Geforce 5900 Ultra 256MB: A Good Choice for Gaming?

[dav2008]

Anyone have this Vid Card? Any comments on it?

 

[grady]

CPU magazine has an article on it this month. I know it has new capabilities ( not just speed and RAM ). From what I've read about Doom 3, I think you'll be able to play that game on the FX. However you never know, Doom 3 will have an opengl 2.0 render path, and though it seems obvious enough considering ATI claims the Radeon 9900 or whatever is GL2.0 compliant I haven't read anything that explicitly says the FX series is fully GL 2.0 ready. There might be another release of vid cards before doom 3 comes out.

Aside from anticipating doom 3 and all of the games that will try to compete with it, you don't need an FX to run other games, not even the ones that will come out in the distant future, the ID people try to push the envelope. you remember when quake 3 came out? could anyone play that game with reasonable graphics settings? That combined with the fact that the FX 5900 256MB card is $500, it takes 2 card slots because of the huge fan, and it is as loud as a motorcycle, I'd say don't get the FX 5900 unless you are developing 3D apps yourself.

 

[dav2008]

So are you saying that if I don't have the ATI 9900 I won't be able to play any games in Opengl 2?

(any idea when its coming out btw?)

 

[grady]

Its the 9800 sorry about that. It's already out, but gl 2 isn't done yet, I've just seen ATI claiming it will work with gl 2. I would defininetly not get ATI though, NVIDIA has much better drivers. GL 2 should be out by spring at least I would think; you can keep up with that on opengl.org. When gl 2 comes out, nvidia and ati will both have cards for it for sure.

 

[russ_watters]

If Doom3 required a Gf FX 5900 or better to play it, ID Games would be disqualifying about 99.99% of their potential customers right off the bat.

It won't.

 

[grady]

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1821 if you go to the little pull down menu at the bottom of this article "review index" its called, you can go to page 20 or so and see how the fx 5900 does with doom 3. I don't think its too good. It says you get 53 fps with AA turned on and medium graphics settings.

 

[Falle]

FX 5900Ultra 256

grady you are way off!

"it takes 2 card slots because of the huge fan, and it is as
loud as a motorcycle" ?

Have you seen or heard a FX 5900Ultra 256?

MSI have gone with a custom built GPU HSF for their FX5900U-VTD256 Ultra and thankfully it's a single slot solution.
The GPU TwinFlow cooling system produced very little noise under power - and would not be audible outside of the case. According to the manufacturer, the actual noise level has been measured at 26dB,

Taken from:
http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1438&page=3

1.it takes only 1 Slot
2.it has dubble fan going in slow rpm >25db!

what motorcykle have you? My hd sounds more than my FX5900 Ultra 256
And about doom3 atleast 4 now FX 5900 is fastest
http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NDc0LDI=

I am very satisfied whit my FX5900 Ultra.
I don´t say its better than Ati, but I am a Nvidiot! ;)
and have had friedns having problems whit drivers and stuff on Ati

And 4 you wondering if the FX5900 Ultra 256 is fast!
It plays UT2003 1280x1024/32 Max in everyting 8xAA 8xAniscopic
(16 bots Max) Whit a P4 2,8@3,5 1024Ram, just like a dream :)

Howewer iam a bit worried about the poorly Dx9 suport
/sorry 4 my bad English

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by Falle
Howewer iam a bit worried about the poorly Dx9 suport

That's a big concern, but again, we'll just have to wait and see (just like with GL2.0/D3 and existing cards). But like I said before, new games are not going to be made to run only on the top 0.01% of video cards. There will be backwards compatibility for quite a while. So even if Nvidia's cards have trouble with DX9, they'll be ok playing the games in DX8. That's not to say it will be easy or work real well - have you read anything about Valve's trials and tribulations in getting Half Life 2 to run on a Geforce?

And btw, welcome to PF and your English is fine.

 

[grady]

Originally posted by Falle
grady you are way off!

MSI have gone with a custom built GPU HSF for their FX5900U-VTD256 Ultra and thankfully it's a single slot solution.

Copying and pasting the phrase "thankfully it's a single slot solution" directly from the article you linked to might have tipped you off that prior to the release of your card, there were cards that were not "single slot solutions", but it did not tip you off. I posted that on July 18, 4 months ago.

Howewer iam a bit worried about the poorly Dx9 suport

Don't worry. I won't tell you why because you'll come back in a year to contradict me about something with direct3d 10, but nevertheless, don't worry.

 

[Falle]

FX 5900Ultra 256

Im sorry grady i didn´t pay attention when you wrote the post!
I just thought you didn´t know there was a "noiseless" single slot solution on the 256 Ultra, didn´t mean to contradict you!

I have only seen the noisy 128 vers taking 2 slots.
Never seen the 256 Ultra in a 2 slot solution.

And beleve me a did spend some time finding out all about the Fx5900 256 Ultra, before i decided to by it. ;)

I had a very hard time to decide if i would buy Nvidia or Ati.
But i really Dont think it matter, Prices are the same and the difference are small.
Atleast 4 now!