ATi lovers rejoice!

[j.o.s.h.1408]

At what point were ATi out of the game exactly? They dominate the low-mid end market where all the money is and are only really beaten in 2 areas (the out-right fastest card and the high-ish end (high 8800GT to low 8800GTS area). It's hardly domination by NV....

LOL the price of these so called low mid cards by ATI are around teh same price has the better 8800GT and 9600. the 8800gt is just a shade over 120 and the 9600 less then or around 100. how are ATI dominating the low mid market?

im no fanboy and i do wish ATI could compete in all levels with NV but im not blind and stupid and can see that NV are dominating. when ATI release a card that can play crysis properly then you guys have somthing to rejoice

[SiM]

LOL the price of these so called low mid cards by ATI are around teh same price has the better 8800GT and 9600. the 8800gt is just a shade over 120 and the 9600 less then or around 100. how are ATI dominating the low mid market?

im no fanboy and i do wish ATI could compete in all levels with NV but im not blind and stupid and can see that NV are dominating. when ATI release a card that can play crysis properly then you guys have somthing to rejoice

Low/mid = HD3450 and HD3650 series
They are the best priced cards for HTPCs and non-gaming machines... They decode HD much better than even the high end nvidias

[Blitzen]

ATI cuts prices on the 3850 and 3870 - The INQUIRER

which means they should drop even further...

It'd be crazy to not get Crossfire if an HD3870 is £100... and i don't care what anyone says - that card is powerful...

Its powerful as far as ATI cards go.

AS far as GPU's go in general its just below mid-range.

At what point were ATi out of the game exactly? They dominate the low-mid end market where all the money is and are only really beaten in 2 areas (the out-right fastest card and the high-ish end (high 8800GT to low 8800GTS area). It's hardly domination by NV....

Im not sure how you conclude that the 8800GT is a 'highish end card'? Its prices now are very similar (£20 difference really) to the 3870 yet the 8800GT is a better card.
Its (8800GT) a mid range and always has been since its release. One price vs performance now its the card to go for.
At £120 now, the 8800GT is the dominant force in the mid range card area and not the 3850/3870.

[this_is_gav]

It's the faster card. Better depends on what you're doing. Personally my computing life doesn't revolve around playing games.

You could call both the HD3870 and 8800GT mid-high end. They're both blown away by the HD3870X2 and 9800GX2 respectively. Whether you count them is another matter, but I suppose if you do take them out of the equation, both HD3870s and 8800GTs are high end.

At no point did I claim the 8800GT wasn't the dominant force. :\

ATi graphics chips are crawling all over the massive cheap laptop market and as has been said, the HD3450 and HD3650 are much more attractive than the 8400, 8500 and 8600s.

[Blitzen]

You could call both the HD3870 and 8800GT mid-high end

I dont think so.
The 3870 is higher end in the ATi range but not in the total GPU market. Its only mid-range at a push.

The 8800GT positively mid-range in both nVidias range and in the total GPU market.
Thhe 8800GT has at least 4 cards above it in the range so it cannot be a high end card.

ATi graphics chips are crawling all over the massive cheap laptop market and as has been said, the HD3450 and HD3650 are much more attractive than the 8400, 8500 and 8600s.

I do agree there.

[cptwhite_uk]

Nividia range higher than 8800GT:

8800GTS 512Mb - by about 5-10%
8800GTX 768Mb - by about 10%
9800GTX - by about 20%
9800GX2 1gb - by about 50%

Two of those cards wouldn't give any noticeable improvement in real world tests:

OC'd 8800GT vs 8800Ultra (lets imagine it's an OC'd GTX)

8800GT gives 92% of the performance of the Ultra, on average according to averaged fps on tom's hardware. It's is commonly understood you about a 10% performance improvement before any real world improvement in performance is perceived.

I'd say that makes the 8800GT pretty close to Nvidia's high end stuff. Lets not be making the suggestion the 8800GT is 'only mid-range' and 'still whoops ATI'. Lets keep it to single GPU cards for a fair comparison. The 3870 was released 6 months ago and still holds a respectable score against Nvidias latest 9800GTX single core solution top end card. Not to mention it's half the price now.

It's also going to be ATI's turn to release the next set of cards I suspect. Nvidia have been lazy with the 9800 series and are resting on their laurels.

This is from someone running an 8800GT...I'm no fanboy.

[Blitzen]

Nividia range higher than 8800GT:

8800GTS 512Mb - by about 5-10%
8800GTX 768Mb - by about 10%
9800GTX - by about 20%
9800GX2 1gb - by about 50%

Two of those cards wouldn't give any noticeable improvement in real world tests:

OC'd 8800GT vs 8800Ultra (lets imagine it's an OC'd GTX)

8800GT gives 92% of the performance of the Ultra, on average according to averaged fps on tom's hardware. It's is commonly understood you about a 10% performance improvement before any real world improvement in performance is perceived.

I'd say that makes the 8800GT pretty close to Nvidia's high end stuff. Lets not be making the suggestion the 8800GT is 'only mid-range' and 'still whoops ATI'. Lets keep it to single GPU cards for a fair comparison. The 3870 was released 6 months ago and still holds a respectable score against Nvidias latest 9800GTX single core solution top end card. Not to mention it's half the price now.
It's also going to be ATI's turn to release the next set of cards I suspect. Nvidia have been lazy with the 9800 series and are resting on their laurels.

This is from someone running an 8800GT...I'm no fanboy.

I can see what you have posted but those figures are very distorted.

Running at lower resolution with nothing turned up, the 8800GT does offer good performance vs the cards higher in the range.
Once the AA/AF are tuned up and the resolutions are higher, the 8800GT doesnt live with any of those 3 cards and the differences become alot more apparent.

The 8800GTS pulls away from it and the GTX moves away from the GTS.
TomsHardware isnt a good place to get facts. It never has been.

Lastly, your point about the 3870 still holing its own against the 9800GTX isnt realy valid.
The 9800GTX is just an overclocked 8800GTS. So, with that in mind its not suprising that its not that far behind the GTX in a few benchmarks.

Take a look at the 9800GTX review Hexus have done. It makes for an upsetting read if you paid £200+ for a 9800GTX

[this_is_gav]

Take a look at the 9800GTX review Hexus have done. It makes for an upsetting read if you paid £200+ for a 9800GTX

The problem with the Hexus reviews, and it's been this way for a while now, is that they only ever test the card(s) in focus with the latest drivers in group tests, while those cards they're comparing to are using much older drivers. I realise it would be difficult, costly and impractical to have a stock of review samples lying around to test and retest, but a lot of the conclusions end up very distorted as a result.

[shaithis]

No review is going to be perfect and (IMO at least) none ever offer you the exact test(s) you would love to see but if you read a number of them and zoom in on the tests that are most relevant to you, then you will get a good idea of how the card will perform for you.

One thing that is clear to me when looking around is exactly what Blitzen is saying, high resolutions and FSAA and you really start to notice the difference between the cards, lower resolutions will just be CPU-limited, you need to ramp those resolutions and AA features up to see how the card performs when asked to really work hard.

[Blitzen]

Yep....
At anything over 20", the 3850/3870/ and to some extent 8800GT start to labour.
The 8800GT copes with the AA/AF far better than the ATI cards though.

Baring in mind, this is gaming.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

With regards to performance without AA/AF I think that with the newer drivers the HD3870 is far more competitive with the 8800GT then at the beginning.

[cptwhite_uk]

I think we can all agree on one thing though, this competition and pricing war is nothing but good for all of us

A HD3870 or 8800GT for £110 and £125 respectively is a fantastic price whichever way you go...

[AndrewJ]

Price wars are always a good thing, well done ATi.

[Pob255]

Price wars are always a good thing, well done ATi.

Price wars are only good while both manufactors survive, if AMD/ATi go under or in the current more likely cases would be withdraw from high end gameing to focus on other areas then all we'll be left with is nvidia and you know they''ll put the prices up and scale back performance increases.
So it'll be bad for us in the long run.

Ideally we could do with a 3rd or 4th manufactor.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Ideally we could do with a 3rd or 4th manufactor.

S3, anyone???

[this_is_gav]

Erm, can you say Larrabee?

Though to be fair, I don't think anyone expects Intel to walk straight in and start pushing ATi and NV in any market segment other than the one they already have (which ATi are steadily eating into). Their drivers are notoriously bad (a lot better now), so even before we get to hardware things are going to have to improve a hell of a lot.