Introducing the Radeon X1650 XT: A New Mainstream GPU from ATI
by Josh Venning on October 30, 2006 6:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Final Words
We mentioned in the intro that ATI seems to be having some problems with paper launching cards and not having parts available to consumers at their suggested price (e.g. the X1950 Pro). The X1950 Pro is a good competitor to NVIDIA's 7900 GS, but we advise potential buyers to stay away from this card if it's over $220. Just pay very close attention to the price when buying one of these cards and you should be alright. We also want to reiterate that the X1900 GT is no longer the same card so stay away from it. Again, it's just poor on ATI's part to bump down the clock speed of a card that has already been on shelves for a while now, without bothering to change its name in order for consumers to distinguish it from its faster predecessor. This is a move that is sure to confuse and frustrate consumers.
The performance of the X1650 XT is just what you would expect from a mainstream graphics card of this type. With the 7600 GT being on the market for so long without any competition from ATI, the X1650 XT was overdue. With the release of this card, we now see performance from ATI that is very similar to the popular 7600 GT. This card handles a wide variety of games with ease at flexible resolutions. It still has trouble running some of the games at 1600x1200 and above, but getting smooth frame rates at 1280x1024 in nearly all the games we tested is a nice achievement in a card projected to be in the <$150 price range. Those with 1280x1024 monitors can easily shun more expensive GPUs without sacrificing that much in the way of gaming enjoyment.
With regards to the issue of the card's price, because of what we are seeing with the X1950 Pro, we can't be sure of what the X1650 XT will sell for once it actually becomes available. Perhaps the fact that this is a paper launch (as opposed to the X1950 Pro's hard launch) will mean prices will be closer to ATI's mark when the X1650 XT finally hits the market. Unfortunately, one current indicator is in a price we saw on an X1650 XT from Gigabyte, available for pre-order at $200. This might be a feasible target for some vendors when they start hitting shelves, but it still wouldn't be a good price for consumers, as it's not quite as fast as other cards currently in the $200 price range. The X1650 XT only really shines when pitted against the 7600 GT at $150.
All said the Radeon X1650 XT looks to be a good option for a lower-midrange card, depending on what it will sell for. We think this will be a decent buy if it makes it out in November at its projected $150 price tag, but honestly we aren't getting our hopes up too high about this happening. As it gets closer to the holidays, we will hopefully see some deals on this card and others, but right now there's really no point in waiting to fork over the money for this card instead of the 7600 GT. A 7600 GT can currently be found for under $140, with mail-in rebates dropping some prices to under $120, which makes it pretty much a no-brainer as to which one to go with.
We are definitely interested to see what direction ATI is headed in now that AMD appears to be at the helm. Hopefully this paper launch will be only a one-time slip on ATI's way to providing consumers with products the day of launch in much the same way NVIDIA does. There's never much debate that ATI consistently provides quality products to computer users; we would just like to see the kind of competitive prices and hard launches with their products that we see from NVIDIA.
We mentioned in the intro that ATI seems to be having some problems with paper launching cards and not having parts available to consumers at their suggested price (e.g. the X1950 Pro). The X1950 Pro is a good competitor to NVIDIA's 7900 GS, but we advise potential buyers to stay away from this card if it's over $220. Just pay very close attention to the price when buying one of these cards and you should be alright. We also want to reiterate that the X1900 GT is no longer the same card so stay away from it. Again, it's just poor on ATI's part to bump down the clock speed of a card that has already been on shelves for a while now, without bothering to change its name in order for consumers to distinguish it from its faster predecessor. This is a move that is sure to confuse and frustrate consumers.
The performance of the X1650 XT is just what you would expect from a mainstream graphics card of this type. With the 7600 GT being on the market for so long without any competition from ATI, the X1650 XT was overdue. With the release of this card, we now see performance from ATI that is very similar to the popular 7600 GT. This card handles a wide variety of games with ease at flexible resolutions. It still has trouble running some of the games at 1600x1200 and above, but getting smooth frame rates at 1280x1024 in nearly all the games we tested is a nice achievement in a card projected to be in the <$150 price range. Those with 1280x1024 monitors can easily shun more expensive GPUs without sacrificing that much in the way of gaming enjoyment.
With regards to the issue of the card's price, because of what we are seeing with the X1950 Pro, we can't be sure of what the X1650 XT will sell for once it actually becomes available. Perhaps the fact that this is a paper launch (as opposed to the X1950 Pro's hard launch) will mean prices will be closer to ATI's mark when the X1650 XT finally hits the market. Unfortunately, one current indicator is in a price we saw on an X1650 XT from Gigabyte, available for pre-order at $200. This might be a feasible target for some vendors when they start hitting shelves, but it still wouldn't be a good price for consumers, as it's not quite as fast as other cards currently in the $200 price range. The X1650 XT only really shines when pitted against the 7600 GT at $150.
All said the Radeon X1650 XT looks to be a good option for a lower-midrange card, depending on what it will sell for. We think this will be a decent buy if it makes it out in November at its projected $150 price tag, but honestly we aren't getting our hopes up too high about this happening. As it gets closer to the holidays, we will hopefully see some deals on this card and others, but right now there's really no point in waiting to fork over the money for this card instead of the 7600 GT. A 7600 GT can currently be found for under $140, with mail-in rebates dropping some prices to under $120, which makes it pretty much a no-brainer as to which one to go with.
We are definitely interested to see what direction ATI is headed in now that AMD appears to be at the helm. Hopefully this paper launch will be only a one-time slip on ATI's way to providing consumers with products the day of launch in much the same way NVIDIA does. There's never much debate that ATI consistently provides quality products to computer users; we would just like to see the kind of competitive prices and hard launches with their products that we see from NVIDIA.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
33 Comments
View All Comments
cornfedone - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
If people stop buying over-priced, over-hyped graphics cards the prices will come down. If people stop pre-ordering paper launched video, mobo, and other PC products, the prices will come down. As long as consumers act stupid and spend money like a drunken sailor then they will be exploited by unscrupulous companies.yacoub - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
This will not change until after the recession/crash, possible depression, that is coming soon.Niv KA - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
There is a quote I remember, but I don't know from who or the exact quote itselfI'm not sure if it was 80% or the quote was structured that way, I just remember hearing it somewhere... not reading, hearing, from someone important, but I forgot who!
yacoub - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
Funny having to go to the Crossfire graphs to see how the 7900GT (non SLI) performs compared to it. The end result: Another budget card that seems rather pointless these days when anyone spending $200 on a GPU should be getting something that can at least play these games that are two years old without having to sacrifice framerates so much. Come on now...Spoelie - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
x1650pro still is competition for 7600gs. x1950pro in europe has an okay price (lowest around €180), but availability a bit tight. 7600gt sli benches missing from battlefield graph!viperboy2025 - Tuesday, October 31, 2006 - link
Anandtech are on crack or something, or they woke up on the bad ATI side in the morning cause they kept bashing them for around 3 or more pages about the price of x1950 pro nto being the said $200 but being $300. I've actually bought one for $205 yesterday recently and there are other ones selling at similar price...$203.99 - (from zipzoomflt.com actually went down by $1 from when i bought it 2 days ago)...Sapphire RADEON X1950 PRO 256MB PCI-Express Dual-DVI, HDTV-Out Retail FREE SHIPPING
$199.99 - (from zipzoomfly..currently out of stock though) Asus EAX1950PRO/HTDP/256M Radeon X1950 Pro 256MB PCI-Express Dual-DVI, HDTV-Out Retail ***Free Shipping***
$199.99 - also from zipzoomfly are x1950 pro from makers of Connect3D and Diamond Viper - (this one is actually higher core clocked to 600MHz rather than 575)
Only cards on zipzoomfly that are over $200 are one from Gigabyte which is $229.99 but its out of stock so its useless anyways considering there are many others to choose from. There is also one manufactured by ATI themselves but who would buy that considering its at stock speeds and $279.99, $80 above all those other cards...
Newegg also has the saphire card at $199.99 plus shipping, and it also offers the ATI version at a ridicously overpriced price which is stupid for anyone to go for considering you can get the same card, higher clocked from a different manufacturer for $80 less and shouldn't be taken seriously by anandtech enough to bash ATI for 3-4 pages about all their 1950 pro cards being close to $300 and not near $200 as they promised. Since only one version of that card is offered at an insane inflated price.
The $200 dollar saphire is also available from pcconnection.com
viperboy2025 - Tuesday, October 31, 2006 - link
i know this was a 1650xt pro review but to add another thing anandtech keeps commenting about is that, the x1950 pro is competitive (actually they do they its also better) than the nvidia 7900 GS given their similar price similarity but if you looked at the performance charts some reviews ago about the x1950 pro it is actually very competitive with the 7900GT as a single card solution and they are nearly the same, but the GT costs $300 so in other words ATI owned 7900GT and the lower end 7900GS variant which is so outperformed that it shouldn't even be mentioned, unless you are going to SLi route which is the only thing that helps nvidia cards scale better against ATI crossfire, NVIDIA lost that battle. But one thing to keep in mind is SLI motherboards are way more expansive than single pci-e solution cards, so if you have a big purse, you should be looking for a more powerful card anyways if you haven't gotten one already, also SLI is not really a worth it (value) solution since it would require you to dish out about $400 for 2 7900GS cards or $550-600 for 2 7900GT cards, if you have that kind of money you should be buying a more powerfulful and mroe high-end card anyways, as most review sites will tell you if money allows, always go for a more powerful card rather than doing SLI/crossfire, since those are only options for future upgrades if you are running low on graphics power rather than being a real/viable current graphics solution. (eg the nvidia $500 7950GX2 SLI on 1 card is a better solution than 2 7900GT cards, and you don't even need an SLI mobo for it since it uses one PCI-e lane)kalrith - Tuesday, October 31, 2006 - link
The 7900GT hasn't cost $300 in quite some time. At ZZF you can get it for either http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?Pr...">$200 after a $20 MIR or http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?Pr...">$190 after a $40 MIR. The $200 one is overclocked from 470/1.37GHz to 500/1.5GHz, which might be enough to put the 7900GT in the lead over the X1950PRO.Either way, both are good cards, and both are the same price. I just wanted to clear things up and say that the following statement is false: "the GT costs $300 so in other words ATI owned 7900GT".
viperboy2025 - Friday, November 3, 2006 - link
btw i got my new ATI card saphire x1950 pro and its great....it comes clocked at (core/memory) 581 MHz/701MHz (x2=1402 Mhz effective memory) which is faster than the 7900GT. I also easily got the ATI card to overlock to 621Mhz/781 x2 = 1562 Mhz effective, which makes this card incredibly fast...if you wanted to get a graphx card that will last you a good two years for games or more look no further, it even comes at a great price of only $200.JarredWalton - Monday, October 30, 2006 - link
BF2 7600 GT SLI performance is now added to the top graph. It was in the scaling graph but somehow left out of the 1600x1200-only chart.