AMD-ATI Ships Radeon 2900 XT With 1GB Memory 132
MojoKid writes "Prior to AMD-ATI's Radeon HD 2000 series introduction, rumors circulated regarding an ultra-high clocked ATI R600-based card, that featured a large 1GB frame buffer. Some even went so far as to say the GPU would be clocked near 1GHz. When the R600 arrived in the form of the Radeon HD 2900 XT, it was outfitted with 'only' 512MB of frame buffer memory and its GPU and memory clock speeds didn't come close to the numbers in those early rumors. Some of AMD's partners, however, have since decided to introduce R600-based products that do feature 1GB frame buffers, like the Diamond Viper HD 2900 XT 1GB in both single-card and CrossFire configurations. At 2GHz DDR, the memory on the card is also clocked higher than AMD's reference designs but the GPU remains clocked at 742MHz"
Considering 32-bit OSes are still mainstream.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Wow! Now that 4GB of main system memory I installed has been pared back down to a more manageable 2GB!
WHEE!
Until 64-bit becomes more mainstream, cards like this will only become more and more detrimental to the systems they're installed in.
Useless! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Considering 32-bit OSes are still mainstream.. (Score:2, Insightful)
Oh wait. You meant Windows. Sorry, I do apologize
This is probably redundant but.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Notice how some of the newer games see less performance degradation on some of the 640MB nVidia cards than equivallently clocked 320MB versions of the same card.
Possible to be used as system RAM? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:I'm not feeding the trolls... (Score:1, Insightful)
And AFAICS, the statement that "ATI's hardware is better it's just the drivers that let them down" sounds pretty unsubstantiated and unprovable, and more than just a little bit fanboyish...
Re:Useless! (Score:3, Insightful)
With an 8800GTS/320, myself, and most all review sites, struggle to stay above 60FPS in 1024x768 at times with all the eyecandy on.
But is it? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:But... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Considering 32-bit OSes are still mainstream.. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Considering 32-bit OSes are still mainstream.. (Score:3, Insightful)
This is where open source trumps closed source, hands down.
In the majority of cases, having an open source 32-bit driver, almost automatically implies having a 64-bit driver. It's just a recompile. Yes, a lot of the time there will be bugs, but since developers are usually on "higher end" 64-bit systems, those bugs are usually fixed quickly.
I'm running 64-bit Debian, and have never had a problem with drivers. My video card, sound card, firewire card, USB devices, network cards and printer all work perfectly. Much better than they would under 64-bit Windows. Same thing with software: if it's available for 32-bit Debian, it's most likely available for 64-bit Debian.
Hardware manufacturers have no motivation at all to release 64-bit drivers for anything but the newest hardware. If you want 64-bit drivers, you pay for a new piece of hardware, or you're screwed.
By all means, use whatever OS you like. But don't try telling people there's a 64-bit driver problem on Linux. The 64-bit Linux world is in *much* better shape than Windows in that respect.
Re:Useless! (Score:3, Insightful)