ATI Radeon X800 XL - A $299 6800GT Competitor
by Anand Lal Shimpi on December 15, 2004 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Final Words
As a side note, before we talk about the comparison at hand, at $199, the Radeon X800 does a good job of competing with NVIDIA's GeForce 6600GT. However, it lacks SLI support and isn't available today, so our mid-range recommendation is still firmly planted on the 6600GT if you're buying a card before the end of the year.Once it was launched, we knew that the X800 XL would be an interesting competitor to NVIDIA's GeForce 6800GT, and indeed it is. As we mentioned earlier in the review, ignoring Doom 3, the X800 XL is quite competitive with the 6800GT and should be $100 cheaper when it hits the streets. At a high level, the X800 XL is a more affordable alternative to the 6800GT that offers similar performance in most areas. Unfortunately for ATI, Doom 3 is a big deal and it somewhat complicates our recommendation.
If you are looking for an AGP card, your only option at this price point is really the 6800GT. There are cheaper alternatives, but not better performing AGP alternatives at $400 or less.
ATI informed us at the X850 launch that the X800 XL would be available sometime in January. If this is indeed true, then in January, we'd be foolish not to recommend the X800 XL, not because it offers a huge performance advantage over the 6800GT (which it does not), but because it holds a $100 price advantage over the 6800GT.
If ATI is able to bring out the X800 XL at its suggested street price of $299, then most users won't have a problem glancing over the lower Doom 3 performance, given that the X800 XL is quite competitive in other titles. If ATI can ensure that their only blemish is Doom 3, and should they continue to work hard to reduce that blemish through further driver optimizations, then the X800 XL won't only be the more affordable solution, but it would become the clear solution.
For now, ATI wins because of price, which is something that we're able to live with. Now, if this thing is actually available when it's suppose to be, then we'll be happy. However, if it's not, then ATI will have succeeded in delaying holiday sales of NVIDIA's GeForce 6800GT. If you are at all worried about ATI bringing out the X800 XL on time, then the 6800GT is still a good option, just a potentially more costly one. We can't predict the future, but for the sake of keeping competition cleaner, we're hoping that come January, we won't regret recommending the X800 XL today.
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Some Guy - Monday, February 13, 2006 - link
I'm satisfied with X800 XL card for playing the game America's Army, very smooth graphics even with 3D settings cranked up to the highest level at 1024x768 resolution. With my previous ATI All-In-Wonder 9600 XT AGP card the game was unplayable, I was "stuck in the matrix" so to speak even when no network lag present. I replaced with ATI All-In-Wonder X800 XL PCI-E, and now I get amazing results, great fun!I'm disappointed with the TV Tuner, ATI screwed things up big time. With my old 9600 AGP card I could repeatedly press the arrow up or arrow down keys on my keyboard to switch channels instantly with no problem. Now with my new X800 XL PCI-E card I press the arrow key and it takes 1 second before changing to next channel, then once it switched channel I lose sound for 1 second and then it come back to normal. Problem persists whether activating onboard audio or installing PCI Sound Blaster card.
With the X800 XL card I have to reboot my computer every time I want to open the TV Tuner, otherwise I get dangerously loud white noise in my headphones, around 110 dB I think. Considering the earing damage limit is 85 dB, are ATI trying to make my ears bleed or something?
While watching TV the image freeze frequently, the TV Tuner won't respond anymore so I have to reboot my computer. Also I must point out that I'm not dealing with a cheap no-name motherboard here. I'm using the ASUS A8R-MVP with the ATI CrossFire chip integrated onboard, this motherboard was supposedly designed specifically for ATI video cards, one would think they figured how to build stable drivers on their own hardware.
Don't bother with X800 XL if you plan on watching TV on your computer, this card is pure crap. Sure it does works fine for gaming, but this makes no sense, for a comparable price why not buy a better standalone graphic card specially for that.
Gerbil333 - Wednesday, February 9, 2005 - link
Perhaps the $299 price is correct. It may be a matter of supply and demand. Resellers could be making a huge profit on the cards they do have, and within a few months the prices will deflate to the correct MSRP. That's how it always goes. Or, maybe ATI changed their mind...deathwalker - Friday, February 4, 2005 - link
When are these flagrent B/S articles going to stop. I am tired of reading reviews on both Anandtech and Tom's Hardware based on mis-information and hear say. Lets get the research done properly before going to press!!...$299 my butt!!...at a minimum be more objective in your expectations concerning pre-release misinformation that these graphics card developers always love to pump you guys up with just to get you to hype there products....grrrrrbupkus - Thursday, January 20, 2005 - link
Here it is January 20th and the only store that lists the X800XL is Allstarshop.com for $449.Puuulease.
coolme - Sunday, January 9, 2005 - link
How did you guys measure the wattage of these cards?You guys did a review before : http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?...
and the wattage numbers on both of the reviews don't look right at all... after all, the AMD processor case could only dissapate just below 200 watts.
T8000 - Saturday, December 18, 2004 - link
How about the 6800GT 128MB? That AGP card does sell for about $300 today and it seems to perform close to the 256MB version in todays games.So the available 6800GT 128MB should perform about the same as the unavailable X800XL.
TinyTeeth - Friday, December 17, 2004 - link
That HL2 runs slowly on FX cards doesn't necessarily mean that Valve intentionally wanted it to. I think it has to do with the failures in the FX design. I see no reason why Valve should optimize the game for DX8.1 graphics processors.GTMan - Thursday, December 16, 2004 - link
The graphs show the ATI part using more power but in the text you say ATI has the advantage in power consumption???quanta - Thursday, December 16, 2004 - link
Half-Life 2 should not be used for benchmarking. There is growing evidence that Valve crippled NVIDIA cards to make ATI cards to run faster[1]. Although this affects more to GeForce FX cards, the extra bandwidth incurred for using 32-bit shaders vs 16-bit could make a difference on frame rates. Regardless of who is at fault, unless the situation is resolved, Half Life 2 is deemed unsuitable for benchmarking purposes.[1] http://www.punkassfraggers.com/cgi-bin/datacgi/dat...
Executor6 - Thursday, December 16, 2004 - link
Good review. I'm particularly grateful for the inclusion of non-standard games like Bloodlines and Pirates. Most of the games I play do not have Doom or Half-Life or Unreal in their name, and its nice to be able to gauge the performance of a card in games that Nvidia and ATI have not bothered to optimize their drivers for.