Originally posted by timmoore
I think you misunderstood me, I was inquiring about the effective memory bandwidth. For example, the 5800 Ultra's effective memory bandwidth is 32GB/sec, and the raw is something like 16GB/sec. I am going to buy an FX because I am a NVIDIA man, and I am very impressed with the advanced features it comes with. IMO, the tests were unfair as the drivers used were BETA and not properly tested in the same situations before. I think that the FX series will perform much better with different drivers .
You are being duped into marketing hype....
The only way to compare bandwidth, at the moment, is to compare raw bandwidth. When you take into effect bandwidth saving techniques, the platform changes continousley, and you end up w/ hypothetical number rather than actual. Hypothetically, ATI actually employs an 8-1 bandwidth ratio ( under peffect conditions), and the R9700PRO can claim "effective" bandwdith near 90MB/sec.....
of course, it's ridiculous to compare bandwidth that way, as games *never* give hardware the perfect conditions that must be met to employ 100% efficiency.
If you've read any number of reviews, you'll find that the FX5800ULTRA offers considerably poorer fsaa. The FX's 4xFSAA does appox. what ATI's 2Xfsaa does....and so on. The FX5800ULTRA seems incapable of rendering fog, it is rumored to be a hardware issue, Nvidia has not commented. Nvidia has dumbed their current BETA drivers to FP16, as opposed to FP32. Also, the FX5800ULTRA is not for sale, the people that do have them have yet to recieve WQHL drivers, and it seems only pre-orders are being filled, so unless you've pre-ordered one, you're going to get the 400mhz version. The FXULTRA was stillborn, over $100 more expensive than card that's been out for over 6-7 months, and the FXULTRA can't even outperform the R9700PRO with AA and AF.......isn't AA and AF the reason for spending the $$ for such a monster card? IQ wise, the FX just didn't show up......
I hope they at least made adjustments to theor FSAA algorithm w/ the NV35......along with a properly optimized 256 bit bus...