ASUS Extreme Radeon HD 3870 review

[Julio Franco]

This week AMD came to unveil its latest generation of ATI graphics hardware, an awaited release that without a doubt created a lot of expectations and speculation especially because of two factors:
1) The dominant player, Nvidia had just killed its whole high-end line up two weeks before, in favor of an affordable and more efficient model, the GeForce 8800GT.
2) A holiday season that has shaped up to become one of the most exciting in recent times for PC gamers, with a buttload of good titles like Unreal Tournament 3, Crysis, Call of Duty 4, World in Conflict, The Orange Box, Bioshock, Hellgate: London, and the list goes on...

So, designed to combat the GeForce 8800 GT is the Radeon HD 3870, which features a long list of very impressive specifications. Already we have learned that the Radeon HD 3870 delivers 2900XT-like performance for the most part, which is both disappointing and impressive. It is disappointing because the GeForce 8800 GT is faster than the 2900XT in a majority of titles. On the other hand this new Radeon features an attractive price tag of just $220, making it a fair bit cheaper than the 8800 GT.

What is more impressive is the fact that AMD just announced the Radeon HD 3870 and it's already selling for just $220. For the time being, GeForce 8800 GT cards are very hard to come by and often users are forced to pay considerably more than the $250 MSRP.

https://www.techspot.com/review/76-asus-radeon-hd-3870/

Please leave your feedback here. Thanks!

 

[Mirob]

Any truth to this? (removed URL)

I just upgraded my x1900xt! A 8800gt is mine, $249.99 from best buy.

 

[Julio Franco]

A few different things to reply to:

1) That is a really great deal from BestBuy, see the actual card (instant buy IMO) here: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...=8800&lp=1&type=product&cp=1&id=1190678470708
2) I removed the URL of that thread you pointed to for inaccuracy.
3) Apparently there was some kind of mix up between cards in one or two of the benchmark results, we are already looking into this, but by far this does not affect the conclusion of the article at all, nor is it biased towards ATI or Nvidia, that conclusion is just stupid.

 

[Steve]

Wow what a conspiracy that is! Truth be told I did make an embarrassing error that I normally wouldn’t make and hope to never make again. When putting together my review I accidently selected the wrong cells in excel which swapped the Radeon HD 2900XT and GeForce 8800 GTS around in a few tests.

This is actually pretty easy to do and normally I check all the graphs pretty carefully. Anyway there is no excuse really but at 3:00am in the morning when the NDA was lifted here in Australia I posted the review and fell asleep. The next morning I woke up, noticed the error and fixed it all of six hours later. Those results had nothing to do with Tech Spot as Julio double checks everything and the results posted here previously were all accurate.

At the end of the day mixing the Radeon HD 2900XT and GeForce 8800 GTS in my review was a silly mistake but did nothing to change the review since it was all about the new Radeon HD 3870 and how it stacked up against the GeForce 8800 GT. The GeForce 8800 GTX, GeForce 8800 GTS and Radeon HD 2900XT were simply there for comparisons sake. Because I did not really comment of the performance of these three graphics cards in the review is half the reason why I missed the error.

Not sure who called the review bias but whenever someone has a difference of opinion they have to be bias it just makes sense. Out of all the reviewers on the internet I am sure I gave the GeForce 8600 GTS the hardest time for being a crummy product yet I am bias towards Nvidia? Go figure!

 

[Julio Franco]

I had replied earlier on the blog, here's the response:

We just got notification about this and we are looking into it. I carefully review every one of the reviews that go up on TechSpot, and while it is possible a mix-up could have happened, I don’t see the conclusion changing at all which is what matters the most. Being so pressured about posting these articles on time (just so we can deliver the information to you ASAP), we are prone to some human error.

Unlike comments on that forum you mentioned, there is no bias towards any of the two companies, simply put the 8800gt is better but temporarily unavailable and a bit more expensive. The ATI cards look really good considering price and the fact that you can get one now, or even two and go Crossfire.

For some reason everybody including us seem to agree, now you tell me where is the bias?

Steve's response should clarify things further. Thanks for bringing this up though, we definitely stand by our own work.

 

[_FAKE_]

I noticed a small mistake in the review;

The Radeon HD 3870 is slightly slower than the 2900XT in Quake Wars, though it was able to defeat the GeForce 8800 GTS. Unfortunately this meant that the Radeon HD 3870 was 21% slower than the GeForce 8800 GT at 1920x1200. Even at 1680x1050 the Radeon HD 3870 was still 18% slower than the GeForce 8800 GT with anti-aliasing disabled.

Its late at night, but from the looks of it. The HD3870 is slightly faster not slower.

And not a bad review, but you could have done it in vista, although every other review is in Vista and we could use an XP review. I'm liking this card very much. I've seen reviews of an OC HD3870 beating a stock 8800GT, yet the HD3870 couldn't clock any higher due to a bug, but apparently its been fixed and I'm awaiting the new review of the OC HD3870 with the bug fix.

I'm planning on buying one of these as the 8800GT are extremely hard to come across in Australia and are beginning to become quite expensive compared to the HD3870. Its really not a bad card if your able to OC it to 8800GT level or better for a much cheaper price

 

[beef_jerky4104]

Very interesting typo you have noticed.

 

[DingleJohn]

Its a shame that the HD3870 arent any better that the old 8800gts..

 

[Rage_3K_Moiz]

It's not meant to compete with the 8800GTS on a performance level, but on a price level. $220 for a card that can give performance equal to a much more expensive card is a superb deal.

 

[_FAKE_]

It's not meant to compete with the 8800GTS on a performance level, but on a price level. $220 for a card that can give performance equal to a much more expensive card is a superb deal.

The HD3870 actually beats the 8800GTS in the majority of benchmarks. Its only in NVIDIA optimized games that it loses, like Crysis, UT3 etc etc.