Price Guides, February 2005: Video Cards
by Kristopher Kubicki on February 19, 2005 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Guides
AGP High End
Unfortunately, even though we now have many options on the PCIe platform, current generation Radeons still have a few weeks before they begin to saturate the AGP market. Thus, X800 Pros slated for gradual replacement by the X800XLs are still way overpriced. The lowest prices on Radeon X800 Pro remained in the high $300s [RTPE: Radeon X800 Pro AGP], while the extremely prolific AGP GeForce 6800GTs continued to mop up the realistic high end AGP market with cards as low as $340 [RTPE: GeForce 6800GT AGP]. It's been a while since we looked at AGP 6800GT cards, and drivers have changed quite a bit since then. We did recently look at the PCIe counterpart in our X800XL preview and in our original X850 launch coverage.However, the real nail on the coffin for the X800 Pro are the benchmarks that we posted back in November detailing the GeForce 6600GT. There's no mistake about it, the GeForce 6800GT is the best performer in the high end AGP sector, and the only way that that will possibly change is if the Radeon X800XL can beat it in price in the next couple weeks.
PNY surprised us this week with a GeForce 6800GT [RTPE: VCG6800GAPB] priced considerably lower than anyone else on the market.
The X800 Pro moved very slightly over the last month, particularly the Sapphire X800 Pro [RTPE: Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro 256MB AGP]. Given the fact that the X800 XL is expected to stabilize at the $299 price point, we would have to expect the X800 Pro to fall at least to that level or lower before it gets phased out. Unlike NVIDIA video cards, ATI video cards have fallen historically in price before hitting complete EOL; although, with the recent paper launches, we would be open to the thought that ATI has changed their marketing strategies a bit in the last few months. A $250 Radeon X800 Pro would be an outstanding buy, but we wouldn't be surprised if ATI simply pulls the cards out of availability before they get anywhere near the $300 price point.
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KristopherKubicki - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
PrinceGaz: We have a roundup scheduled for the very near future (days at most perhaps). From what I could gather from our internal conferences, nForce4 (Ultra and SLI) had several hiccups - but not showstoppers. With the proximity of the analysis, I'll let Wes go into more detail in his review.Kristopher
bobsmith1492 - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
Maybe because the xbox runs at like 640x800 resolution, and this hardware can run it at 4 times that resolution with AA and AF and the xbox is a mass-produced group of identical objects that makes it easy to progam for..... :PShizNet - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
how the f**k is it possible?xBox runs M$ OS and PC hardWare (including vidCard) and able to play new games just fine AND for only ~$200
where the same game for PC takes extra year to reWrite (i wonder why) and hardWare demands are about $2000 more - just to be able to play the same game??? can you say - we are giving run arounds here? CPU for $400+, memory for $300+, vidCard for $500+.. and ++
what we'd read if there'd be no need for new vidCards every 6 mo.? silver arctic paste review?
PrinceGaz - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
Please Kristopher, say more or tell us when the article that reveals the problems is due to be published. I'm one of those who is waiting for E revision A64 before jumping on the nForce4 bandwagon, and I'm glad I did if there are problems with the chipset.I never intend to use SLI though as I know it is more cost effective overall to sell the first card and buy a second-hand replacement instead of another duplicate card.
Are the problems limited to nVidia's nForce4 SLI implementation (which would be odd as you say Intel's Turnwater is fine, and nVidia created SLI), or something more fundamentally wrong with the PCIe implementation?
We need this information as a lot of AT readers are buying nF4 SLI boards every day and will be seriously upset if you have delayed information about a problem.
KristopherKubicki - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
Live pretty much answered everything for me. nForce4 beware for now.Kristopher
joeld - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
yeah, where are the high end nvidia cards?Regs - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
I would also like to know the issues with SLI on motherboards. Since everybody on the message board has been recommending or has all ready purchased a SLI set up, I think it would be of great importance to explain what you guys have uncovered.And I really like that you guys down with the Real-Time pricing engine. It's one powerful piece of programming ingenuity.
Live - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
Very nice guide! Keep up the good work. I did miss the 6800 U in the high end AGP tough. Or is it unavailable? I would hope to see a strong stand against paper launches in the next video preview (Hello agp from ATI?) Nivida and ATI are doing a poor job right now.#5 considering it was hinted that AnandTech were supposed to have published there SLI roundup this week I would guess they have uncovered issues in those creepy underground labs they call home. SLI only works on a few games and if you play an unsupported game you take a performance hit and a huge financial hit considering you played for 2 cards and get less performance then one.
#3 I am pretty sure it is supposed to be the 6800GT.
PrinceGaz - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
#3- I think it's supposed to say 6800GT, not 6600GT :)AtaStrumf - Saturday, February 19, 2005 - link
What exactly did you mean by:"With **issues** on nForce4 starting to surface, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense right now to throw all of your eggs into the SLI basket."
I'm not aware of any issues.