Introducing the Radeon X1650 XT: A New Mainstream GPU from ATI
by Josh Venning on October 30, 2006 6:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
CrossFire Performance
The X1650 XT is the second card with the new ATI CrossFire features. With the X1950 Pro, ATI got rid of the annoying dongle connector for good, and they have adopted a very NVIDIA-like approach, with small bridge connections on the top of the cards for CrossFire operation. We think this was a wise choice for ATI and applaud them for it.
We were curious what kind of CrossFire performance we would see with the Radeon X1650 XT, particularly in comparison with the GeForce 7600 GT in SLI mode. Again, since the 7600 GT is the X1650 XT's main competitor, how these cards perform in CrossFire and SLI was something we wanted to take a look at. We've also included some other cards for reference, and we've chosen a few of the same tests from our performance section for comparison.
CrossFire Performance Battlefield 2
The first test is in Battlefield 2 with 4X AA enabled.
In Battlefield 2, we see that with CrossFire we get a 55%-59% improvement in frame rate with the X1650 XT over single card operation. The performance of two of these cards in CrossFire (in this game) is comparable to a single X1950 Pro (or a 7900 GT or 7950 GT on the NVIDIA side). We can also see that the 7600 GT SLI gets slightly better performance than the X1650 XT in each of the resolutions. This is something we've seen in the past: in many instances, SLI provides better performance scaling than CrossFire. Here the 7600 GT SLI configuration performs 80%-90% better. Hopefully ATI can improve the efficiency of CrossFire more in the future.
CrossFire Performance Oblivion
For our Oblivion CrossFire tests, we again used 1024x768, 1280x1024, and 1600x1200, omitting 1920x1440 because most cards can't run the game at this resolution.
We noticed an issue during our Oblivion SLI and CrossFire tests with the 7600 GT in SLI mode. There appears to be only a very tiny increase in performance when running two of these cards in SLI mode over a single 7600 GT. We aren't exactly sure why this is, but Oblivion is definitely a very graphically demanding game, and ATI hardware tends to perform better with this game. This fact is very evident when we look at the kind of increase we see in performance on the graph above with the X1650 XT in CrossFire mode over a single card. At 1600x1200 we see about a 68% increase in performance with the CrossFire X1650 XT setup over the single X1650 XT. Having two of these cards in CrossFire mode will definitely allow you to crank up the settings in the game more, if you plan to go that route.
For now, we would disregard 7600 GT SLI performance in Oblivion as there appears to be a driver glitch at play. 7900 GS SLI scores 83%-88% higher than a single 7900 GS, so the <10% improvement seen on the 7600 GT SLI cards is clearly incorrect. We are investigating the matter further. X1650 XT will likely fall slightly behind 7600 GT SLI if we see a similar SLI improvement, however, as CrossFire only improves X1650 XT performance 62%-75% and the single X1650 XT is basically tied with a single 7600 GT.
CrossFire Performance Half-Life 2 Episode one
Lastly, we looked at Half-Life 2 Episode one with 4xaa enabled.
Here we see the 7600 GT SLI and X1650 XT CrossFire are back to being much closer to each other in performance (than with Oblivion) but this time the X1650 XT CrossFire gets a little better performance than the 7600 GT in the two higher resolutions; 1600x1200 and 1920x1440. Again we see that the performance of the X1650 XT in CrossFire mode is very similar to the X1950 Pro, and consequently, the latter card might be a better option that buying two X1650 XT cards to run in CrossFire.
CrossFire is something we wanted to look at for this launch, but generally speaking, it won't be a very practical option for use with this card. CrossFire requires a motherboard with two PCIe X16 slots which tends to be pricey, so if you are in the market for a system that is capable of this, you most likely aren't looking to get two cards of the performance of an X1650 XT; more likely you are looking to get the biggest and best. The performance of two cheaper cards in CrossFire or SLI operation is usually about equal to the performance of what it would cost to get a single faster card at the same price. Sure, it may look impressive, but it usually means more hardware, more power consumption, and more general headaches than you would get with a single card. Oblivion didn't have any performance anomalies with single GPUs, you will notice....
The X1650 XT is the second card with the new ATI CrossFire features. With the X1950 Pro, ATI got rid of the annoying dongle connector for good, and they have adopted a very NVIDIA-like approach, with small bridge connections on the top of the cards for CrossFire operation. We think this was a wise choice for ATI and applaud them for it.
We were curious what kind of CrossFire performance we would see with the Radeon X1650 XT, particularly in comparison with the GeForce 7600 GT in SLI mode. Again, since the 7600 GT is the X1650 XT's main competitor, how these cards perform in CrossFire and SLI was something we wanted to take a look at. We've also included some other cards for reference, and we've chosen a few of the same tests from our performance section for comparison.
CrossFire Performance Battlefield 2
The first test is in Battlefield 2 with 4X AA enabled.
In Battlefield 2, we see that with CrossFire we get a 55%-59% improvement in frame rate with the X1650 XT over single card operation. The performance of two of these cards in CrossFire (in this game) is comparable to a single X1950 Pro (or a 7900 GT or 7950 GT on the NVIDIA side). We can also see that the 7600 GT SLI gets slightly better performance than the X1650 XT in each of the resolutions. This is something we've seen in the past: in many instances, SLI provides better performance scaling than CrossFire. Here the 7600 GT SLI configuration performs 80%-90% better. Hopefully ATI can improve the efficiency of CrossFire more in the future.
CrossFire Performance Oblivion
For our Oblivion CrossFire tests, we again used 1024x768, 1280x1024, and 1600x1200, omitting 1920x1440 because most cards can't run the game at this resolution.
We noticed an issue during our Oblivion SLI and CrossFire tests with the 7600 GT in SLI mode. There appears to be only a very tiny increase in performance when running two of these cards in SLI mode over a single 7600 GT. We aren't exactly sure why this is, but Oblivion is definitely a very graphically demanding game, and ATI hardware tends to perform better with this game. This fact is very evident when we look at the kind of increase we see in performance on the graph above with the X1650 XT in CrossFire mode over a single card. At 1600x1200 we see about a 68% increase in performance with the CrossFire X1650 XT setup over the single X1650 XT. Having two of these cards in CrossFire mode will definitely allow you to crank up the settings in the game more, if you plan to go that route.
For now, we would disregard 7600 GT SLI performance in Oblivion as there appears to be a driver glitch at play. 7900 GS SLI scores 83%-88% higher than a single 7900 GS, so the <10% improvement seen on the 7600 GT SLI cards is clearly incorrect. We are investigating the matter further. X1650 XT will likely fall slightly behind 7600 GT SLI if we see a similar SLI improvement, however, as CrossFire only improves X1650 XT performance 62%-75% and the single X1650 XT is basically tied with a single 7600 GT.
CrossFire Performance Half-Life 2 Episode one
Lastly, we looked at Half-Life 2 Episode one with 4xaa enabled.
Here we see the 7600 GT SLI and X1650 XT CrossFire are back to being much closer to each other in performance (than with Oblivion) but this time the X1650 XT CrossFire gets a little better performance than the 7600 GT in the two higher resolutions; 1600x1200 and 1920x1440. Again we see that the performance of the X1650 XT in CrossFire mode is very similar to the X1950 Pro, and consequently, the latter card might be a better option that buying two X1650 XT cards to run in CrossFire.
CrossFire is something we wanted to look at for this launch, but generally speaking, it won't be a very practical option for use with this card. CrossFire requires a motherboard with two PCIe X16 slots which tends to be pricey, so if you are in the market for a system that is capable of this, you most likely aren't looking to get two cards of the performance of an X1650 XT; more likely you are looking to get the biggest and best. The performance of two cheaper cards in CrossFire or SLI operation is usually about equal to the performance of what it would cost to get a single faster card at the same price. Sure, it may look impressive, but it usually means more hardware, more power consumption, and more general headaches than you would get with a single card. Oblivion didn't have any performance anomalies with single GPUs, you will notice....
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cornfedone - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
If people stop buying over-priced, over-hyped graphics cards the prices will come down. If people stop pre-ordering paper launched video, mobo, and other PC products, the prices will come down. As long as consumers act stupid and spend money like a drunken sailor then they will be exploited by unscrupulous companies.yacoub - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
This will not change until after the recession/crash, possible depression, that is coming soon.Niv KA - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
There is a quote I remember, but I don't know from who or the exact quote itselfI'm not sure if it was 80% or the quote was structured that way, I just remember hearing it somewhere... not reading, hearing, from someone important, but I forgot who!
yacoub - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
Funny having to go to the Crossfire graphs to see how the 7900GT (non SLI) performs compared to it. The end result: Another budget card that seems rather pointless these days when anyone spending $200 on a GPU should be getting something that can at least play these games that are two years old without having to sacrifice framerates so much. Come on now...Spoelie - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
x1650pro still is competition for 7600gs. x1950pro in europe has an okay price (lowest around €180), but availability a bit tight. 7600gt sli benches missing from battlefield graph!viperboy2025 - Tuesday, October 31, 2006 - link
Anandtech are on crack or something, or they woke up on the bad ATI side in the morning cause they kept bashing them for around 3 or more pages about the price of x1950 pro nto being the said $200 but being $300. I've actually bought one for $205 yesterday recently and there are other ones selling at similar price...$203.99 - (from zipzoomflt.com actually went down by $1 from when i bought it 2 days ago)...Sapphire RADEON X1950 PRO 256MB PCI-Express Dual-DVI, HDTV-Out Retail FREE SHIPPING
$199.99 - (from zipzoomfly..currently out of stock though) Asus EAX1950PRO/HTDP/256M Radeon X1950 Pro 256MB PCI-Express Dual-DVI, HDTV-Out Retail ***Free Shipping***
$199.99 - also from zipzoomfly are x1950 pro from makers of Connect3D and Diamond Viper - (this one is actually higher core clocked to 600MHz rather than 575)
Only cards on zipzoomfly that are over $200 are one from Gigabyte which is $229.99 but its out of stock so its useless anyways considering there are many others to choose from. There is also one manufactured by ATI themselves but who would buy that considering its at stock speeds and $279.99, $80 above all those other cards...
Newegg also has the saphire card at $199.99 plus shipping, and it also offers the ATI version at a ridicously overpriced price which is stupid for anyone to go for considering you can get the same card, higher clocked from a different manufacturer for $80 less and shouldn't be taken seriously by anandtech enough to bash ATI for 3-4 pages about all their 1950 pro cards being close to $300 and not near $200 as they promised. Since only one version of that card is offered at an insane inflated price.
The $200 dollar saphire is also available from pcconnection.com
viperboy2025 - Tuesday, October 31, 2006 - link
i know this was a 1650xt pro review but to add another thing anandtech keeps commenting about is that, the x1950 pro is competitive (actually they do they its also better) than the nvidia 7900 GS given their similar price similarity but if you looked at the performance charts some reviews ago about the x1950 pro it is actually very competitive with the 7900GT as a single card solution and they are nearly the same, but the GT costs $300 so in other words ATI owned 7900GT and the lower end 7900GS variant which is so outperformed that it shouldn't even be mentioned, unless you are going to SLi route which is the only thing that helps nvidia cards scale better against ATI crossfire, NVIDIA lost that battle. But one thing to keep in mind is SLI motherboards are way more expansive than single pci-e solution cards, so if you have a big purse, you should be looking for a more powerful card anyways if you haven't gotten one already, also SLI is not really a worth it (value) solution since it would require you to dish out about $400 for 2 7900GS cards or $550-600 for 2 7900GT cards, if you have that kind of money you should be buying a more powerfulful and mroe high-end card anyways, as most review sites will tell you if money allows, always go for a more powerful card rather than doing SLI/crossfire, since those are only options for future upgrades if you are running low on graphics power rather than being a real/viable current graphics solution. (eg the nvidia $500 7950GX2 SLI on 1 card is a better solution than 2 7900GT cards, and you don't even need an SLI mobo for it since it uses one PCI-e lane)kalrith - Tuesday, October 31, 2006 - link
The 7900GT hasn't cost $300 in quite some time. At ZZF you can get it for either http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?Pr...">$200 after a $20 MIR or http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?Pr...">$190 after a $40 MIR. The $200 one is overclocked from 470/1.37GHz to 500/1.5GHz, which might be enough to put the 7900GT in the lead over the X1950PRO.Either way, both are good cards, and both are the same price. I just wanted to clear things up and say that the following statement is false: "the GT costs $300 so in other words ATI owned 7900GT".
viperboy2025 - Friday, November 3, 2006 - link
btw i got my new ATI card saphire x1950 pro and its great....it comes clocked at (core/memory) 581 MHz/701MHz (x2=1402 Mhz effective memory) which is faster than the 7900GT. I also easily got the ATI card to overlock to 621Mhz/781 x2 = 1562 Mhz effective, which makes this card incredibly fast...if you wanted to get a graphx card that will last you a good two years for games or more look no further, it even comes at a great price of only $200.JarredWalton - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
BF2 7600 GT SLI performance is now added to the top graph. It was in the scaling graph but somehow left out of the 1600x1200-only chart.