Mid End shootout

Av
Anton Nilsson
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It’s time for the second mid end round up this year. On the table we have two GeForce FX 5900 XT, one GeForce FX 5700 Ultra (with GDDR3) and one Radeon 9600 XT. For some extra spicyness we have added the high end Radeon 9800 XT. The brands represented in this review are Gainward, Point of View, ABIT and Leadtek.

It’s time for
the second mid end round up this year. On the table we have two GeForce FX
5900 XT, one GeForce FX 5700 Ultra (with GDDR3) and one Radeon 9600 XT. For
some extra spicyness we have added the high end Radeon 9800 XT. The brands
represented in this review are Gainward, Point of View, ABIT and Leadtek.

Apart from the

fact that the 5700 Ultra card is equipped with GDDR3 there are no obvious

news in this review. And because of that we have reduced the number of performance

tests and will be concentrating on overclocking potentials, accessories and

price levels.

ABIT is a very

well known manufacturer on NH, mostly for their success in the motherboard

market. We have also tested several of ABIT’s graphics cards during the years

but this is the first time we’re reviewing an ATI-based graphics card from

ABIT.

ABIT Radeon 9600 XT-VIO

Chipset:

RV360

Manufacturing process:

0.13-micron
Transistors:

~65 mil.
GPU-speed:

500 MHz

Memory speed:

600 MHz / 9.6 GB/s

Pixel Shader:

2.0

Vertex Shader:

2.0

Pixel Pipelines/Pixel Fillrate:

4 / 2000 MP/s

TMU’s/Texel Fillrate:

1

/ 2000 MT/s

RAMDAC:

400 MHz
Amount of memory:

128 MB
Type of memory and interface:

128-bit, DDR

In- and

outputs:

VGA, DVI, S-Video in/out

Extra accessories:

S-Video cable, composite cable, Video-in/out adapter, DVI->VGA-adapter

Software:

–

Retail

applications:

PowerDVD 5.0, PowerDirector Pro 2.55ME

Estimated

price:

~1800 SEK

Radeon 9600 XT

doesn’t need any real presentation. The RV360-core delivers great mid end

performance and to increase the quality even further, ABIT has chosen to equip

the card with a PCB, cooling and high quality components of their own. The

card costs 1800 SEK and the availability is pretty good. The price is a few

100 SEK (2-400 SEK) more than you can buy a 9600 XT for today. For some extra

money, you can get a faster card like 5900 XT or Radeon 9800/Pro today.

ABIT Radeon

9600 XT-VIO is the first ATI-based board from ABIT which differs from ATI’s

reference design somewhat. The card’s PCB is the same orange color that we’ve

seen on i.e. their nForce2-based motherboards, ABIT NF7-S v2.0, and should also

be manufactured with a 6-layer design. According to the box, the card should

also be using "high quality japanese capacitors " and we assume that they’re

talking about Rubicon-capacitors that were also used on earlier mentioned

motherboards. Though there are no markings on the capacitors that could

verify our theories.

The memory

modules on the card are in a TOPS-format and doesn’t require any cooling, something that we can’t complain about. The card,

that is a 256 MB model, has 8x 32 MB modules placed on the PCB, four on the

front and four on the back.

The cooler is a custom job by ABIT. Radeon 9600 XT doesn’t create a lot of

heat and the cooler that is placed on it seems to do its job very good. The

ambient level is ok, neither worse nor better than the standard cooling that

ATi uses on 9600 XT.

ABIT’s software
package is nothing that’ll make you jump out of your seat. In addition to
drivers and applications (like PowerDVD 5.0), a copy of PowerDirector from
CyberLink has been sent with the package to use the card’s VIVO-capabilities.
ABIT brings you all the cables you need for VIVO: composite cable, S-Video
cable, Video-in/out adapter and a DVI->VGA adapter.

ABIT’s flagship among their ATI-based graphics cards is Radeon 9800

XT, which was the first cards that ABIT launched with an ATI-chip.

ABIT Radeon 9800 XT

Chip:

R360
Manufacturing process:

0.15-micron
Transistors:

~115 mil.
GPU-speed:

412 MHz
Memory speed:

730 MHz / 23.4 GB/s

Pixel Shader:

2.0

Vertex Shader:

2.0

Pixel Pipelines/Pixel Fillrate:

8 / 3296 MP/s

TMU’s/Texel Fillrate:

1

/ 3296 MT/s

RAMDAC:

400 MHz
Amount of memory:

256 MB
Type of memory and interface:

256-bit, DDR
In- and outputs:

VGA, DVI, S-Video

Extra accessories:

S-Video cable, composite-cable, power cable,

S-video->composite-adapter, DVI->VGA-adapter
Software:

–
Retail software:

PowerDVD 5.0
Estimate price:

~4700 SEK (Exchange rates)

Just like 9600

XT 9800 XT isn’t news to any of us. The R360-core is a minor upgrade of the

R300 that came with Radeon 9700 Pro. So far we have had a hard time finding

the card in stores and when we have the price is rather high. It costs almost

1000 SEK more than the competitors to get an ABIT 9800 XT.

Since this was one of ABIT’s absolutely first ATI-based cards there isn’t many changes to ATI’s reference design, more or less none to be precise. The only difference we can tell is a ABIT-sticker on the cooler. The PCB itself is ATI-red and the card is equipped with eight 32 MB-memory modules. Here they use BGA-modules but the lineup is the same as with ABIT’s R9600XT, four on either side of the card.

The cooling itself

is ATI’s own reference pure and simple, which means that both memory and VPU

is cooled with a copper heatsink. The fan is a relatively large one, about

70 mm, and can be regulated. ATI’s own software alerts when the temperature

reaches 70-73 degrees Celsius and then increase the rpm. When running in standard

mode the fan is relatively silent and in no way annoying. When it increases

its rpm (there are only two modes, high or low) it makes quite a lot more

noise, far from the FX5800-level but still noticeable and somewhat annoying.

Most of the noise comes from the pushinging air though, which isn’t as annoying as small

whining fan engines.

The in- and outputs are the usual, VGA, S-video and DVI.

Since ABIT Radeon
9800 XT doesn’t have Video-in-support the software package is even smaller
here and the only thing of value is PowerDVD 5.0. On the other hand this package
includes a Half Life 2 cupon. It’s nice to see that manufacturers ship their
cards with the new DVD-player versions. You shouldn’t need to buy any extra
cables though since get all the cables you might need, S-Video cable, composite
cable, power cable, S-video->composite-adapter and DVI->VGA-adapter.

Gainward does

hardly require any introduction, as it is the most common graphics card manufacturer

at NordicHardware.

Gainward FX PowerPack! Ultra/1100XT

Chip:

NV35
Manufacturing process:

0.13-micron
Transistors:

~130 mil.
GPU-speed:

400 MHz / 450 MHz EM

Memory speed:

700 MHz / 780 MHz EM 21.9 GB/s / 25 GB/s

Pixel Shader:

2.0
Vertex Shader:

2.0
Pixel Pipelines/Pixel Fillrate:

4 / 1600 MP/s
TMU’s/Texel Fillrate:

2 / 3200 MT/s
RAMDAC:

400 MHz
Amount of memory:

128 MB
Memory type and interface:

256-bit, DDR
In- and outputs:

VGA, DVI, S-Video

Accessories:

S-Video-composite-adapter, DVI-VGA-adapter, powercable
Software:

Expert Tool
Full version software:

WinDVD 4
Estimated price:

1950

SEK (Exchange rates)

FX 5900 XT is

based on the old and familiar GeForce 5900 Ultra and GeForce FX 5900. The

only difference is that the XT versions (also known as LX or SE) have slower

memory. We have seen many different types of 5900 XT. The standard from nVidia

is 390/700 MHz, but we know of cards with 400/700 and 390/710. Gainwards card

has a standard at 400/700 and if you launch Expert Tool and activate Enhanced

Mode you will get 450/780 instead. This brings the card up to the same level

as an ordinary non-Ultra, and even more.

Gainward set

the price to just below 2000 SEK for this 1100 XT, and with the Enhanced Mode

in mind, this is a fairly just price. However, there are Radeon 9800 Pro cards

that can be found at about the same costs.

The design is

"Gainward red" like expected.

As the card "only" has 128 Mb memory there are no memory banks on

the back of the card.

The cooling is

solid with heavy heatsinks for both GPU and memory. The noise level is acceptable

but could have been quieter.

The bundled software
from Gainward is not normally very juicy and 1100 XT is not an exception.
Beside the drivers it’s only the old WinDVD 4 that stands out.

The third manufacturer which is represented in this review is Leadtek,

which we got to known in earlier reviews through their cards from their GeForce

FX-series. The time has come once more and now it’s a GeForce FX 5700-based

card with some unique characteristics.

Leadtek Winfast A360 Ultra TDH

Chip:

NV36
Manufacturing process:

0.13-micron
Transistors:

~80 mil.
GPU-speed:

475 MHz
Memory speed:

950 MHz / 14.4 GB/s
Pixel Shader:

2.0
Vertex Shader:

2.0
Pixel Pipelines/Pixel Fillrate:

4 / 1900 MP/s
TMU’s/Texel Fillrate:

2 / 3800 MT/s
RAMDAC:

400 MHz
Amount of memory:

128 MB
Type of memory and interface:

128-bit, DDR
In- and outputs:

VGA, DVI, S-Video

Extra Accessories:

S-Video cable, composite cable, S-Video-composite adapter, DVI-VGA adapter, power cable

Software:

WinFastDVD, WinFox II, Cult 3D , Coloreal Embedded, Coloreal Visual, Coloreal Bright.
Retail software:

Gun Metal, Big Mutha Truckers.
Estimated price:

1800 SEK (Exchange rates)

NV36 ,aka GeForce

FX 5700 Ultra, was a considerably better card than its predecessor NV31, aka

GeForce FX 5600 Ultra. The twist with this version is that the card uses

GDDR3-memories and that it is 50 MHz faster than the versions with GDDR2.

In other words this looks like an interesting competitor for our 9600 XT.

Leadtek charges 1800 SEK for their card, just as much as ABIT charges for their equivalent 9600 XT. As we have said earlier this dangerously close to 5900 XT and 9800/Pro.

Leadtek WinFast A360 has the same green PCB color as big brother A380 (FX 5950 Ultra) but otherwise there are quite a lot of differences. One of the big differences are the memory which in this case is of GDDR3-model. GDDR3 is a type of memory which saw on e.g. NV40 that with its high frequencies will be used more and more with high end cards. Leadtek WinFast A360 is only equipped with 128 MB of memory and despite the GDDR3-memorys high frequencies the bandwidth becomes relatively low with a 128-bit memory bus.

GDDR3-modules are always of BGA-format and here they use four 32 MB-modules on the front of the card.

The cooling gives

you a bit of a nostalgic feeling and even if it’s not that big it handles

it assignment flawlessly. The memory modules are also equipped with heatsinks.

One of the GDDR3-memorys advantages is supposed to be lower heat dissipation,

but we assume that Leadtek wants to play it safe with their first GDDR3-equipped

card. The fan cover has to purposes; first of all to block any dust particles

and second to reduce whining wind noise. The level of noise is clearly acceptable

and is about the same level as ABIT’s 9600 XT.

Leadtek is without
competition when it comes to the software, but that was hardly a surprise
if you remember the review of the Leadtek WinFast A380 Ultra. Except for Leadtek’s
own software such as WinFastDVD and WinFox II they also send along several
useful applications and even two games, Gun Metal and Big Mutha Truckers.
Hardly the "game of the year" competitors, but still a nice addition.

Leadtek are just as generous as the others when it comes to cables, you will
find any cable you might possibly need for your graphics card.

Point Of View is new brand here at NH even if the manufacturer has been available on the swedish market for a long time. Time to take a closer look at one of their GeForce FX-based graphics cards.

Point Of View GeForce FX 5900 XT

Chip:

NV35
Manufacturing process:

0.13-micron
Transistors:

~130 mil.
GPU-frequency:

390 MHz
Memory frequency:

680 MHz / 21.8 GB/s
Pixel Shader:

2.0
Vertex Shader:

2.0
Pixel Pipelines/Pixel Fillrate:

4 / 1560 MP/s
TMU’s/Texel Fillrate:

2 / 3120 MT/s
RAMDAC:

400 MHz
Amount of memory :

128 MB
Memory type and interface:

256-bit, DDR
In- and out connections:

VGA, DVI, S-Video

Extra accessories:

S-Video-composite-adapter, DVI-VGA-adapter, ATX-cable
Software:

–
Full version software:

PowerDVD 5.0, Tomb Raider Angel Of Darkness

Approximate price:

2100 SEK (Exchange rates)

FX 5900 XT is based on the old well known GeForce FX 5900 Ultra and GeForce FX 5900. The only practical difference is that the XT-versions (sometimes also called LX or SE etc.) has somewhat slower memories. We have seen many versions of the 5900 XT. The standard that nVidia has set is 390/700 MHz. POV has chosen to use a bit slower memories at 680 MHz.

Point Of View charges approximately 2100 SEK which is a bit more than Gainward charges for their 5900 XT, and don’t forget that the Gainward card has higher frequencies. This puts the card at the same level as a Radeon 9800 Pro.

Point Of View is otherwise known for their low prices but this time they are overcharging.

Personally I think that POV’s card has a really neat design, a completely black PCB which has been crowned with a black cooler with a silver touch. It feels like powerful card in some way, alas the frequencies speaks of something else but we shouldn’t jump to conclusions until the performance tests are done. The design is very good according to us though, but as we all known taste varies.

The card is a 128 MB-version but actually uses 8 st memory chips which means that they individually have a capacity of 16 MB, the other cards use 32 MB-modules.

The cooler is as I said in the same color as the PCB and covers both memory and VPU. The level of noise is about the same as other 5900 XT, which is good of course.

The software
package for this card is very good. PowerDVD 5.0 and the latest Commandos-game
is included.

The Test system
hasn’t changed since the last time.

Test system

Hardware
Processor:
AMD Athlon XP 3200+ (400) Mhz
Mainboard:
ABIT AN7 uGuru

(nForce2 400 Ultra)
RAM:
768 MB DDR400 @ 2-5-2-2 Timings:

3x 256 MB Corsair TWINX512-3200LL DDR-SDRAM

Graphics card :

Reviewed cards:

ABIT Radeon 9600 XT (256 MB, 500/600)

ABIT Radeon 9800 XT (256 MB, 412/730)

Gainward GeForce FX 5900 XT (128 MB, 450/780)

Leadtek GeForce FX 5700 Ultra (128 MB, 475/950)

Point Of View GeForce FX 5900 XT (128 MB, 390/680)

Reference card:

Radeon X800 Pro (256 MB, 475/900)
HDD:
RAID0: 2x 37 GB Western Digital Raptor 10 000 RPM (SATA, 8 MB cache)
Sound card :
Creative

Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS Platinum Pro

PSU:
Tagan TG480-U01 480w
Ethernet:

3Com 10/100

Software
Operating system :
Windows XP Professional (Service Pack 1 + updates)
Video drivers:
nVidia: Forceware 56.72

ATi: Catalyst 4.5
Other drivers:
nVidia ForceWare UDA Chipset Drivers v4.24
Benchmarking programs:

Unreal Tournament 2003 (v2225)

Quake 3: Arena (v1.32)

Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness (v.49)

Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy (v1.1)

Battlefield 1942: Secret Weapons of World War II (demo "1.0")

Comanche 4 (demo "v1.0")

WarCraft 3: Reign of Chaos (demo "1.0")

Counter-Strike (v1.6)

Mafia: City of Lost Heaven (v1.1)

Halo (v1.4)

Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne (v1.01)

In all the tests

we use the resolution 1280×1024 with 4x AA (Full Scene Anti Aliasing, i.e.

edge smoothening) and 8x AF (Anisotropic filtering, i.e. advanced texture

filtering) if nothing else is specified. We have chosen the resolution 1280×1024

(or 1280×960 in those games where 1280×1024 isn’t available) because it is

a reasonable setting when it comes to performance but also because most of

our readers most likely have monitors that can handle this resolution.

In those tests where 1280×1024-4xAA/8xAF has turned out to be too demanding we first lowered the resolution to 1024×768 and then lowered and finally turned off AA/AF until a playable level of performance has been reached.

After the actual performance tests we spent about 30 minutes (in some cases even more) with just really playing the game to see that it works out when it comes to practical use as well.

Quake 3: Arena

We test the Open GL-game Quake 3 to evaluate the performance of older titles. A large amount of titles are built on the “Q3”-engine. We use the test demo four.dm_67 in the test utility Q3Bench.
Game engine :

Open GL (DX7-class)

Pixel Shaders:

No
Vertex Shaders:

No

Quake 3
1280×1024, 4xAA/8xAF
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  250
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  228.5
 
Radeon X800 Pro
  222.5
 
POV 5900 XT
  211.3
 
ABIT 9800 XT
  202.2
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  100.7
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  99.2
 
  0 70 140 210 280 350

nVidia dominates as usual in Quake 3. That Gainward’s 5900 XT manages to squeeze past ATi’s recently launched X800 Pro is quite impressive. We can’t see any big differences though until we get down to 5700 Ultra/9600 XT. In turn those two cards performs identically.

Subjective

analysis: Cards with a 256 bits memory bus handles Quake 3 without

any problems despite the high resolution and AA/AF-levels. But with the two

mid end cards 9600 XT and 5700 Ultra things get a bit tougher even if 100

fps is more than ok when it comes to playability. For those of you who wonders

if you can feel a difference the answer is a clear yes. There are clearly

situations where the slower cards are so slow that you really wish you had

something faster.

Unreal Tournament 2003

UT2003 is a DirectX 8-game which puts the graphic cards under a lot of stress with large textures, high amount of polygons and more. A multiple of games are built on this engine. We are using the more graphic demanding flyby-test. We test two different maps in the game: Bifrost and Inferno.
Game engine:

Direct3D (DX8.1)

Pixel Shaders:

Yes (1.1 and 1.4)

Vertex Shaders:

Yes (1.1)

UT2003
1280×1024, 4xAA/8xAF
Radeon X800 Pro
  91.7
 
ABIT 9800 XT
  76.6
 
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  54.8
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  43.3
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  40.3
 
POV 5900 XT
  38.6
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  36.2
 
  0 24 48 72 96 120

UT2003 is ATi’s home ground as usual. We can also see that cards with 256 MB manage to pull through much better than cards with only 128. 9600 XT handles quite a lot better than 5700 Ultra here and even threatens Gainward’s 5900 XT. Just as in Quake 3 we can see that Gainward’s 15% extra overclock comes to use since Point Of View is beaten.

Subjective

analysis: These settings may be playable on all cards but we can’t

say that they are really enjoyable except for 9800 XT and X800 Pro. Even Gainward’s

5900 XT feels slow while it feels relatively ok with our 5950 Ultra.

WarCraft 3: Reign of Chaos

WarCraft 3 is one of this year’s best-sellers which make it a good object for testing. Even if the graphics lacks extravagant technique the game is quite demanding. The performance tests are made on the first map in the WC3-demo with FRAPS.
Game engine:

Direct3D (DX8.1)

Pixel Shaders:

No
Vertex Shaders:

No

Warcraft 3
1280×1024, 4xAA/8xAF
ABIT 9800 XT
  64
 
Radeon X800 Pro
  64
 
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  61.2
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  57.8
 
POV 5900 XT
  54.3
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  54
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  44.8
 
  0 16 32 48 64 80

There aren’t any big differences when it comes to Warcraft 3. The only cards that slips behind is Leadtek’s 5700 Ultra, but it is more than playable even on this card.

Subjective analysis: I’m my humble opinion you don’t need more than about 30 fps when playing a RTS. All cards handles great.

Mafia:

The City of Lost Heaven

Mafia
is based on a Direct3D engine (developed by the Mafia team) which
uses large amounts of low-quality objects to get a high detail level.
Similar 3D engines can be found in i.e. GTA. We have used Free Rides
first level with FRAPS to measure the performance.

Game engine:

Direct3D (DX8.1)

Pixel Shaders:

Yes (1.1)

Vertex Shaders:

Yes (1.1)

Mafia
1280×1024, 4xAA/8xAF
Radeon X800 Pro
  66.3
 
ABIT 9800 XT
  65.5
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  49.2
 
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  34.9
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  28.9
 
POV 5900 XT
  27.8
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  24.9
 

  0 15 30 45 60 75

The two faster Radeon-cards hits the CPU-limitation here and as usual it’s ATi that has a noticeable advantage in Mafia. What it really depends on we don’t know. Just as we have observed before frequencies doesn’t do much for the performance which explains the small difference between POV and Gainward’s 5900 XT in this test.

Subjective analysis: ATi is obviously the for Mafia-fans. Although it is completely playable all the way down to 5700 Ultra too.

Comanche 4

Comanche 4 is based on a self-developed Direct3D engine which uses Pixel and Vertex Shaders together with high resolution textures. The game is one of few which really “needs” a graphic card with 256 MB. We’re using the downloadable demo’s benchmark tool
Game engine:

Direct3D (DX8.1)

Pixel Shaders:

Yes (1.1)

Vertex Shaders:

Yes (1.1)

Comanche 4
1280×1024, 4xAA/8xAF
Radeon X800 Pro
  50
 
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  48.9
 
ABIT 9800 XT
  47.5
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  45.4
 
POV 5900 XT
  41.1
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  36.2
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  29.1
 

  0 15 30 45 60 75

In Comanche 4 it’s time for 5900 XT to show 9600 XT who’s the boss.

Subjective analysis: The only card that doesn’t really keep up here is ABIT’s 9600 XT, the other cards manages to pull through nicely. Despite the small difference between 5700 Ultra and 9600 XT here Leadtek’s card has a much more stable performance.

Counter-Strike

Counter-Strike does not need any presentation. The new 1.6 version is told to be more demanding than before, therefore we chose to test it. The test consists of a demo from the map cs_havana and a total of 18 players.
Game engine:

Open GL (DX6-class)

Pixel Shaders:

No
Vertex Shaders:

No

Counter-Strike
1280×1024, 4xAA/8xAF
ABIT 9800 XT
  165
 
Radeon X800 Pro
  164.9
 
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  164.1
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  160.1
 
POV 5900 XT
  154.3
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  117
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  113
 

  0 40 80 120 160 200

The situation in CS reminds of the one in Quake 3. All cards performs equally good (thanks to the CPU-limitations) except Leadtek’s and ABIT’s mid end cards.

Subjective

analysis: CS flows well on all cards here. I can’t say I noticed any significant difference between the faster and slower cards here.

Battlefield 1942:

Secret Weapons of WWII

Developed in Sweden, Battlefield 1942 is still a very popular online multiplayer game and therefore we feel that it’s important to test it. Once again, we use FRAPS and test the downloadable demo.
Game engine :

Direct3D (DX8.1)

Pixel Shaders:

No
Vertex Shaders:

No

Battlefield 1942
1280×1024, 4xAA/8xAF
Radeon X800 Pro
  98.6
 
ABIT 9800 XT
  90.1
 
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  58.4
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  53.9
 
POV 5900 XT
  49.7
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  48.8
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  34.1
 

  0 24 48 72 96 120

With Battlefield 1942 we have yet another trump for the two Radeon-based cards. Especially Leadtek’s card have a hard time coping here.

Subjective analysis: The BF-fan goes for a Radeon of course. The difference between the three 50x+-cards are purely theoretical. When it comes to the gaming experience there is no difference. ABIT’s 9600 XT keep the same level as those cards as well and the only card that has some trouble is Leadtek’s.

Tomb Raider:

Angel of Darkness

Tomb Raider is the first commercial game using DirectX 9.0 fully for rendering graphic, and that makes it an interesting test object. The test is performed using the latest patch with built-in tools. The level Prague3a was chosen for the test.

Game engine:

Direct3D (DX9)

Pixel Shaders:

Yes (1.1, 1.4 and 2.0)

Vertex Shaders:

Yes (1.1 and 2.0)

Tomb Raider
1280×1024
Radeon X800 Pro
  65.4
 
ABIT 9800 XT
  54
 
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  33.9
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  30.8
 
POV 5900 XT
  29.3
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  28.6
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  18.9
 

  0 20 40 60 80 100

The demanding Tomb Raider pressures our cards hard and the only two that get out alive is ABIT’s 9800 XT and our X800 Pro. After them we have four cards that more or less performs the same way and poor Leadtek finishes last again.

Subjective analysis: The difference between 5950 Ultra and 9600 XT and the cards in between is nothing that you affect the gaming experience.

5700 stutters real bad and is just about unplayable in this test. Moving up to 9800 XT makes a big difference though and ABIT’s card delivers a really playable and enjoyable fps.

Star Wars Jedi Knight:

Jedi Academy

Jedi Academy is the follow-up to the popular Jedi

Knight II. It’s based on

the Q3 engine but has

high resolution textures and more

light effects. We have tested

a demo recorded by ourselves on the map Traspir where we met 7 opponents.

Game engine:

Open GL (DX8.X-class?)

Pixel Shaders:

Yes? (1.x?)

Vertex Shaders:

Yes? (1.x?)

Jedi Academy
1280×1024, 4xAA/8xAF
Radeon X800 Pro
  49.7
 
GeForce 5950 Ultra
  48.4
 
ABIT 9800 XT
  47.5
 
Gainward 5900 XT
  43.7
 
POV 5900 XT
  41.8
 
Leadtek 5700 Ultra
  32
 
ABIT 9600 XT
  23.4
 

  0 15 30 45 60 75

Jedi Academy is built on the Quake 3-engine. As we saw earlier 5900 XT had a big advantage in Quake 3 and it shows here as well. Even Leadtek manages to impress us a little by slapping 9600 XT around a little.

Subjective analysis: When it comes to playability there is really only a 9600 XT that has problems, Leadtek’s 5700 Ultra passes with a thin margin.