reaches full speed under load. However, I have it set to go full speed when the chipset temps go above 50C, so I'm not sure how a different threshold will react. Also, it doesnt matter whether you use the stock gpu cooler or something like the vf700 or 900 - it still heats up the chipset fan, probably because of those vregs right above it.

 

[OvErHeAtInG]

CP5670:

GF7's all have VIVO I think.
What do you mean "real HDR in SC:CT"? I thought the ATI cards could do this as well.
Also X1900's fan pulls air out of the case, so it shouldn't blow hot air on your chipset fan....

 

[Munky]

The x1k cards could do FP16HDR in SC:CT, but because of the way the game is coded, they still run it using FX10 HDR. Anyway, I deleted the game before I even beat it after I found out it was using Starforce. :|

 

[Ackmed]

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster

Well, really not even the X1900XTX can play modern games well with 16x12 HDR 4xAA and 16xAF. It would kill itself e.g oblivion.

Sorry, this is false. Oblivion is more than playable to me at those settings. Reviews back me up.

 

[Jules]

Originally posted by: jack bauer
Does anyone here have an eVGA 7900GTX? If so, what are your opinions? Have a friend who has a X1900XT for comparision?

I think I'm going with the X1900XT because it's 420 bucks on newegg. But, my last ATI card sucked (9600XT) and my old geforce rocked (one from 4 years ago), so I guess I just kinda have a bias too. My mobo is also going to be a A8N32, and if I buy a X1900, I can't crossfire and I'm pretty set on this board, love the features not to mention the looks.

Had both the x1900xt and 7900gtx sold the 7900gtx and kept my x1900xt because the price was great compared to a 7900gtx.

 

[jack bauer]

F that man, the X1900XTX is way too loud. Is the X1800XT or X1900XT that loud? Can this be fixed? What after market cooler should I buy? There is no way I can have this loud machine in my rig. I'd buy a 7900GTX, but no AA with HDR? No way!

 

[Elfear]

Originally posted by: CP5670

7900 GTX:

• faster by varying amounts in all the games I play and settings I use (seems to be faster in everything except BF2, Oblivion and DX9 COD2, none of which I care about; performance hit caused by HQ mode may even this out though)

• 
  
  I agree with most of your statements but this.
  
  X1900XTX vs. 7900GTX
  

 

[atybimf]

Originally posted by: Elfear

Originally posted by: CP5670

7900 GTX:

• faster by varying amounts in all the games I play and settings I use (seems to be faster in everything except BF2, Oblivion and DX9 COD2, none of which I care about; performance hit caused by HQ mode may even this out though)

• 
  
  I agree with most of your statements but this.
  
  X1900XTX vs. 7900GTX
  

• 
  
  Very nice Elfear!