Radeon 1800 XT / 1800 XL Review

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If the R520 architecture and derivatives have a weakness, it may be performance in current applications given the number of transistors. The R520 apparently requires more transistors for what's basically a 16-pipe design than NVIDIA's G70 does with 24 pixel shaders and texture units. ATI has made up the deficit with higher GPU and memory clock speeds, but that tradeoff leads to higher power consumption than G70, even though ATI's GPU is manufactured on a smaller fab process. Then again, the Radeon X1800 XT outperforms the GeForce 7800 GTX in many cases. That performance gap may grow if future applications begin making extensive use of shaders with flow control, where ATI's architecture is more efficient. However, I certainly wouldn't expect that to happen overnight, and it may not happen during the lifespan of G70, R520, and their offspring.

[...]At the very high end of the market, the Radeon X1800 XT is indeed a worthy competitor for the GeForce 7800 GTX. In Direct3D games, the X1800 XT is usually faster than the 7800 GTX. Unfortunately, ATI's weak showing in OpenGL games keep the X1800 XT from capturing the undisputed heavyweight title. I also have a few concerns about the likely extent of the Radeon X1800 XT's availability in the market, given its relatively high GPU clock speeds. We will have to wait and see about that.

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Add on features like adaptive antialiasing and a higher-quality anisotropic filtering mode, and it's clear that ATI's new offerings are much more than a simple speed upgrade. From a feature-set perspective, ATI appears to match or exceed Nvidia's 7800 series at every turn. Where the rubber meets the road is in today's demanding games. How do they look, and how fast do they run?

We're impressed with the Radeon X1800 XT. In the "money is no object" world of $400-and-up graphics cards, this is the fastest one we've yet tested. Without AA or AF, it's basically on par with the GeForce 7800 GTX, but you don't buy $500 graphics cards to run without AA or AF, do you? It's also great to see ATI offer a 512MB card on the high end, and at a reasonable $50 price premium over the 256MB card. We're a bit disappointed that ATI hasn't managed to get its cooling solution for this card down to a single slot or significantly reduce its noise output, relative to the Radeon X850 XT. Under heavy load, it's just a bit more noisy than we'd like, but we're sticklers for quiet computer parts.

As upbeat as we are about the X1800 XT, we need to point out that it's not quite shipping yet. ATI could be accused of "vaporware" here, and with its spotty history of shipping products on time and in quantity, that reputation may be deserved. Though Nvidia unveiled its GeForce 7800 GTX with retail availability the same day, historically both companies have announced product and put it in the hands of reviewers a few weeks before they ship. It remains to be seen if ATI will meet its target ship date in reasonable quantities. We'll steer clear of potential "might happen" shipping mishaps for the time being and just review the product based on quality, not rarity. If you're interested in an X1800 XT, just know that the shipping date and availability might be a problem, based on ATI's track record.