Comments
Overall I am far happier with this card than the x1800. For starters it is a great deal less fragile and does not have the same driver related issues I was getting on the X1800.
Ati tool works flawlessly with the card both with voltage adjustments as well as the clock sliders
One thing I found impressive was that eventhough the AIW board uses 5 phase power and not 7 phase which is found on the XTX and XT, it still manages to clock as well or in my case *better* than the majority of either per clock.
This could be extremely important to those looking to buy the X1900GTO since it should use the same exact layout as well as 5 phase power.
Alot of people saw issues with the 5 phase power on the X1800XL and were unable to use the same degree of voltage that the XTs could, thus hampering their overclock significantally. Some infact couldnt even set to the default XT vcore of 1.3v (mine couldnt either)
Some blamed the lack of power to the card as the cause but clearly my results are in direct conflict with this train of thought. Perhaps there is something inherently wrong with the XL R520 chips as a whole that causes these issues and not the PCB.
That being said this is very good news to potential GTO owners (and Im sure there are plenty) as these boards have no issues whatsoever with power (as I have seen this card handle as high as 1.4v without any issues whatsoever) More imporantally this card is capable of almost XT speeds with vcore as low as 1.175v (which is stock). This is a clear indication to me that the yields are very strong on the R580 which is a big deal to us
Good times are ahead it seems. The X1900GTO is going to be quite popular when it hits the streets next month id say.
