Ati Radeon Hd 2600 Xt 256mb

At $150, ATI'due south new Radeon Hard disk drive 2600 XT graphics bill of fare comes $25 to $50 under Nvidia'due south competing Nvidia GeForce 8600 GTS cards. Simply before we give out whatsoever good deal awards, we need to note that we observe the 3D performance of both new cards disappointing, fifty-fifty considering their mainstream ambitions. The simply affair ATI'southward new card truly excels at is decoding HD video, but so so does Nvidia's card (specially after a recent driver update). Nosotros're certainly glad that Hd video enthusiasts have a broad diverseness of options, only midrange gamers tin get much more bang for the buck with an older 3D carte while they look for more than next-gen games to come up out, and more powerful midrange graphics cards to play them on.

Unlike Nvidia, ATI has a very fragmented lineup with its new Radeon HD 2000 series. Afterwards the Radeon HD 2600 XT, the next bound from ATI is the $400 "http:="" reviews.cnet.com="" graphics-cards="" ati-radeon-hd-2900="" 4505-8902_7-32445399.html"="">Radeon HD 2900 XT. That leaves GeForce 8800 GTS cards with no true competitor at the $250 to $300 price level. That also ways that if y'all take a particular loyalty, ATI has left y'all fewer options with this new generation of Radeons. We suspect Nvidia may become a lot of business organisation in that high midrange/low high-finish market segment as a result.

For the Radeon Hard disk drive 2600 XT, its basics compare favorably to Nvidia's GeForce 8600 GT and GTS. Like its Nvidia competitors, most boxed versions of ATI's new menu volition come with 256MB of DDR3 SDRAM. Yous may see DDR4, or even DDR2 versions besides as pricier models with 512MB of RAM. In addition to the memory type and amount, the various retail models of the card will vary by cadre and memory clock speeds as well. Our stock model came with an 800 MHz clock on the core, the retentiveness, and the shader pipeline, and then whatever boxed card with a higher clock speed on whatever one of those parts should do good with faster 3D functioning.

We'd encourage y'all to look for any performance boost, besides, considering the Radeon Hard disk 2600 XT'south stock 3D scores. As usual, GameSpot'due south Sarju Shah came through for us with the benchmark scores, both for us and for GameSpot's own summertime graphics carte du jour roundup, which we recommend you cheque out. For this card in particular, unless you're a dedicated Company of Heroes fan, you can get better overall 3D functioning from Nvidia's GeForce 8600 GTS (which yet isn't nifty), or any of a number of cards from the previous generation, if you don't mind losing out on DirectX x capability, and if can withal find them in stock. And considering those next-gen DirectX 10 games aren't actually that impressive nonetheless, nosotros don't consider losing out on DirectX 10 a major loss today. And by the fourth dimension more next-gen PC games come out that really use it well, y'all'll likely have another generation of 3D cards to choose from.

3DMark 2006
(Longer bars point better performance)

1,280x1,024

ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT

iv,963

'Quake 4'
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

1,600x1,200, 2x antialiasing, 8x anisotropic filtering, high quality

'Company of Heroes'
(Longer bars signal better operation)

1,280x1,024, 2x antialiasing, 8x anisotropic filtering, loftier quality

'Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl'
(Longer bars signal better operation)

i,280x1,024, 8x anisotropic filtering, medium quality

'The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion'
(Longer confined indicate better operation)

i,280x1,024 2x antialiasing, 8x anisotropic filtering, high quality

With the ugly 3D performance truth out of the style, we can focus on HD video, where the Radeon Hard disk 2600 XT actually shines. For raw image quality, ATI's new chip fares just likewise every bit Nvidia's GeForce 8600 GTS, which is to say, it's excellent. If you lot're a complete videophile, y'all'll still notice a defended player to be your all-time bet, but for most of us, the video output from these cards is completely acceptable.

ATI likewise has a leg up every bit far every bit convenient installation in that information technology requires no internal cable connections to the other parts of your PC. Thanks to an onboard audio chip, if you lot use ATI'due south included DVI-to-HDMI adapter to connect your PC to your goggle box, you lot can too send the sound from your PC out through that same connection. Nvidia's menu can almost do the same thing, but because information technology lacks a congenital-in sound bit, it requires an additional internal connection to route the audio signal over the HDMI cable. The Radeon 2600 XT as well doesn't require a direct connexion to your PC's power supply. The GeForce 8600 GTS does.

Every bit far as power requirements, the two cards are equal. Both vendors recommend a 400-watt power supply in your PC. That means a lot of off-the-shelf, budget-class desktops won't exist able to handle them with their 300-watt stock PSUs. So again, few of those systems accept an Hard disk optical drive, which leaves petty justification for picking up one of these cards in the first place.

Finally, we take to admit that while ATI'southward Vista drivers handle Goggle box connections very well, Nvidia has also gained ground in this area, thanks to a contempo driver update. Nvidia'due south cards used to overscan the Windows Vista desktop when you connected your PC to a wide-screen television. Now that Nvidia has solved that effect, ATI can no longer claim superiority in terms of its overall video compatibility. Still, the Radeon 2600 XT's ease-of-installation superiority volition likely win it some fans among abode theater PC enthusiasts.

Discover out more about how we test desktop systems.

Score Breakdown

Pattern 8 Features 8 Operation 5

Ati Radeon Hd 2600 Xt 256mb,

Source: https://www.cnet.com/reviews/ati-radeon-hd-2600-xt-review/

Posted by: forsmanmoren1988.blogspot.com

Share this post