Advantages: Fairly cheap, Good for older games
Disadvantages: Not very good for todays games or even some of yesterdays

...it ran terrible. To get a playable frame rate I had to turned everything to low, disable all options and put the res to a hideous 640x480. Anything higher and it was virtually unplayable. This causes me to give the card a low rating as it fails to deliver any sort of acceptable performance to games, its not even one of those cards for budget systems that only want to be used for older games, because the price tag of it is still £70-80 and you could pick up a faster ti 4200 for around £60. Better still wait that extra month and buy a XFX 5900 xt its the best 'bang for buck card' you can get now! Long story short, I simply cannot find a reason to recommend this hardware, because if you want a budget card there are so many other choices out there that are cheaper and better, like the ti 4200, and if moneys not such a problem... Read review

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Advantages: Very High Spec, Very Compatiable
Disadvantages: Highish price tag.

...Since purchasing my first PC over two years ago now, I have only ever owned one graphics card, the impressive-back-then-not-too-impressive-now Nvidia GeForce 3 Ti200. With its 128mb of ram and impressive specification it played games with no trouble from Grand Theft Auto 3 to Need For Speed Underground. With the release of DirectX 9.0c and many new games namely Doom 3, NFSU2 and the upcoming GTA San Andreas I decided to bite the bullet and get a new graphics card so I can continue my hardcore gaming habits with the releases of now and the furture. I initially went out for the impressive Radeon ATI 9800 but for some reason, probably due to the christmas season, these seemed to be unavailable everywhere. I was browsing at my local branch of Maplin Electronics I came across the uniquely packaged Nvidia Geforce 5900xt for the quite... Read review

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Advantages: Fast, Well-priced, Stable
Disadvantages: none

...Overview ***************** Today I will be reviewing the latest addition to my customized PC setup – MSI’s Geforce FX5900XT-VTD128 graphics card (bit of a mouthful, that one!) The board is manufactured by a company called MSI (Micro-star International) that many of you will have heard of. For those that haven’t, MSI are a massive computer electronics company, and manufacture all kinds of computer-related kit – from a vast range of motherboards and graphics cards, to optical drives such as CD and DVD readers/writers. My DVD writer is made by MSI – as is my motherboard (K7n420Pro, reviewed here on dooyoo). They make decent products at a decent price, and I am very happy with my purchases. This particular graphics card is built using NVIDIA’s Geforce FX5900XT chipset - more about that below… Chipset... Read review

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Advantages: cheap, can be modded, reliable, easy to install, quiet,
Disadvantages: old, none, still needs extra power connector, bulky cooling, only great performance once modded

...remains steady and true. Performance: Performance was again perfect for this card and inline with every expectations I had of it. It soundly beats an ATI 9600XT and the 5700ultra (stock) as expected. It clearly rules the roost in the mainstream middle enthusiast section of the market, whilst never threatening the 'big boys' such as the ATI 9800xt and 5950ultra. It does thorougly beat ATI's 9800se which was a direct response to the 5900LX/XT too. So, at it's current price the card is certainly pulling it's weight in terms of performance, and exceeds expectations compared to the similarly priced 9600XTs. However, when modded to the speeds of a 5950 ultra, this card performed within 4% consistently of it's £300 counterpart. This is where the performance excels becuase you get an expensive card's performance for much much less without... Read review

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Advantages: Good performance at a cheap price
Disadvantages: Only a bit cheaper than the 5900 xt

...of the card allow this, and the 5700 ultra on most games allows for a good performance. First of all the speeds of this card are greatly higher than the 5600, in fact have a look for yourself Whereas the XFX 5600 and Ti4200's Clock speeds(measured in MHZ - the faster the better) were 235 and 280 respectively, the 5700 Ultra clock core is 475 mhz, thats over twice the speed, and the memory clock in a whopping 900 mhz as opposed to the 5600's 345 average speed. But speed isnt everything, since cards clocked lower have better performance than the 5700 Ultra (5900xt for example). Now lets test the games out that I tested with my xfx 5600 in my XFX 5600 review here http://www.ciao.co.uk/XFXGeForceFX5600Review5415821 First I ran 'COMMAND AND CONQUER GENERALS' and the difference was instantanious. I was getting a totally... Read review

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Advantages: Very Fast for price
Disadvantages: Now surpased by the 5900XT

...As you can see from the image the box this product comes in is shaped like an X. I have yet to work out the reason for this but it sure does make an impact when you see it. If you have not heard of XFX they are a ocmponent manufacturer that work with AMD and Nvidia to create motherboards and graphics cards. Obviously this is one of their graphics cards and in future, I will definately look out for their name when searching for hardware. Now, onto the performance, if you know about Nvidia graphics cards then you will know that this is one of 3 of their mid range graphics cards, the 5600(Ultra), 5700(Ultra) and the 5900XT. Of these the 5700 Ultra is at the higher end of the midrange, although not as powerful as a 5900XT, although that will set you back an extra £30 or so. I actually used this in a system I built for a friend... Read review

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Advantages: Very, Very fast, Stunning Graphics, Very Reasonable in Price
Disadvantages: Can be heard when playing a game with no sound, can get quite hot

...for was the 5900XT, the top of the line one. But as you know the story does not end here. Just before I ordered it , it became apparent that the geforce 6600 was cheaper than the 5900XT. This seemed strange and I investigated. The low end 6600 is not as good as the 5900XT and hence the cheaper price tag, but the 6600GT was a far superior card, for roughly the same price as the 5900. So, obviously I changed my mind and bought this one. The card arrived in rapid and stylish fashion, with some great artwok on the box. The package is full of really useful bits and bobs like a composite video out adaptor for connecting to a TV, and also high definition outputs for the future. It also can have 2 monitors plugged into it at the same time, so you can have an extra wide screen or two idetical screens. All the bits you need to do this are included. The card... Read review

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Advantages: very cheap and good performance
Disadvantages: a bit old and only 128Mb

...MSI are one of the best computer component manufacturers in my opinion. I do prefer Gigabyte for motherboards out of sentimentality, but when it comes to graphics cards I either choose PNY (for their amazing after sales service) or, if it's performance I want, then I go for MSI. The MSI FX5900 was in my PC until very recently. I've now upgraded to a 6800 - also made by MSI. My husband has two PCI-express graphics cards in his machine - the height of performance and power, but not everyone has the ability to use PCI-express cards, myself included. For those of us with slightly older machines, AGP cards are the only really viable option. The MSI FX5900 is a nice graphics card. It fits into the AGP slot, which most computers made in the past few years should have. It has an absolutely massive heat sink and fan on it, and some smaller... Read review

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Advantages: Fast, great visual quality, 8 pixel pipelines, 256-bit memory bus, 256MB, great package, cheaper than most rivals, quiet and compact,
Disadvantages: Expensive, replaced by the x800xt, runs very hot, Overdrive is pointless

..., I still find it impossible to recommend this card – I never have. Yes, performance is good, but why spend the extra for this old card when the 9800pro is even cheaper, or the 5900XT from nvidia is even cheaper and can scale up to 5950ultra speeds. If you want the best performance, get the ATI x800XT or Nvidia 6800ultra. If you want a budget card, but still great performance, get the 9800pro or 5900XT. That leaves the poor kicker 9800XT sitting in the middle all alone. Just as with the 9800SE, the card itself is fine, but there are far better alternatives around at this moment in time, especially given I have found some 9800XTs priced from £123 to £220. If you can find one for £150, that is a good choice, but don’t pay much more. The 9800XT, once the best GPU, is now officially dead.... Read review

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Advantages: Good solid midrange card that won't let you down with some overclocking potential.
Disadvantages: A little bit too middle range given superior competition for less.

...to the poor cooling overclocking potential was limited. Another pro is that it is so close to the reference '9800' board so potentially the card could be softmodded to a full 9800 or 9800pro. No such luck there. I could not get my card stable via a bios flash or using rivatuner to unlock the card's full potential. Darn. No free performance potential to boost the score. Unfortunately, I simply cannot recommend this card. Although I enjoyed using it, and it gave no trouble whatsoever to run and install, performance is nothing special given cheaper 9600XT cards exist. If you can even spare a few pounds extra, you can get a far better 9800pro or Nvidia 5900XT(which can be modded). Sorry Sapphire, but this card can only be considered average. The card in isolation is fine, ironically the performance is well on par for a good solid product, whilst... Read review

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