We are comparing the performance of the X1650 XT to the original X1600 XT and the X1650 Pro released a couple months ago, two obvious choices. We are also comparing it to a X1950 Pro which might be within your budget if you can afford an extra $50, and we're throwing in an X1900 XT 256 which, going by MSRP prices, is about $40 cheaper than two X1650 XT's in Crossfire. Unfortnately I couldn't get my hands on NVIDIA's 7600 GT in time to use in this review so you'll have to use your imagination or something to fill in the gaps.

Games Benchmarks (click for settings)

• Prey, v1.2 (OpenGL)
  • Video
  • Texture Quality: Highest Quality
  • Advanced 1
  • Use Shader Programs: Yes
  • Shader detail: Highest
  • Enable Shadows: Yes
  • Enable Specular: Yes
  • Enable Bump Maps: Yes
  • Vertical Sync: No
  • Anti Aliasing: Various
  • High Quality Specular: Yes
  • Sharpen Bumpmaps: Yes
  • Enable Bump Maps: Yes
  • Advanced 2
  • Use Glow: Yes
  • High Particle Detail: Yes
  • High Quality Skinning: Yes
  • Image Anisotropy: Various
• Half-Life 2, Source Engine 7 build 2894 (DirectX)
  • Model Detail: High
  • Texture Detail: High
  • Shader Detail: High
  • Water Detail: Reflect All
  • Shadow Detail: High
  • Antialiasing mode: Various
  • Filtering mode: Various
  • Wait for vertical sync: Disabled
  • High Dynamic Range: None
• F.E.A.R., v1.08 (DirectX)
  • Computer: Maximum
  • Graphics card: Medium
    • FSAA: Various
    • Light Detail: Medium
    • Enable Shadows: On
    • Shadow Detail: Medium
    • Soft Shadows: Off
    • Texture Filtering: Various
    • Texture Resolution: Medium
    • Videos: Medium
    • Pixel Doubling: Off
    • DX8 Shaders: Off
    • Screen Resolution: Various
    • Shaders: Medium
• Battlefield 2, v1.4 (DirectX)
  • Terrain: High
  • Effects: High
  • Geometry: High
  • Texture: High
  • Lighting: High
  • Dynamic Shadows: High
  • Dynamic Light: High
  • Anti-Aliasing: Various
  • Texture Filtering: High
  • View Distance Scale: Max
• Quake 4, v1.3 (OpenGL)
  • Video Quality: High Quality
  • High Quality Special Effects: Yes
  • Enable shadows: Yes
  • Enable specular: Yes
  • Enable bump maps: Yes
  • Vertical sync: No
  • Antialiasing: Various
  • Multiple CPU/Core: Yes
• Half-Life 2: Lost Coast, Source Engine 7 build 2894 (DirectX)
  • Model Detail: High
  • Texture Detail: High
  • Shader Detail: High
  • Water Detail: Reflect All
  • Shadow Detail: High
  • Antialiasing mode: Various
  • Filtering mode: Various
  • Wait for vertical sync: Disabled
  • High Dynamic Range: Full
• Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, v1.05 (DirectX)
  • Shader Model Type: Various
  • Shader Options (SM3.0 only)
    • HDR Rendering: On
      • Tone Mapping: On
    • Parallax Mapping: On
    • High Quality Soft Shadows: On
  • Shadow Resolution: High
  • Trilinear Filtering: On
  • Specular Lighting: On
  • High Quality Textures: On
  • Vertical Sync: Off
  • Hardware Shadow Mapping: On
    
• Far Cry, v1.4 (DirectX)
  • Texture Quality: Very high
  • Texture Filter Quality: Trilinear
  • Anisotropic filtering level: Various
  • Particle Count: Very High
  • Special Effects Quality: Very High
  • Environment Quality: Very High
  • Shadow Quality: Very High
  • Water Quality: Ultra High
  • Lighting Quality: Very High

• 1024x768
• 1280x1024 / 1280x960
• 1600x1200

Image Quality Settings

• No AA & No AF
• 4x AA & 16x AF

Test Systems	ATI
Motherboard ( chipset )	MSI K9A Platinum (ATI RD580/SB600)
CPU	AMD Athlon FX-62 @ 2.8GHz
Graphics Card	ATI Radeon X1650 XT x2 Sapphire Radeon X1650 Pro ATI Radeon X1600 XT ATI Radeon X1950 Pro ATI Radeon X1900 XT 256MB
Driver Version	ATI 8.301 Beta
Memory ( Timings )	2GB (2x1024MB) SuperTalent PC2-6400 DDR2 @ 800MHZ ( 4-4-3-8 2T)
Hard Disk	Western Digital Caviar WD2500KS SE16 250GB
Sound	Onboard
Network	Onboard
PSU	PC Power & Cooling 1KW Turbo-Cool Quad-SLI
OS	Windows XP Pro SP2, DX9c (August 2006)

Card Specifications	ATI X1650 XT	Sapphire X1650 Pro	ATI X1600 XT	ATI X1950 Pro	ATI X1900 XT
Core	RV560	RV530	RV530	RV570	R580
Silicon Process	80nm	90nm	90nm	80nm	90nm
Transistor Count (millions)	330	157	157	330	384
Core Speed MHz	575	590	590	575	650
Memory Speed MHz (Effective)	675 (1.35GHz)	700 (1.4GHz)	700 (1.4GHz)	690 (1.38GHz)	1,000 (2.0GHz)
Memory Size	256 MB	256 MB	256 MB	256 MB	256 MB
Bus Standard	PEG x16	PEG x16	PEG x16	PEG x16	PEG x16
Bus Width	128bit	128bit	128bit	256bit	256bit
ROPs	8	4	4	12	16
Pixel Shaders	24	4	4	36	48
Vertex Shaders	8	5	5	8	8
Peak Memory Bandwidth (GB/s)	21.6	22.4	22.4	44.2	64.0
Pixel Fillrate (million pixels/sec)	4,600	2,360	2,360	6,900	10,400
Texel Fillrate (million texels/sec)	4,600	2,360	2,360	6,900	10,400
API Compliancy	DX 9.0c	DX 9.0c	DX 9.0c	DX 9.0c	DX 9.0c

The Windows XP desktop was set to 1280x960 with a 32bit color depth and 85Hz refresh rate for all tests. Refresh rate lock for 3D was not enabled. V-Sync was forced off via the graphics card control panel as well. All graphics card control panel settings for the ATI cards were left to their default settings.

Anti-Aliasing and Anisotropy were applied in the game engine where the options existed. For games that did not support those options natively, the graphics card control panel was used.

Custom batch files were used when possible for automated benchmarking, which are available upon request. When manual benchmarking was necessary Fraps was used.

Benchmarking was done with Windows set to the "Adjust for best performance" profile and all unnecessary Windows services and hardware devices were disabled. The latest drivers for each necessary hardware component were installed prior to testing and kept consistent throughout.

Sound and networking interfaces were enabled for all tests.