Radeon 9800 Pro 256MB or GeForce FX 5900XT 256mb?

Hi all,

Are there any websites that have a direct comparison between these two
cards? What are your opinions on strengths and weaknesses?

Thanks

 

My humble opinion:

In that "last generation" of cards (9800 vs 5900), the Radeon was superior.
Not by far. But it was. Now the thing is I'm comparing the very high end
9800 ?XT? with the very high end 5950ultra so I'm assuming you are comparing
apples to apples when you say 9800 pro vs. FX 5900XT. Tom's Hardware has a
nice comparison list here:
http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031229/index.html

As opposed to the new generation where I believe the Nvidia is superior.

And they keep leapfrogging each other because the new ATi 850 is coming I
hear...

Of course it depends on what you see as superior.
Like the current generation the ATi does often beat the Nvidia by a few
frames per second, barely. But the Nvidia has Shader 3 and 32bit precision
as opposed to ATi's 24 bit precision. Oh and I hear that Nvidia's drivers
are still superior. So the CURRENT Nvidia 6800 line is superior in my
opinion.

I don't know if ATi's new 850 is finally 32 bit or if it has Shader 3.

Why care?
The next gen of games *should* be using Shader 3 but who knows? I know
FarCry's latest patch uses it. Not sure about Doom3. Half Life I hear is
optimized for ATi cards.

 

The FX 5900XT is a 5900 model that is clocked SLOWER. The 9800 would blow
it away.

 

Home Mail:

Each is faster in certain games but except for Half Life2, they are fairly
close with the 9800 having the overall edge. The 9800Pro wins handily in
HL2.

 

I see where the FX5900XT at 400,700 is slower than the plain FX5900 at
400,850 but with the 9800 clocked at 325,580 I wonder why you feel the
Radeon is the faster board?

dvus

 

I have used both the FX5900XT and my current 9800Pro and the 9800pro is alot
faster. Pipelines, drivers, software optimaizatioin. who knows, it just
is.

 

DaveW:

The 5900XT is clocked slower but the memory is faster, the performance
difference between a 5900 and 5900XT is 0-2%. The 9800Pro is faster in
many games but not all, overall both cards perform well in most games. The
9800 does not 'blow away' a 5900XT except in HL2 and Far Cry.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/graphics-cards-2004.html

 

As I understand it the 5900XT has a ton of overclocking potential, where as
a 9800 can't overclock well without added cooling.

 

They both have 8 pipes, both are DX9 compatible and the 5900 has
significantly faster rated chip and memory clocking. But, if you have better
results with the 9800 that's all that counts, I guess.

dvus

 

I never really got the point of it but the 5900XT is 2x4 pipelines and the
9800pro is 1x8. Don't know if this is the difference. All I am saying is
I put a 5900XT in my machine and benched at about 5000 from memory and then
with the 9800pro I benched at 5600 (using 3dmark03) So I brought the
9800pro. (at the time they were both second hand and I had the choice of
either or for the same money). People rave about the 5900XT. I don't
know. I am sure if I had chosen that one I would have been happy with it.
But then again I play HL2 all the time so probably best luck I did pick the
Ati card.

 

Me neither. Sounds as good as anything.

It really sucks that software developers code for one piece of hardware and
ignore another that makes up a significant percentage of what's out there.
Anyone not optimizing for both Ati and nVidia ought to be made to feel the
consequences by having their product boycotted by the ignored faction, but I
doubt that'll ever happen.