ATI R700 Preview

[annihilat0r]

No, they haven't stated something like that. Actually I sense quite the opposite with "we feel that we both have to report on games that do benefit from CrossFire and underline the fact that there are games out there that do not benefit or that do not benefit significantly from CrossFire". They didn't include any games without CF support in their benchmarks.

[MomijiTMO]

I guess it is because it totally sucks atm [assuming it will improve].

PS : I edited my post a gazillion times and don't know if you are replying to the latest one

[cakofony]

Looking at the numbers i've seen so far, the card looks amazing! Anybody know if the 1gb card, and the 2gb are getting released at the same time?

also, does anybody know if the memory is shared? I will guess that it is not, because nothing would use 2gb, at least not for the next year or two. But, I heard that the two gpu's communicate through ram, not a crossfire bridge.

It looks like time to upgrade from my 8800gtx :-P
since this card uses crossfire, i wonder if/when linux drivers will be released, because the other 4000 series cards shipped with a linux driver cd in the box!

[eleeter]

also, does anybody know if the memory is shared?

The memory is not shared. There is a nearly 3 fold increase of bandwidth because the use of a PCIe 2.0 chip. And also GDDR5 memory has some type of memory sharing tech, although I am not exactly clear what it does or how it works.

Essentially the 4870x2 is an improved version of the the 3870x2. A vastly improved one in many ways, but is not seen as one GPU like some had hoped.

[ghost101]

3DMark Vantage shows enormous potential for the new ATI card. Scaling over the Radeon HD 4870 is about 80% in High mode, and a whopping 95% in Extreme mode. It's also quite a bit faster than the $650 GeForce GTX 280. So far so good, right? Well, there's a reason the card isn't out yet, as some of our other benchmarks demonstrate.

Dont they know how the 3dmark vantage scores are calculated? Of course the scaling on different presets will be different. The weights given to the gpu and cpu scores for each one is different.

[cakofony]

If i buy this card, will my pcie1 mobo hold me back at all?

[tiro_uspsss]

If i buy this card, will my pcie1 mobo hold me back at all?

nope!

[JohnZS]

I'm not that impressed to be honest, IMHO minimum FPS and Average FPS is really where the money is at, check out the poor minimum FPS in Crysis!
Sadly I was expecting this sideport thing to boost the minimum FPS as it would take the load off the CPU syncing the cards or something...
John

[Bo_Fox]

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/articl...50aHVzaWFzdA==

Alrite, but wanted to mention on this thread (since it's now moved here) that HardOCP site omitted the GTX 280's CSAA modes without even mentioning it. We all know that those Nvidia cards can do 8x and 16x CSAA modes at little to no performance cost compared to 4x AA. Yet they praise ATI's CFAA modes that are often criticized on other sites (due to edge blurriness in games that heavily utilize post-processing like Unreal3 games and extreme performance hit in many games on single 4870 cards).

While it is truly to be praised that the R700 architecture can do 8x AA very well compared to Nvidia's true 8x MSAA, 8x CSAA and 16x CSAA are done with even less performance hit--usually none at all. And many sites accept that 16x CSAA is better than straight 8x MSAA.

Do you guys agree about 16x CSAA > 8x MSAA?

[cakofony]

I really don't like crysis as a benchmark because it does not scale very well, and I really don't like the engine (and personally, i don't like the gameplay).
That said, the artwork is beautiful... if only the rest of the game were so amazing.

sorry if that was off topic, but I think its important to remember that some games are coded badly, and might not be as good for benchmarking as others :-)

[strange|ife]

forget crysis, the game wont be playable to next year at near max at any decent reso. Farcry 2 hopefully wont be poop

[YukonTrooper]

But this round is still up in the air, and Who said it was 70% faster then a GTX 280? lol, Because from what I see, it's about 10%-35% Max. Considering it's 2 GPUs vs 1 GPU. That's not too impressive and Now let the price war begin. Of course revisions to the cards too.

It was up to 80% and 40% on average, I believe is what the article said. I don't think you're looking hard enough.


BAM! Almost 100% faster.

[villa1n]

From What I see, compares to what I said before. It's really going to be a mix bag of chips.

so far from all the articles more or less, The GTX 280 gets better avg FPS, but the 4870 gets a better high FPS.
Typically you wanna go for avg more then high.

? what reviews are showing that, those don't seem typical at all. Seems most of the reviews show the x2 ahead of a gtx...

[annihilat0r]

I'm not that impressed to be honest, IMHO minimum FPS and Average FPS is really where the money is at, check out the poor minimum FPS in Crysis!
Sadly I was expecting this sideport thing to boost the minimum FPS as it would take the load off the CPU syncing the cards or something...
John

I'm inclined to agree, the results are somewhat underwhelming and the min FPS values aren't that awesome even in games that scale well with CF.

That being said, this card being at around $500 still reduces a $500 GTX 280 to a joke.

[tiro_uspsss]

this looks like my next card!!!

me so happy!

[Clairvoyant129]

? what reviews are showing that, those don't seem typical at all. Seems most of the reviews show the x2 ahead of a gtx...

I agree, what are people talking about? The X2 seems to be killing the single GTX 280 for less $$$.

[OBR]

is there microstuttering problem? Or is fixed?

[tiro_uspsss]

is there microstuttering problem? Or is fixed?

good question! anyone read the articles thoroughly?

or did you's all skip to tha puuurty pics?

[eleeter]

or did you's all skip to tha puuurty pics?

Hey this aint :banana::banana::banana::banana:o, well at least not to some of us.

[tiro_uspsss]

Hey this aint :banana::banana::banana::banana:o,

blasphemy!

graphs showing bench results/fps is haaawt!

[hurleybird]

Do you guys agree about 16x CSAA > 8x MSAA?

No way in hell. CSAA sucks serious ass.

[OBR]

good question! anyone read the articles thoroughly?

or did you's all skip to tha puuurty pics?

in which article is something about it? In Anands is nothing ...

[tiro_uspsss]

in which article is something about it? In Anands is nothing ...

I asked if anyone had read any of the articles thoroughly - I dont know if any of them mention it - hence the question

[Cooper]

in which article is something about it? In Anands is nothing ...

i guess only Sampsa done some investigation in this field for now. Hopefully we'll see his preview soon

[fellix_bg]

Some frightening AA scaling in AoC @ [H]ard: