[nextpage title=”Introduction”]
Radeon X800 GT is the latest graphics chip released by ATI and it is targeted to the mid-range market, i.e., for people that can’t afford a high-end video card but can’t play with a low-end one. Usually mid-range video cards offer the best cost/benefit ratio, since they are not so expensive and they offer a good performance for the average user.
This new chip officially runs at 475 MHz, the same clock speed of Radeon X800 Pro, but it is capable of processing only eight pixels per clock cycle (the same amount as Radeon X800 SE), while Radeon X800 Pro can process up to 12 and Radeon X800 XT can process up to 16.
You have to pay a lot of attention to the memory configuration of video cards based on this chip. There are boards based on Radeon X800 GT using DDR, DDR2 and GDDR3 memories running at different speeds. We’ve seen GDDR3 models running at 980 MHz and DDR models running at 700 MHz. Also, we’ve seen video cards based on Radeon X800 GT accessing video memory at 128 bits and at 256 bits. Of course the 256-bit models will performance a lot better.
The model we reviewed from HIS accessed memory at 256 bits and 980 MHz, used GDDR3 chips and had a memory transfer rate of 31.36 GB/s.
You can see in our tutorial “ATI Chips Comparison table” the difference between this new chip and the other chips from ATI, while on our tutorial “NVIDIA Chips Comparison Table” you can compare it to its competitors from NVIDIA. It is very important to keep in mind that NVIDIA chips from series 6 and 7 use a Shader 3.0 engine (DirectX 9.0c), while ATI chips still use Shader 2.0 (DirectX 9.0).
It is always important to remember that the “memory clock” column from these tables informs the chip manufacturer (ATI or NVIDIA) recommended clock. In some cases, specially on cheaper video cards, the card manufacturer uses simpler memory chips (in order to cut the board price) and lower memory clocks (compatible with the memory chip used), making the board to achieve a lower performance compared to boards that use the same graphics chip but with their memory chips running at the chip manufacturer recommended clock. Because of that, we always run PowerStrip software in order to check if the video card memory is running at the standard clock set by the chip manufacturer or running at a lower clock rate.
The reviewed Radeon X800 GT model from HIS runs at 472.50 MHz for the chip and 985.50 MHz for the memory.
This video card is targeted to the PCI Express bus, so in our review we will compare it only to other PCI Express video cards.
[nextpage title=”The Radeon X800 GT from HIS”]
The reviewed model is called IceQ II, which is the name of the big (and silent) fan used on this model. It is interesting to note that HIS created this fan and sooner its concept was copied by Sapphire. You can see Radeon X800 GT from this manufacturer on Figures 1 and 2.
Figure 1: HIS Radeon X800 GT IceQ II.
Figure 2: HIS Radeon X800 GT IceQ II, back view.
The fan works pulling hot air produced by the video card to the outside of the computer. This exhaust mechanism makes the video card “fat”, as you can see in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Exhaust mechanism from HIS Radeon X800 GT IceQ II.
We disassembled the video card heatsink to take a look, see Figure 4. Contrary to the Radeon X800 GT model from PowerColor we reviewed, in this model from HIS the heatsink touches the memory chips, cooling them down.
Figure 4: Video card with its heatsink detached.
Figure 5: The heatsink touches the memory chips.
This video card uses 2 ns GDDR3 memory chips from Samsung which can run up to 1 GHz, according to the manufacturer. Since this video card accesses the memory at 985.50 MHz, there is very little room for memory overclocking inside the memory’s specifications. But of course you can try overclock it over its specs.
This video card has one VGA connector and one DVI connector, allowing you to use two video monitors on your PC. The board comes with one DVI-to-VGA adapter, so you can transform this DVI output into standard VGA.
In Figure 6, you can see all cables and adapters that come with this video card.
Figure 6: Cables and adapters that come with Radeon X800 GT IceQ II from HIS.
This video card comes with two complete games, Flat Out and Dungeon Siege, and several demo games: RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, Half-Life 2, Act of War: Direct Action, Tribes: Vengeance Single Player and Axis & Allies.
Before going to our benchmarking results, let’s recap this video card main features.
[nextpage title=”Main Specifications”]
- Graphics chip: Radeon X800 GT running at 472 MHz.
- Memory: 2 ns 256-bit 256 MB GDDR3 memory from Samsung (K4J55323QF-GC20), running at 985.50 MHz.
- Bus type: PCI Express 16x.
- Connectors: One VGA, one DVI and one mini-DIN for S-Video output.
- Number of CDs that come with this board: Five.
- Games that come with this board: Flat Out (full version), Dungeon Siege (full version), RollerCoaster Tycoon 3, Half-Life 2, Act of War: Direct Action, Tribes: Vengeance Single Player and Axis & Allies (all demo versions).
- Programs that come with this board: PowerDirector 3 SE Plus, PowerDVD, Power2Go 4, etc.
- More Information: https://www.hisdigital.com
- Average Price in the USA*: We couldn’t find this product being sold in the USA on the day we published our review. However, we think it will be sold in the USD 160 range.
* Researched on https://www.pricewatch.com/ on the day we published this review.
[nextpage title=”How We Tested”]
During our benchmarking sessions, we used the configuration listed below. Between our benchmarking sessions the only different device was the video card being tested.
Hardware Configuration
- Motherboard: DFI LAN Party 925X-T2 (Intel 925X, Sep. 20th, 2004 BIOS)
- CPU: Pentium 4 3.4 GHz LGA 775
- Memory: Two 512 MB DDR2-533 CM2X512-4200 CL4 from Corsair memory modules
- Hard Drive: Maxtor DiamondMax 9 Plus (40 GB, ATA-133)
- Screen resolution: 1024x768x32@85 Hz
Software Configuration
- Windows XP Professional installed using NTFS
- Service Pack 2
- Direct X 9.0c
- Intel inf driver version: 6.0.1.1002
- ATI video driver version: 4.10 (6.14.10.6483)
- ATI video driver version: 4.12 (Radeon X850 Platinum Edition)
- ATI video driver version: 5.3 (Radeon X800 GT)
- NVIDIA video driver version: 66.93
- NVIDIA video driver version: 77.72 (GeForce 7800 GTX)
- NVIDIA video driver version: 78.02 (GeForce 7800 GT)
- MSI video driver version: 77.50 (GeForce 7800 GTX with D.O.T.)
Used Software
We adopted a 3% error margin; thus, differences below 3% cannot be considered relevant. In other words, products with a performance difference below 3% should be considered as having similar performance.
[nextpage title=”3DMark2001 SE”]
3Dmark2001 SE measures video card performance simulating DirectX 8.1 games. It is very effective software for evaluating the performance from previous-generation games, programmed using DirectX 8. In this software we run six tests. We run the software in three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32, first without antialising and with no frame buffer, then we put the antialising at 4 samples and the frame buffer at triple-buffering. This improves the video quality but lowers the performance. We were willing to see how much performance we lost by putting the VGA to run at the maximum possible image quality. It is important to note that ATI chips can run at 6x antialising. Since NVIDIA chips cannot run at this configuration, we had to use 4x antialising to use a configuration that is valid to all video cards included in our bechmarks, allowing direct comparison between them.
You may be asking yourself why we added an old program in a review of a latest generation video card. To us, it is as important to know the performance of a video card with the latest games as it is to know its performance in an older game. That’s why we kept this software in our methodology.
At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 8.96% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 13.52% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 17.25% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 40.45% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 43.64% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, and 61.81% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 13.33% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 7.68% faster, MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 6.81% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 3.68% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 3.67% faster than the board was been tested.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 13.65% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 15.03% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 16.94% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 58.59% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 60.40% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 90.92% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to NVIDIA GeForce 6600 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 15.39% faster, MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 11.28% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 11.13% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 10.90% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 7.64% faster.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 6.09% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 13.17% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 21.64% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 71.08% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 90.65% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 130.32% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 25.06% faster, MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 22.73% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 22.52% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 21.95% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 17.05% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 8.30% faster than the board was been tested.
At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 4.21% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 6.19% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 20.34% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 68.84% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 83.78% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, and 99.85% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 24.35% faster, MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 20.95% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 20.81% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 17.06% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 11.75% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 4.75% faster.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 10.44% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 30.21% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 97.47% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 125.74% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, and 137.27% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 35.09% faster, MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 29.23% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 27.81% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 25.38% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 19.38% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 10.71% faster.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 12.73% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 61.01% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 199.58% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 232.57% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 309.02% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PoderColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 52.91% faster, MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 50.42% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 46.95% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 44.12% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 35.27% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 10.98% faster.
[nextpage title=”3DMark03″]
3Dmark03 measures performance by simulating games written to DirectX 9, which are contemporary games. We run this program in three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32, first without antialising and anisotropic filtering, and then configuring antialising at 4x and anisotropic filtering also at 4x. This improves the video quality but lowers the performance. We were willing to see how much performance we lost by putting the VGA to run at the maximum possible image quality. It is important to note that ATI chips can run at 6x antialising. Since NVIDIA chips cannot run at this configuration, we had to use 4x antialising to use a configuration that is valid to all video cards included in our bechmarks, allowing direct comparison between them.
At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 7.55% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 13.38% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 25.21% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 88.45% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 121.27% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 163.38% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 75.39% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 69.41% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 64.27% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 50.65% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 39.94% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 22.87% faster.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 4.36% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 16.52% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 31.55% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 98.95% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 135.42% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 180.77% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
PowerColor Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 86.83% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 79.54% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 73.87% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 56.23% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 46.53% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 25.53% faster.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 12.50% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 32.55% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 94.92% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 144.96% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 190.48% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 109.89% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 101.48% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 94.00% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 88.16% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 61.13% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 36.86% faster.
At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 12.35% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 37.58% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 97.35% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 138.71% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 180.35% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 127.91% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 119.48% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 111.57% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 91.75% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 72.77% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 47.43% faster.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 36.44% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 41.61% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 132.13% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 157.22% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 186.72% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 140.35% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 130.79% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 122.53% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 96.86% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 80.66% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 48.83% faster.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 41.99% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 49.27% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 149.56% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 250.14% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 274.71% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 160.09% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 151.85% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 139.88% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 129.15% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 96.02% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 56.77% faster.
[nextpage title=”3DMark05″]
3DMark05 measures performance by simulating DirectX 9.0c games, i.e., using the new Shader 3.0 model. This programming model is used by Far Cry game and other games to be launched in the future. This new programming model is used by GeForce 6 and 7 series from NVIDIA and Radeon X1000 series from ATI.
We run this program in three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32, first without antialising and anisotropic filtering, and then configuring antialising at 4x and anisotropic filtering also at 4x. This improves the video quality but lowers the performance. We were willing to see how much performance we lost by putting the VGA to run at the maximum possible image quality. It is important to note that ATI chips can run at 6x antialising. Since NVIDIA chips cannot run at this configuration, we had to use 4x antialising to use a configuration that is valid to all video cards included in our benchmark, allowing direct comparison between them.
At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 5.58% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 38.36% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 39.03% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 134.74% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 178.65% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 192.53% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 76.41% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 74.23% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 70.02% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 58.85% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 43.55% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 13.62% faster.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 5.07% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 41.68% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 63.11% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 153.53% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 206.92% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro, and 221.77% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 101.88% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 96.68% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 90.07% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 72.43% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 48.50% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 17.32% faster.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 35.83% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 92.25% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 157.42% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 198.53% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro, and 243.22% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 137.78% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 130.04% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 121.03% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 96.95% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 61.77% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 27.20% faster.
At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 9.96% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 57.84% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 173.74% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 239.40% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro, 276.79% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, and 290.14% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 81.98% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 78.17% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 71.79% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 57.79% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 41.10% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 5.02% faster.
To run at 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements on 3DMark05 the video card must have at least 256 MB of memory, because of that some video cards couldn’t run this test. Here HIS Radeon X800 GT was 45.76% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 212.58% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 332.01% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 123.19% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 115.50% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 106.61% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 85.82% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 60.48% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 18.29% faster.
To run at 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements on 3DMark05 the video card must have at least 256 MB of memory, because of that some video cards couldn’t run this test. Here HIS Radeon X800 GT was 41.78% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 230.73% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 471.26% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 125.98% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 122.28% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 113.96% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 92.30% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 70.69% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 14.63% faster.
[nextpage title=”Doom 3″]Doom 3 is one of the heaviest games available today. As we’ve done on other programs, we ran this game at three resolutions: 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32. This game allows several image quality levels and we’ve done our benchmarking on two levels, low and high. We ran demo1 four times and wrote the obtained number of frames per second. The first result we discarded at once, since it is far inferior than the other results. This happens because at the first time we run the demo the game must load all textures to video memory, fact that doesn’t happen from the second time we run the demo on. From the three results left, we consider as our official result the middle result, i.e., we discard the highest and the lowest values. Curiously almost all times the values obtained at the second round on were the same.
A very important detail that we must mention is that Doom 3 has an internal FPS lock: it is only capable of generating 60 frames per second, even if your board is able to produce more frames per second than that. This is done in order to make the game to have the same “playability” sensation independently from the video card installed on the PC. This lock, however, is disabled in the game benchmarking mode.
For further details on how to measure 3D performance with Doom 3, read our tutorial on this subject.
At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 25.36% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 28.84% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 125.57% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 176.59% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 37.45% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 35.58% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 35.01% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 34.00% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 21.23% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 18.65% faster, and XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 8.90% faster.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 25.47% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 27.87% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 138.78% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 192.50% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 99.15% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 93.38% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 93.16% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 86.97% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 63.68% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 61.97% faster, and XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 27.99% faster.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 18.87% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 23.53% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 140.46% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 197.17% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 170.48% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 160.63% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 156.51% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 141.90% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 104.44% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 98.10% faster, and XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 45.71% faster.
At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 29.96% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 34.50% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 135.61% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 186.03% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 45.65% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 44.12% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 43.21% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 42.90% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 27.63% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 24.73% faster, and XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 8.09% faster.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 29.07% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 32.93% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 141.30% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 196.00% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 108.33% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GT, which was 101.58% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 99.77% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 95.27% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 67.57% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 63.06% faster, and XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 25.00% faster.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 22.00% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 26.56% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 162.93% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 196.12% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 175.74% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 164.92% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 161.97% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 146.56% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 100.33% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 97.70% faster, and XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 42.30% faster.
[nextpage title=”Far Cry”]
Far Cry is a game based on the new Shader 3.0 (DirectX 9.0c) programming model available on series 6 and 7 from NVIDIA and series X1000 from ATI graphics chips. We’ve updated the game to version 1.3.
As we’ve done on other programs, we ran this game at three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32. This game allows several image quality levels and we’ve done our benchmarking on two levels, low and very high. To measure the performance we used the demo created by German magazine PC Games Hardware (PCGH), available at https://www.3dcenter.org/downloads/farcry-pcgh-vga.php. We run this demo four times and made an arithmetical average with the results. This average is the result presented in our graphs.
This game has a very important detail in its image quality configuration. Antialising, instead of being configured by numbers (1x, 2x, 4x or 6x) is configured as low, medium or high. The problem is that on NVIDIA chips both medium and high mean 4x, while on ATI chips medium means 2x and high means 6x, making the comparison between ATI and NVIDIA chips completely unfair. Because of that we configured antialising at 4x and anisotropic filtering at 8x manually at the video driver control panel.
For further details on how to measure 3D performance with Far Cry, read our tutorial on this subject.
At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 6.50% faster than MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, 7.08% faster than XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, 7.87% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, 8.36% faster than MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, 9.64% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 11.48% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 11.60% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 17.77% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 20.74% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, and 29.36% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E and Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 3.29% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 7.29% faster than MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, 7.55% faster than XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, 8.50% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, 8.52% faster than MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, 11.96% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, 12.01% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 12.37% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 60.36% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 62.79% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, and 95.97% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 5.23% faster than PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, 17.40% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 21.95% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 102.49% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 114.51% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, and 162.68% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT.
PowerColor Radeon X800 GT was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 11.90% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 4.37% faster, MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 4.33% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 3.96% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 3.79% faster.
At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements HIS Radeon X800 GT was 34.63% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 43.21% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 131.60% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 168.59% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro, and 192.53% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 39.75% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 38.31% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 37.50% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 37.50% faster, MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 37.16% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 23.91% faster.
At a resolution of 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X800 GT was 36.28% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 48.84% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 155.01% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 171.59% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro, and 182.16% faster than Radeon X600 XT da ATI.
HIS Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 89.88% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 89.02% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 85.09% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 76.76% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 74.58% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 34.09% faster, and PowerColor Radeon X800 GT, which was 3.80% faster.
At a resolution of 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements HIS Radeon X800 GT was 38.63% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 42.04% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 145.92% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 245.02% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro, and 295.72% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.
HIS Radeon X800 GT achieved a performance similar to PowerColor Radeon X800 GT.
PowerColor Radeon X800 GT was beaten by MSI – DOT GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 127.22% faster, XFX GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 118.28% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 109.44% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 95.49% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 88.72% faster, and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 23.61% faster.
[nextpage title=”Conclusions”]
Radeon X800 GT was clearly launched to compete with GeForce 6600 GT, achieving a better performance than Radeon X700 Pro. In almost all tests Radeon X800 GT was faster than GeForce 6600 GT – in some cases up to 50% –, which is great news.
We think Radeon X800 GT brings a terrific cost/benefit ratio, costing almost the same thing as GeForce 6600 GT: both are in the USD 160 range, but you can find some places selling NVIDIA model a little bit cheaper.
On the other hand, you have to keep two things in mind. First, Doom 3, which is definitely a game for NVIDIA. If you are looking for a mid-range video card for playing this particular game, GeForce 6600 GT is our recommendation.
Second, GeForce 6600 GT supports SLI. If you have a motherboard with nForce 4 SLI you can buy a GeForce 6600 GT today and then another GeForce 6600 GT in the future to theoretically double your system gaming performance.
Yes, you can counter-argument that ATI has Crossfire. But so far Crossfire is still a dream. No motherboards available at the market, and you will need a “master” video card, which hasn’t been released yet. Also, since Crossfire is not available at the market yet, it is not clear if it will support Radeon X800 GT or not.
Regarding HIS model, its main advantage over other models we reviewed is its cooler, which helps to blow away hot air from inside the computer, and also its fan is really silent. The heatsink touches the memory chips, which can help achieving a better overclocking.
Costing almost the same thing as GeForce 6600 GT and achieving a performance up to 50% higher, depending on the game, Radeon X800 GT from HIS is perfect for the average user that wants good performance, good price and a video card that helps lower the internal temperature of your PC. That’s a guy buy!
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