r300 review

[OldGrey]

Anandtech (http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1656)
Toms Hardware (http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/02q3/020718/radeon9700-12.html)
from nvnews:

* UT2003: Using the most stressful DM map, R300 is able to outperform a Ti4600 by 38-54% across several different resolutions!
* UT2003: Under 4x Antialiasing situations, R300 is a whopping 251% and 228% higher than a Ti4600 under various settings!
* As Anand pointed out, just when you thought Quake3 framerates couldn't get any higher, R300 is capable of delivering 37% more performance than a Ti4600 @ 16x12!
* Anisotropic filtering is now on-par with nVidia's implementation. IE Anisotropic + Trilinear is now possible.

[I.R]

Cool should be in this part of the world in about 2 to 3 months....... $1000+ I don't think I'll be getting one anytime soon :(

[KingJackal]

LOL - kinda funny how the NVnews coverage is about on par with the Rage3D coverage.... :D

( and yes, I've been reading nVnews for a few years :) )

As they say:

It's a great time to be a gamer, and coming weeks/months are certainly going to make things interesting.

In case others are wondering, you'll find just about everything related to the R300 linked either here:
http://www.rage3d.com/
....or here:
http://www.nvnews.net/

[Volodkovich]

nice to see ATi ontop of Nvidia for once...I know what GFX card im getting in my upcoming system...

[KingJackal]

Originally posted by Volodkovich
nice to see ATi ontop of Nvidia for once...

Ummm :rolleyes:

*sighs*

Need I point out that the still non-existant Radeon WILL BE faster than the NOW-OLDER GeForce, while the next nVIDIA card will be faster again......
:rolleyes:

:p

[NTBlowz]

By the time Ati ship their Radeon9700 to NZ NV30 will be released...:rolleyes:

[KingJackal]

Originally posted by NTBlowz
By the time Ati ship their Radeon9700 to NZ NV30 will be released...:rolleyes:

Actually - for once I don't think so.

The cards should be on the street in 30 days ( in the US ). Reviewers already have silicon - working near-final silicon, too. They should be here by ( my estimate ) September sometime. The NV30 won't be announced until November ( at the very earliest ), and will probably only just make Christmas in the states. I doubt we'll see NV30's down here in bulk until next year ( because they're gonna have one hell of a big US market demand if they deliver ;) ).

[Ragnor]

Yeah the NV30 will be awhile, delayed due to poor 0.13 micron yields ... last I read.

Hmm you never know... nvidia may say: screw letting ATI steal our high end (very profitable) market share, in which case they'd release a 0.15 micron NV30 rather then waiting for high enough yields of 0.13

[Wibber]

yay!, well at least my gfx card will be cheaper since i een wating to upgrade my cpu fore I upgrade it

[Wibber]

yay! smackdown! I hope the cheap one is well ... cheap

[SilverPriest]

http://geekflat.orcon.net.nz/images/smileys/slobber.gif
That, is crotch grabbingly omfg whoa kinda numbers.
Now, for what the NV 30 will be like
*rubs hands in glee*

[Grrr!!]

Hopefully this will also drive GF4 Ti prices down.

[dumass]

mmmm.. 6x FSAA

quite impressive that theres hardly any preformance loss with FSAA and antistropic filtering and stuff..

[I.R]

Originally posted by Ragnor

Hmm you never know... nvidia may say: screw letting ATI steal our high end (very profitable) market share....

Huh? I always thought that the budget chip were Nvidias bread and butter as they ship **** loads of them :eek:

[KingJackal]

Originally posted by I.R
Huh? I always thought that the budget chip were Nvidias bread and butter as they ship **** loads of them :eek:

Correct. They actually make very little money at the top end. Lots per card - but they sell bugger all cards. They'll probably sell more MX440's than Ti4600's, Ti4400's, Ti500's and GeForce3's combined.... and then some....

BUT, it's the top end that people watch. So if you rule the top end, people are more likely to buy your slower chips ( regardless of how good/bad they are ). Weird really, but that's life....

[Grrr!!]

I agree entirely with KJ on this. The low end market is the most profitable, however the high end is what consumers actually judge. Ask an idiot for instance ... after having read a review comparing the Ti4600 and the Radeon 8500, which they'll buy of a GF4 MX420 or a Radeon 7500? Customers are weird!

[RockBoy]

There might be some Radeon 9700 goodness in CHCH before you guys realise

i remember that there were 3 8500's here before they were "readily" available might just have to do it all again ;)

RB

[DiscoStu]

september is a very good guess for availablilty ;)

[Volodkovich]

Rockboy...have u always liked ATi, or have u just changed sides now thau uve seen that some ass-whoopage is about to come out?

[Maverick]

RB was one of the first 8500 owners in NZ.

A dyed in the wool 3dfx fanboy who traded loyalties to ATi on 3dfx's death. There were the unhappy months of TNT2 Ultra and GF2MX in the past, but we wont go into too many details there -best left unsaid;)

[DiscoStu]

Originally posted by Volodkovich
Rockboy...have u always liked ATi, or have u just changed sides now thau uve seen that some ass-whoopage is about to come out?
ahahahahahaha.

You can't have read many of his posts :p

[Volodkovich]

well, ive read a few, but i cant seem to remember him going on about ATi. All i remember is his 3dfx avatar.

[RockBoy]

Not so much preaching ATI
But definatley against Nvidia that shoud be clear in a few posts thats for sure ;)

when my aging Voodoo 55500 couldnt keep up i decided that a new card was in order ATI produced a good card so i went to some big lenghts to get some in the country

I believe that ATI is going to give Nvidia a run for its money, i started backing them teh first time i read the technology preview on the R200 at anandtech

and anyone who can bring Nvidia down a peg or to and bet them at their own product cycles is good in my books ;)

i have not traded loyalities really im still as loyal as ever to 3dfx, we fan boys are a strange breed, very nostalgic, why just the other day i was having a "discussion" with someone who couldnt understand and i asked him if he had ever seen a voodoo 5 5500 running?? to which the answer was no turned out he hadnt seen any voodoo's running ?!?!?

in fact im still trying to buy a PCI voodoo 5 5500 but the are getting rarer and rarer

Cheers RB

[KingJackal]

Well, I'm a staunch nVIDIOT who's unfortunately stuck with a Radeon.

Heh - nah, ATi hardware is good. *cough* ATi HARDWARE is good.....
;)

:p :p

[Volodkovich]

hey, u gotta admit their drivers are getting better!
/edit - fixed spelling....
//edit - d00d, what did i spell wrong?

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Yeah it's such a pity when a piece of hardware, that on paper looks like it should beat down the competition like the dogs they are, fails to do so because of poor drivers.

Hopefully they don't make the same mistake again.

[kaz]

Originally posted by Gh0s7 L3mUr
Yeah it's such a pity when a piece of hardware, that on paper looks like it should beat down the competition like the dogs they are, fails to do so because of poor drivers.

Hopefully they don't make the same mistake again.


actually the drivers ati r starting to bring out now r quite good

i had a radeon 8500 about a month ago and the up-to-date drivers i had were excellent, no bugs etc so yes ati's drivers have changed quite alot

[DiscoStu]

ATi have really picked up the game with their drivers & release schedules.

It gets a little annonying when people claim they are still slack release wise when they have actually gone through quite a few cycles. But most people don't tend to notice (unless of course they have an ati card that is - or someone that tends to constantly remind them ;) ).

The latest driver release is fast & stable........so stop your whining :p

[KingJackal]

They still have bugs though. I download a LOT of game demos ( yes, DEMOS without the wink ), and on my ATi card with the latest drivers, I get render errors in quite a few - most noticably Freedom Force.

Warcraft III also has issues with some texture detail settings and my R7500. At high, the game crashes after an hour or two, and at lowest, the animated avatars don't show.

nVIDA cards? You get render errors? What's a render error?

I have yet to see such a thing on an nVIDIA card, the only exception being render errors that happen on all cards ( read: incorrect game code ).

[DiscoStu]

Can't say I download demo's any more, so I'll tak eyour word.

I have never had Warcraft 3 crash on me though. And I always have eye kandi ++1 ;)

[Wibber]

yeah man war3 has no problems for me whatsoever..... same card and all, I think yours is just munted

[DiscoStu]

THinking back - their was one war3 map (night elves) where the fog was pretty sketchy....

back back on topic.

The r300 looks niiiiiiiiiice :cool:

[RockBoy]

Back off topic ;)

KJ how fast people forget

i still remember quite vividly when Nvidiots were installing about 30 differnet sets of drivers so they could play 30 different games easilly while 3dfx fanboys laughed in their faces

The pace that ATI has put on driver developmet since the release of the 7500/8500 series has changed things and you WILL see ATI's drivers as good if not better than Nvidias very soon.

Mind you Nvidia has been dealing with 6 month product cycles for the last 3-4 years i would hope they had figured out how to build a driver buy now ATI is still playing catch up and doing so a great pace

and again for the record my Retail 8500 has no problems here with drivers at all

dont know what you do with your ASUS and ATI stuff KJ perhaps your just jinxed,

now if you come out and start telling me how wonderfull Creative is we are going to have ourselves a serious fight on ;)

RB