G400DHmax replacement?

[Prototype3a]

Ok so I have the above card and I love it. But these days I need a card with hw T&L to mess around with the demos and such I might happen to play from time to time. Since the P is absolutely out of the question is what else is there that has what my G400 does but a tad faster and with the required hardware T&L?



Thank God I'm poor and didn't buy a P when it came out.

[R.Carter]

The need for Hardware T&L limits your options a bit.

Off the top of my head I can think of

ATI RADEON 7500 or later
Nvidia GeForce 3 / 4 Ti 4xxx (_NOT_ the MX versions!)

I think the GeForce 2 cards also have hardware T&L but they are getting hard to find these days and are a tad slow.

[Ribbit]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but all GeForces have T&L (it was the whole point of the original chip!), including the MXs.

[hans2]

Ribbit,
The MXs have T&L, but they're crap cards. Better off keeping with the G400 than buying one of those.

[Tomasz]

Depends on how much money you are willing to spend...

$130-$150 (USD) Radeon 9000 128 MB or Radeon 8500 128 MB

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduct.asp?submit=manufactory&manufactory=1126&catalog=48&DEPA=1&sortby=14&order=1

$100-$130 (USD) Radeon 8500 64MB or Radeon 9000 64MB

<$100 Get an LE version of the Radeons mentioned above or buy a powered by ati card instead of a built by ati card

Very Cheap, Bare minimum:
Get a Geforce 2 or 3 64MB (wouldn't recommend going with less than 64MB nowadays) or a Radeon 7500 if you can find one cheap or get one of these second hand for no more than $50 if someone is will to sell their old dust collecting graphics card.

I can't believe I am actually recommending ati cards, but the truth is they are pretty good nowadays. Drivers are still sometimes quirky, but they work about 99% of the time. Believe me, I have tested them with numerous games and applications, with very few incidents. Image quality is quite good in terms of sharpness... the only area in which my g400max beats my 8500 is color reproduction (the colors on the ati are slightly washed out... but I'm just being picky).

Thank God I'm poor and didn't buy a P when it came out.

Yeah, I share your sentiments. It is sad that the graphics division in Matrox is a complete mess. Sadly , the Parhelia, which I was really looking forward to, has turned out to be an overpriced, overhyped and mediocre piece of hardware that I would be willing to pay ~$199 max for, not $399. I seriously doubt that it is selling well (virtually no OEM sales, no brick and mortar retail presence, poor reviews, underachieving performance, crappy anisotropic filtering, imperfect FAA, and a high price make the card unpalatable to 99% of the market and make it a strictly niche product). Hopefully they can turn it around with the Parhelia 2, but I am not holding my breath... It would be sad to see Matrox go the way of Number Nine.

[Prototype3a]

So a radeon 8500 or 9000 does everything my G400 does except faster and it has hw T&L? Currently I'm using dual head with independant refresh/resolutions and both are crts. I also occasionally hook the second output up to a tv and play dvds.

[Tempest]

Well, it does not do everything that Matrox DualHead does. Only Matrox cards do that. But it has dual monitor support and TV-out. Two RAMDAC cards also have a "Theatre Mode" similar to DVDMax that can be enabled.
3D performance of the 8500 is of course way ahead of any Matrox card prior to Parhelia. If you choose a nice 8500 with dual RAMDACs and a Rage Theatre chip chances are that you will be pretty satisfied with your purchase. It's not Matrox of course, but then again even Matrox doesn't seem to be Matrox anymore.

Edit: According to http://www.ati.com/products/pc/radeon8500/faq.html, all Windows versions except for Win2K and NT4 will support independent refresh/resolution. Win2K and NT4 will only support independent refresh, and desktops will only be avalaible in stretched mode. Only Matrox does independent DualHead in Win2K.

[Pace]

Will you be using Win2k sir?

[Prototype3a]

Aye. Thinking on going back to 98se tho since my printer doesn't work with 2k. I looked a bit on ATi's site and I couldn't find a single card with dual analog connectors. They all had either an analog and a s-video or an analog and a digital. What's up with that?!?

[Prototype3a]

ahh my bad... Ati needs to fix their site as it is very misleading. I looked at the product pics on newegg and it shows what looks like a DVI -> 15pin adapter. Yet nowhere does anyone say anything about it. Does any one know if anyone make a remote for your pc that can emulate the mouse? My thrustmaster gamepad *can* do it but it has a cord...

[thop]

original radeon ddr (le), you should get them for next to nothing on ebay.

[Kruzin]

Moved to General HW/SW

[Prototype3a]

Thanks for all the advice guys... I got a Radeon 9000pro 64mb for $0 I'm quite happy with it so far (only been in there ~5 min heheh My brother gots it fer me for my birthday. Got's to luv tha big guy about to try out that UT2003 demo again and see how it compares to my G400 lol bbl guys with another update