Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Rant: ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT Performance Benchmarks

Ok, this is not a Tech Link for a reason, and it's just my random rant. I happen to stumble upon this AMDtech news bit (yes, yes, I know it's DailyTech) from XS. It is about AMD's upcoming video card, and no, that's not my rant, but before I post my rant, let me quote part of the news bits:

Onto the benchmarks. The tests were conducted on an Intel D975XBX2 BadAxe2, Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 and 2x1GB DDR2-800 MHz. The operating system on the test system was Windows XP, with a fresh install before benchmarking each card. Testing of the AMD ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT was performed using the 8.361 Catalyst RC4 drivers, while the GeForce 8800 GTS used ForceWare 158.19 drivers.


I bolded the items which I wanted to emphasize. So here's the rant: why would AMD used a Bad Axe 2, of all the boards capable of CrossFire? And didn't ATi already have their very own chipset that supports CrossFire with an AMD CPU? Or if I am mistaken, I know there's a board for Intel that has an ATi chipset that can support Crossfire and quad core (Fatal1ty F-I90HD) so why not this one instead? And even if they really prefer i975, why not Asus for such demo?

I know that they can use anything they like, but I just find it odd that of all the possible alternatives, they end up with a competitor's board, and chipset, not to mention, processor.

Update (04/26/2007): Apparently, DailyTech is the one running the benchmark. I am really not sure, because their first paragraph is as clear as mud and can be very easily mis understood:

After several delays, AMD plans to launch its long-awaited R600 graphics processors. AMD is currently briefing select members of the press on its R600 architecture in the Tunisia, but there is no embargo date on the R600 for DailyTech -- we can show you benchmarks now.


Anyway, here's the update that makes it much clearer now:

* Our benchmarks for Half Life 2: Episode 1 showed an abnormal framerate for the NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTS card that scaled with lower resolutions -- we believe there was a copy error. We reran the tests this morning and achieved 119.2 frames per second with the GeForce 8800 GTS.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can point out tons of flaws in the report linked that a technically and visually knowledgeable and prude individual would also, and this is not a typical "fan boy" speaking but a professional businessman.

I was there at the AMD briefing and tour recently when we got to see the final product to be released. Also having contacts and 10 year plus friendships with many AMD/ATi reps/employees and reviewers from many sites who were given this GPU and signed the NDA in Tunisia.

There's too much obvious there to break the shell and for me to let you know how it all really stands. :rolleyes:

However, I'd just like to leave on 2 notes since you may also have one of the R600's under NDA (IDK):

*What did the Crysis lead Developer say about this, any idea's? (they have the cards too)

*What are your personal thoughts on the 3 articles in relation to this that Daily Tech have posted?

As always I understand that if you don't have possession of the card yourself or close to someone who does, then it is wiser to keep silent for a few days than use conjectures for lengthy conclusions. But I'm asking only for initial thoughts. :-)

Good job with the site. I try to read when I can!

death_metal said...

Thanks for the comments. As it stands right now, everyone who has the card (or knows someone who have one) is under NDA and those who aren't under NDA doesn't have the card nor a clue of how it performs, well save of course for DailyTech.

So for now, I'll say, let's post the final thoughts, once the card is in the open or at least, NDA has expired ;)