By
twinky64, February 1, 2008
Anybody here know much in the way of video cards?
I just bought an ATI Radeon HD 3870 and from what I've read on advertisements, this card is supposed to have a memory clock of 2200MHz-2400MHz by Diamond Multimedia. I bought a Diamond 3870 (different box though - french and english text on the box) and my memory clock only allows me to go up to 1180MHz. Why is that?
Need a bit more info - what system / OS you running this thing on, ie. custom box or a one from a major retailer?. What are you using to report the core and memory speeds? - a 3rd party app or ATI's Catalyst software
As far as speeds - it depends on what yardstick, they use to measure the speed. There was some confusion comparing the GDDR3 to the GDDR4 memory clock speeds - basically, GDDR4 is reported at half its speed compared to the GDDR3 cores. No worries - the 3870 is spec'd at 1.12-1.2GHz on the AMD/ATI website. Basically some places are listing the "effective" clock speed. This is to make a direct comparison between the different cards running either GDDR4 or GDDR3 - they are trying to change it to a common yardstick, as many are confused as what is the correct memory clock speed.
I too have some several reviews that have the mem clock speeds at 2200 - 2400MHz, some have made corrections and brought them back to the spec 1.12-1.2GHz ratings - some have not.
I also am in the market for one of these badboys - already have a 8800 GTX for "work" related needs, but the 3870 should prove to be very competitive at a fraction of the cost - perfect for the detail rich, immersive games out there. Maybe by tax refund time - new system + new WS monitor (the big ones have been dropping in price like crazy - might have to upgrade to a 22"-30" one for grins now 
). Just have to decide what flavor of processor I want to run.
Need a bit more info - what system / OS you running this thing on, ie. custom box or a one from a major retailer?. What are you using to report the core and memory speeds? - a 3rd party app or ATI's Catalyst softwareI have been an AMD fan for a while now and an ATI fan ever since Voodoo was bought out by Nvidia for copying Nvidia's GeForce 3 chipset I believe. I've had way too many bad experiences (my own and of others) where Nvidia cards are so power hungry and so shabby on their cooling that the card actually overheated itself. A total of 5 experiences ranging from the 6000 series to the high end 7000 series. Ergo, I've lost respect for Nvidia. I remember just a couple years ago, that typically, ATI is a more expensive product than Nvidia. But I THINK that AMD and ATI are sharing profits; I dont know for sure their business partnership relationship. Therefore, products are less expensive.As far as speeds - it depends on what yardstick, they use to measure the speed. There was some confusion comparing the GDDR3 to the GDDR4 memory clock speeds - basically, GDDR4 is reported at half its speed compared to the GDDR3 cores. No worries - the 3870 is spec'd at 1.12-1.2GHz on the AMD/ATI website. Basically some places are listing the "effective" clock speed. This is to make a direct comparison between the different cards running either GDDR4 or GDDR3 - they are trying to change it to a common yardstick, as many are confused as what is the correct memory clock speed.
I too have some several reviews that have the mem clock speeds at 2200 - 2400MHz, some have made corrections and brought them back to the spec 1.12-1.2GHz ratings - some have not.
I also am in the market for one of these badboys - already have a 8800 GTX for "work" related needs, but the 3870 should prove to be very competitive at a fraction of the cost - perfect for the detail rich, immersive games out there. Maybe by tax refund time - new system + new WS monitor (the big ones have been dropping in price like crazy - might have to upgrade to a 22"-30" one for grins now
I built my own setup. Abit mobo AMD590chipset. Windows XP Prof. SP2. 2GB DDR2 800MHz ram. ATI Radeon HD 3870 512MB GDDR4.
verdict is still out on ATI's newer drives and how well they play with linux sadly. nvidia has much better linux support to date and seems to run opengl a tad faster as well.
i've had my best luck with nvidia products in terms of them working. my 6800Ultra is OC'd nicely on its stock cooler and performs adequately. i just got a pair of 7800GTX (both BFFG cards) to run in SLI for my summer build. i've got some other stuff picked out and not bought, and some things bought. when i've got it all put together i'll probably put up a thread for it 
it should be a nice machine, i do love watercooling and overclocking 
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