Mini-review: X1900XT 512mb vs Powercolor 3850 512mb

[gurusan]

Have this posted at another puter forum but I figured some people here might be interested as well.

-gurusan

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Hopefully this post will help those of you who have 7-series or x1900s to determine whether upgrading to a 3850 512mb is worth it.

The Card

First of all, here's the card side by side with my old x1900xt 512mb. You can see how small the core is in comparison. Card length is identical. The memory cooling is a bit funky and I have some spare heatsinks to put on there but I figured I would just leave it for the moment. I also put the card straight under water with my mcw60 so I won't comment on the cooler.



Test Setup

All benchmarks were done with the AtiTrayTools slider at max quality. 6xAA and 16x AF is run on all benchmarks unless stated otherwise (ut3 has no AA in dx9 mode, 3dmark06 does 4xAA...etc) Unfortunately Crysis and DiRT were acting funky and I wasn't able to determine the problem (been having problems with these 2 ever since I had my x1900gt, I think it might be a XP x64 problem actually) so I'm not able to include them.

For all the tests my rig is setup as such:

-Q6600 @ 3.3ghz
-2gb Ballistix 920mhz
-P5B Deluxe
-XP Pro x64
-Cat 7.11 drivers from AMD/ATI site

Benchmarks and Games to be tested:

-Call of Duty 4
-X3: Reunion
-Unreal Tournament 3
-3dmark06 GPU tests (sm2/sm3)
-Lightsmark

Results (fps except in 3dmark06)

ALL DONE AT 1280x1024





Conclusion

I'll allow everyone to draw their own conclusions...but personally I'm pleased with this upgrade as I saw a pretty significant performance jump from my x1900; and also after reselling my x1900 and purchasing the 3850 I was left with a net loss of 25 quid. Not bad. Obviously the 8800GT is a better card, but it's also quite a bit more expensive.

Other stuff

-I noticed that once the memory was overclocked the heatspreader was burning hot to the touch, so I'll definitely throw on some ramsinks to keep the temps down.
-This is the first card I've ever seen that gives you a message while POSTing telling you that you don't have the PCI-E power plugged in.

[gurusan]

just threw the ramsinks on for peace of mind. The card looks pretty snazzy now

[Squirrel]

the 3870 is better

[gurusan]

yeah, it's also more expensive.

[Squirrel]

wish i had the cash to do an upgrade

[gurusan]

It's all about timing....don't wait too long or your current cards won't have much resale price...

[mosaleh]

that card is pretty sweet, but it looks huge in the pics

[gurusan]

it's smaller than a 8800GTX....it's 9.5'' i believe...which is pretty much standard these days.

[gurusan]

Got my card to 1ghz core 2.2ghz memory

Got 14,815 in 3dmark06.....definitely not shabby...higher than a lot of 8800GTX+Quad setups

http://service.futuremark.com/compare?3dm06=4210636

[repsol23]

Originally Posted by gurusan

Got my card to 1ghz core 2.2ghz memory

Got 14,815 in 3dmark06.....definitely not shabby...higher than a lot of 8800GTX+Quad setups

ORB - Compare

Was curious as to what mods if any you did to your card to get it to run at those speeds? I just purchased and installed my card a couple of days ago and my overclock maxes out around 837/1035. I also wanted to say thanks for pics with the waterblock, I just so happened the exact same block (new) just sitting around collecting dust.

[gurusan]

I did a pencil mod. Which model 3850 do you have in particular?

[repsol23]

I have a Powercolor 3850 with 512 MB of ram, think its the same as yours hence the question about the mods. I found a site that talks about pencil mods but someone on there talked about theirs just dying on them doing this mod so I am hesitant to do this. I can't seem to get beyond 837 on core even with the block and running on a waterchiller. The temps of this card don't even break 20C even under full load, temps in my case rarely go above 28C, and my cpu hovers around 5C. I still run a 3.2e p4 on a s478 board (p4c800) but my 3dmark06 score went from a high of 4230 to 7120 with my cpu overclocked at 4.25 (fsb 260). This will be my absolute last upgrade for my old agp system, but I still would like to try and max out this card even though my cpu will be bottlenecking this card.

How long have you been running your card at those settings? Have you had any problems with this high clock? Also, what do your temps look like for the card? Prior to placing the block on the card, with the same overclock I would get temps around 65C or so under full load.

[gurusan]

Well I don't suggest doing the pencil mod without a voltmeter...but if you have one it really is extremely easy and basically idiot proof.

I am actually back to the stock cooler and getting about 55c full load on 1.45vcore and 930mhz core. Been running like this for about 3 months now.


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And wait, you have the AGP version? The Pentium 4 is severely bottlenecking your card.....Even an AMD x2 @ 2.4-2.6 will be a bit bottlenecked by this card.

[repsol23]

Yeah, the bottleneck was one of the first things I had expected to happen but it's still quite an improvement over what I used to have. Here is a 3dmark06 pic of my fastest run (3.2e @ 4.24 w/ FSB 265), if you notice the temps on the card that is after benching for several hours. I had started benching at stock 3.2 and worked my way up in 100 MHz increments until reaching the 4.24 mark and my temps never got above 21C and the card temps actually bottom out at 19C no matter how low the temp of the water is!

[gurusan]

dude you need to upgrade your cpu.

My e6300 @ 3.3ghz gets 3000 cpu points.