Originally Posted by Pookeyhead Not at the higher screen resolutions it doesnt.
Still a great card though! Fab review... very concise, well written, and a great help if you're in the market for a new card. The kind of review that makes you proud to be part of bit-tech.
I think that ATI tends to perform better at the higher resolutions, because the R580 chip has much better Hierarchical Z-buffer tuning for XHD resolutions. NVIDIA didn't tune the pre-rasterisation stage of Heirachical Z-buffer quite as well for the higher resolutions.
Basically, Heir Z-buffer tuning is about throwing away as many (unused) pixels as possible before rendering. Also, the chip designer has to ensure that the buffers are large enough and are accessed in the right way when it comes to drawing the pixels on screen.
Great review! It shows the dedication of you guys - there was a 'lul' over the last day or so, in terms of articles, but this proves you weren't slacking!
Hopefully the board manufacturers will stick to Arctic Cooling's solution too, as maybe a few will try and improve on it, but ultimately fail?
Originally Posted by Lazlow Great review! It shows the dedication of you guys - there was a 'lul' over the last day or so, in terms of articles, but this proves you weren't slacking!
I feel like death after writing this review. ;)
Quote:
Hopefully the board manufacturers will stick to Arctic Cooling's solution too, as maybe a few will try and improve on it, but ultimately fail?
Typically, most of ATI's partners just sell the card with the same heatsink/fan combination. I'm more interested in what HIS will do now, as it is famous for its IceQ coolers (made by Arctic Cooling, just like the one on the X1950XTX)... could be interesting times ahead in ATI board partner land.
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Basically, Heir Z-buffer tuning is about throwing away as many (unused) pixels as possible before rendering. Also, the chip designer has to ensure that the buffers are large enough and are accessed in the right way when it comes to drawing the pixels on screen.
That new cooler looks killer ! All red baby !
Hopefully the board manufacturers will stick to Arctic Cooling's solution too, as maybe a few will try and improve on it, but ultimately fail?
Fantastic Review! Cant wait to see them in CF.