Sapphire Radeon X1800XL

[Tim S]

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/200...x1800xl/1.html

[Xen0phobiak]

"It seems strange that the fan is actually larger than the hole in the top plate of the four part heatsink. The fan is a 50mm flat fins design, whilst the hole is strangely only 40mm across."

Thats how centrifugal blowers/fans work.

Its good to see ATi catching up, but its a shame about the pricing.

[Tim S]

The reason it seems strange is because the airflow doesn't seem that great. In fact, if you put your hand at the power end of the card, you can't actually feel the air blowing through it, even when it is howling.

EDIT: I've also done the paper test - that works a little better. The paper moves back a little, but not very much at all considering the noise that the fan is making.

[Xen0phobiak]

It seems to be more of a radial blower than a fan, which means noise and pressure over greater unresisted airflow, are there a lot of closely packed fins in that heatsink?

[atanum141]

hmmmm..i like your analysis on the fan.as i remember sapphire allways has noisey HSF's on their cards...so it shows with their latest ones.

i was just wondering the ram chips on the board were all of them covered by the HSF or are those small "lego" looking bricks next to the power components ram modules aswell??

[Tim S]

Originally Posted by Xen0phobiak

It seems to be more of a radial blower than a fan, which means noise and pressure over greater unresisted airflow, are there a lot of closely packed fins in that heatsink?

yes probably about twice as many as on a 7800 GT. Incidentally, they both have similar fans.

[Tim S]

Originally Posted by atanum141

hmmmm..i like your analysis on the fan.as i remember sapphire allways has noisey HSF's on their cards...so it shows with their latest ones.

i was just wondering the ram chips on the board were all of them covered by the HSF or are those small "lego" looking bricks next to the power components ram modules aswell??

There are only 8 DRAMs.

Sapphire's coolers don't tend to stray much from ATI's reference coolers. I wish they would though, in all honesty.

Since the X800XT/Pro cooler, I've not been a fan of any of ATI's reference coolers since then strictly speaking pretty - the dual slot X850/X1800 XT cooler looks ok, but does have some issues. The X850XT was an inferno, giving off ~64W and the X1800XT is said to be even worse at ~69W.

[Andy Mc]

it wouldbe nice to see this review redone when ATI makes their 'magical' openGL tweak availalble to the masses.

[Shadowed_fury]

Bring on the price wars!

[LockmanX]

Seeing as the card has two dual-link DVI ports, we hope that Sapphire will amend this bundle to include a second VGA-to-DVI converter for those gamers who are still running two analogue monitors.

Honestly, I think most people running multiple analogue monitors will already be equiped with an adiquate number of converters. Some I know even have a small surpless. That said, there is still a situation in which someone maybe be buying a card and a second monitor. Those dvi converters are inexpensive and would just be tossed into the order. Anyone paying $300-500 + the cost of a monitor is more than likely not going to be crying of an extra $2-5.

As always though, good article. Personally, I think nVidia has a the lead in this round, this far anyway. The X1x00's weren't the cards I was hoping for. One thing that I've been disapointed with is that niether manufacturers cards are capable of providing flat out brutal frame rates in current games and the absolute best picture quality. That maybe unrealistic but I'm just not happy with the current appoarch (which seems to be "hey!, just throw another card at it....Wee! Sli and Crossfire). On the other hand, its very nice to see games that are continually moving toward a more life-like visual quality.

Still, I don't feel that multi-card solutions are the answer. I definatly think that multi-GPU graphics solutions is the direction we are heading but a second card is extra baggage. I really like some of Gigabyte's SLi solutions in which both cores were on the same card. While definatly a step in the right direction, I think that we will eventually end up with multi-core GPUs. That would get us a nice, small unit with incredable power. I emphasize small mainly due to one of my personal issues with using multiple cards. In most situations with two graphics cards, there is only room for a single PCI slot and sometimes a single x1 PCI-e. This is extremely limiting in my opinion. Usually that single slot would find itself occupied by a high-end sound card such as the new X-fi's (if you are going to drop the the kind of cash required for two video cards, you better be paying attension to sound). So with that filled, you are basicly screwed if you need to add a card if you want/require additional functionality for your computer. These aren't suppose to be consoles with gaming as the sole purpose. PC's have a potentially infinite number of uses and thats what sets them apart from dedicated gaming hardware.

Things are good, but it all needs work.

[Tim S]

Originally Posted by Andy Mc

it wouldbe nice to see this review redone when ATI makes their 'magical' openGL tweak availalble to the masses.

I'm not actually using any OpenGL games at the moment (because there aren't any that are popular enough), but when Quake 4 comes out, we'll be making use of it I would have thought.

And yes, its all well and good ATI having a magic OpenGL tweak seeded to journalists (I've got it too), but I don't have the time to look at it explicitly now, but when it is included in the drivers, we'll definitely have a look at it.

LockmanX, I agree with you but, you have to consider how much they're making on these cards. After taking that in to account I think you'll realise why I moan about it every single time a manufacturer 'forgets' to put adequate cables/adapters in the box. The price it'd cost them to include another DVI to VGA converter is less than 1/5th of what it'd cost the consumer because they buy them in such massive quantities.

[MrWillyWonka]

Haven't finished reading the article, but the 2nd and 3rd images on the 3rd page aren't working - missing the .jpg extension.

[Tim S]

thanks, fixed.

[Tulatin]

Sooo you're telling us that we've waited all this time for a card that performs very close to NVIDIA's offering, but at a higher price...?

[MrWillyWonka]

Originally Posted by Tulatin

Sooo you're telling us that we've waited all this time for a card that performs very close to NVIDIA's offering, but at a higher price...?

Sort of what I was thinking. After a good 30 minutes of reading, I wasn't impressed by the card. Basically, what it means is that ATI has finally caught up with nVidia a bit after a few months of absence.

I personally will be getting the 7800GT, the extreme edition at £245 seems good. What is the extra bit for £30 more bigz, is it just looks or is performance improved? Any info on that?

[Tulatin]

along with that, you're getting a screamer of a videocard versus the relatively quiet 7800...

[Tim S]

Originally Posted by MrWillyWonka

I personally will be getting the 7800GT, the extreme edition at £245 seems good. What is the extra bit for £30 more bigz, is it just looks or is performance improved? Any info on that?

I'll grab a picture, give me a second.





It's the same card, but 'improved' aesthetics, depending on your tastes. I think it looks pretty cool IRL, depends whether it floats your boat or not though...

[Shadowed_fury]

Well considering I won't be keeping the stock cooler on...

[buzz_lips]

Good write up but no real surprises. I think it's quite amusing that ATI relaeased these at these price points. Surely no one in their right mind would buy one considering it's £60/£70 more than the 7800GT. I'm also surprised really ATI have their card inside the Xbox which is obviously gonna make em some cash so would have thought they could have taken a bigger hit re pricing on these cards.

I might have missed it somewhere in the review but which drivers were used under testing assume the 5.10's but wanted to check.

Roll on the 580.........

As I'm on on an X800XT atm I think I'll skip this round of cards unless I spy a real baragin for a 7800 GTX

[Tim S]

Nope, Catalyst 5.10 don't support Radeon X1800 - I had to use beta drivers against my wish. I'm all for using drivers that everyone can get hold of.