X-bit labs

ATI RADEON X800 XL 512MB Graphics Card Review. 512MB: Today’s Need or Reserve for the Future? (page 14)

Category: Video

by Alexey Stepin , Anton Shilov

[ 05/05/2005 | 02:10 PM ]

Half-Life 2

The d1_canals_12 map abounds in pixel shaders, so graphics cards based on the ATI R480/430 processor are in the lead here.

It’s in the “eye candy” mode that we for the first time see a really big difference between the two versions of the RADEON X800 XL: the 512MB version is 5% faster than the older one in 1280x1024 and almost 20% faster in 1600x1200! It is no surprise the RADEON X800 XL 512MB enjoys a speed bonus from having the extra memory in Half-Life 2 rather than elsewhere since this game abounds in high-resolution textures other games, for example Far Cry, don’t have. Added the enabled full-screen antialiasing and anisotropic filtering, each megabyte of graphics memory becomes valuable, and the 512 megabytes of the new RADEON come in most handy here.

The RADEON X800 XL 512MB enjoys supremacy over the ordinary RADEON X800 XL in the “extreme quality” mode, too. Here, the gap varies from 15% in 1280x1024 to 20% in 1600x1200. Note also that the performance is high even in 1600x1200 – it’s comfortable to play at 70fps. The GeForce 6800 Ultra and GT are good enough in the first two resolutions, but slow down below the acceptable limit in 1600x1200.

The scene recorded on the d3_c17_02 map depends much on the speed of the system’s central processor, but ATI’s RADEONs are undoubtedly leaders here, even in the “pure speed” mode. The 512MB of memory don’t give any special bonuses, but that’s expectable in modes without full-screen antialiasing.

This map isn’t as large as d1_canals_12 and is simpler in terms of graphics. The RADEON X800 XL 512MB is only 5% faster than the 256MB version, and only in 1600x1200 resolution.

The advantage goes up to 18-20% with 6x antialiasing, but again in the highest resolution only. Thus, the RADEON X800 XL 512MB even beats the RADEON X850 XT Platinum Edition. The GeForce 6800 GT and Ultra are far behind the others in this test: the enabled 8xS FSAA mode affects the performance negatively, but you can still play 1024x768 resolution.