Board analysis

Before we go further, it’s important to note that 0.11-micron is TSMC’s value/mainstream manufacturing process, it doesn’t provide performance-enhancing extras such as low-k dielectric. As a result, both of ATI’s R430 cards, the RADEON X800 and RADEON X800 XL are clocked at 400MHz. This pales in comparison to the 500MHz+ clocks of ATI’s high-end 0.13-micron parts, but remember, ATI’s X700 XT, which was also produced on TSMC’s 0.11-micron process, was apparently never able to yield well at the 475MHz clock frequency ATI was shooting for -- and it was only an 8 pipeline part.

You can see the power connector required for the X800 XT (top)

The X800 XL card

With a core clock frequency of 400MHz, the RADEON X800 XL runs 50MHz faster than the GeForce 6800 GT, and sports the same 500MHz (1.0GHz effective) GDDR3 memory, giving the X800 XL a fill rate advantage and the same memory bandwidth figure of 32GB/sec. Of course, NVIDIA would argue that they have the advantage of SLI capability as well as shader model 3.0, but ATI counters by offering the RADEON X800 XL for $100 less than the GeForce 6800 GT, with an MSRP of only $300. And don’t forget that ATI has demonstrated equal footing against NVIDIA with shader model 2.0b in Far Cry.

Feature Comparison
GPU	Core Clock (MHz)	Memory Clock (MHz)	Pixel Pipelines	Peak fill rate (Mtexels/sec)	Peak Memory Bandwidth (GB/sec)	MSRP
GeForce 6800 GT	350	500	16	5600	32	$399
GeForce 6800	325	350	12	3900	22.4	$299
GeForce 6600 GT	500	500	8	4000	16	$199
RADEON X800 XL	400	500	16	6400	32	$299
RADEON X800	400	350	12	4800	22.4	$199

Familiar board design

Besides the price cut, one additional change ATI has made since the original R480/R430 announcement is the reference cooler used: it’s the same cooler ATI used previously on their RADEON X800 cards! Therefore, if you’ve seen an R423 card (especially one based on the X800 PRO), R430 should look pretty familiar to you.

Top of the card

Bottom of the X800 XL card

Taking a look at the X800 XL next to an RADEON X800 XT PCI-E, you’ll see both board designs are practically identical. Like the PCI Express X800 PRO, X800 XL doesn’t require an external power connection, the PCI-E interface supplies all the power the card needs. ATI made a few minor changes with the X800 XL’s power circuitry, but the changes are nothing major.

In operation, the RADEON X800 XL runs quietly and due to its 400MHz clock speed, it doesn’t generate a lot of heat. Because of this, we’re actually a little surprised ATI decided to go with the more expensive copper setup on their final X800 XL boards. Our guess is that ATI will stick with the original aluminum heatsink/fan unit ATI depicted a few weeks ago for the vanilla RADEON X800, but perhaps they’ll surprise us? We’ll see.

In any case, the X800 XL would run great inside a small form factor system, or any other application where space/heat is an issue. Hopefully ATI’s multimedia unit is taking a serious look at this card. Could you imagine how sweet an ALL-IN-WONDER X800 XL would be inside a SFF box?!