Jam wrote on 2020-06-24, 23:03:

I've got quite a few cards based on the R200 core. People will often tell you that the Radeon 9000/92x0 cards are close the 8500LE or 8500, and that the 9100 is spot on. Something you'll want to keep in mind is memory bandwidth. My 64-bit 128MB Radeon 9250s are dwarfed by not only my Radeon 8500, but also the weaker brother, AIW 8500DV. The 8500 scores almost 12,000 3DMarks in 2001SE while paired with an overkill Pentium E5700 running at stock clocks. With the same system, a 9200 scores barely over 5,100 3DMarks. All of these cards are based on R200 core. The 9000/92x0 cards are a little cut down but with the full 128-bit bandwidth they're only ~1000-2000pts behind. Much better. Keep this in mind for sure. Screenshot_16.png

I don't think you will get any disagreement from anyone here that a 128-bit bus is better than a 64-bit one . What I'm curious about is how much of a cost advantage it was for a manufacturer to put fewer higher density RAM chips for a 64-bit DDR SDRAM-based 128MB card versus more lower density RAM chips for a 128-bit DDR SDRAM-based 128MB card .

darry wrote on 2020-06-24, 23:24:

I don't think you will get any disagreement from anyone here that a 128-bit bus is better than a 64-bit one . What I'm curious about is how much of a cost advantage it was for a manufacturer to put fewer higher density RAM chips for a 64-bit DDR SDRAM-based 128MB card versus more lower density RAM chips for a 128-bit DDR SDRAM-based 128MB card .

I should have been more specific. My point was, the 64-bit cards are extremely common and of course fall under the same name. It's easy to get confused if you're a beginner and the difference is huge. So a 9000/9200 can be a whole lot worse than you'd expect. 128-bit is the way to go for sure, but we all knew that.

Jam wrote on 2020-06-24, 23:38:

darry wrote on 2020-06-24, 23:24:

I don't think you will get any disagreement from anyone here that a 128-bit bus is better than a 64-bit one . What I'm curious about is how much of a cost advantage it was for a manufacturer to put fewer higher density RAM chips for a 64-bit DDR SDRAM-based 128MB card versus more lower density RAM chips for a 128-bit DDR SDRAM-based 128MB card .

I should have been more specific. My point was, the 64-bit cards are extremely common and of course fall under the same name. It's easy to get confused if you're a beginner and the difference is huge. So a 9000/9200 can be a whole lot worse than you'd expect. 128-bit is the way to go for sure, but we all knew that.

I understand your point and agree completely. My impression is that manufacturers compromised heavily on performance for very little financial incentive .

Yeah, I remember picking up an 8500LE at Comp USA and it was a great value especially once overclocked and this was my first real kind of side-grade from a mx400, which the gf4 mx series was a tricky for the same reasons, if you got the wrong one you got a slow card. I dislike sneaky marketing like that.

zPacKRat wrote on 2020-06-25, 02:06:

Yeah, I remember picking up an 8500LE at Comp USA and it was a great value especially once overclocked and this was my first real kind of side-grade from a mx400, which the gf4 mx series was a tricky for the same reasons, if you got the wrong one you got a slow card. I dislike sneaky marketing like that.

for sure, my 64bit MX440s really aren't good cards at all. Memory Bandwidth should have been pictured on boxes back then in all honesty- but that would have lost sales.