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Radeon x800 XL, XL? You know I'm still reluctant to figure out what exactly the XL stands for: Extra Large, Extra Long... what ? But I'm sure that I'll receive an email from an ATI contact soon that will explain that in flying red colors :) Anyway, before we dive into the technological stuff I have to state this. This article might look similar to previous Radeon articles. Why? Well, ever since the release of Radeon 9700 in the most simplistic view nothing really groundbreaking has changed besides the paradoxal effect called performance.
Frame Buffer 256 MB 256 MB 256 MB 256 MB 256 MB 256 MB 256 MB 256 MB 256 MBCore Freq 425 MHz 475 MHz 475 MHz 400 MHz 500 MHz 500 MHz 520 MHz 520 MHz 540 MHzMemory Freq 433 MHz 525 MHz 450 MHz 500 MHz 500 MHz 500 MHz 560 MHz 540 MHz 590 MHzMemory Controller 128 bit 128 bit 256 bit 256 bit 256 bit 256 bit 256 bit 256 bit 256 bitMemory type GDDR3 GDDR3 GDDR3 GDDR3 GDDR3 GDDR3 GDDR3 GDDR3 GDDR3DirectX 9.0 9.0 9.0 9.0 9.0 9.0 9.0 9.0 9.0Vertex Shaders 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0 2.0Pixel Shaders 2.0b 2.0b 2.0b 2.0b 2.0b 2.0b 2.0b 2.0b 2.0bVertex Shader Pipes 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6Pixel Shader Pipes 8 8 12 16 16 16 16 16 16Extra Power-connector - - Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes YesChip - Transistors 120 mln 120 mln 160 mln 160 mln 160 mln 160 mln 160 mln 160 mln 160 mlnChip - Fab Process 110 nm 110 nm 130 nm 110 nm 130 nm 130 nm 130 nm 130 nm 130 nm
Type Radeon X700 Pro Radeon X700 XT Radeon X800 Pro Radeon X800 XL Radeon X800 XT Radeon X800 XT Radeon X800 XT Platinum Edition Radeon X850 XT Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition codename RV410 RV410 R420 R430 R420 R423 R423 R480 R480 Interface PCI-Express x16 PCI-Express x16 AGP PCI-Express x16 AGP PCI-Express x16 AGP/PCI-Express x16 PCI-Express x16 PCI-Express x16
Right then, the Radeon x800 XL sits in-between the mid-range x700 series and the high-end x800XT/850XT range, therefore initially I expected it would have 12 pixel pipelines to compete directly with NVIDIA's 12-pipe GeForce 6800, I was wrong, it's actually a 16 pipeline product at the same price level. There will be a 12 pipe solution for sure, it's called x800.
So why is this 16 pixel pipelined puppy performance wise somewhat slower then the top of the line then? That can be found in two central factors. First off, the cheaper 0.11 micron build does not allow a significantly high core speed at this time. We are looking at 400 MHz where the 0.13 micron 850 XT PE manages 540 MHz. Secondly, somewhat cheaper memory was used. The XL is using 2x500 MHz and that XT PE uses 2x590 MHz. Looking a bit closer at that memory we notice that it's manufactured by Samsung and is rated 2ns. 1000:2ns is a 500 MHz nominal clockspeed.
Other then that there really is not much differentiation, feature wise, between the Radon lineup. So you see, this is a somewhat caged VPU (graphics core) that would like to do more then it is allowed to. Keep this in mind when we will show you the overclocking results. 3D Feature wise this new R430 part does not differ from the x800 series or x850, except from what we heard some Power Management features and Thermal Throttling capabilities. Nothing noteable though.
The boardFlashback. Yes it looks 100% similar to the "older" x800 Pro and XT doesn't it? Well, that's because it is the same, the PCB is similar to the x800 XT (PCX), yet you of course recognize it immediately by the similar active fan. What more does the eye catch? That's right, did you spot it already? No external PSU connector is needed. Apparently the chip does feeds itself from the mainboard and does not need additional power from the power supply.
Radeon x800 XL - 256Mb gDDR3 memory
Back to the fan, board partners of course can use they own cooling solutions. In that matter I'm looking forwards to the HIS review.
The last thing that we notice on this reference model is the fact that the card has two output connectors, one DVI and one CRT/VGA connector. In the middle we see the traditional video output connector, in this case the card was not equipped with the Rage Theater chip and thus does not have an optional video input through that same connector.
