Next video card?

[Chrono_Wanderer]

Originally posted by Duty
No Nvidia cards?


Thanks everyone...



Jeff

the only draw back of NV cards is the slow pixel shaders performance. That cannot be greatly improved in the drivers, its an architectural problem.

MSFT/NV says DX9.1 will boost NV cards by 80% or something... lol... more like 8% at most

edit: wait, is slow PS still a problem on NV cards? (i really need update on this, thx)

[Admiral]

edit: wait, is slow PS still a problem on NV cards? (i really need update on this, thx)

Not for the 5900XT, I think it was at least on par with the 9600XT. Do a forum search for bsdgeek's 5900XT review thread.

[Kurt]

Originally posted by Admiral
It's 340 MHz(680 DDR) not 390 MHz (780 DDR).

[The PIT]

Originally posted by Admiral
And yes, you're right, there is always the chance that you might get the lemon, that's why I suggested three more cards to choose from.

Give me the money and I'll let you know.

[Wombat]

Okay all,
I'm looking too. I think I'm going to get an ATI 9x00-something-something, probably built by Sapphire. On newegg, the 9600Pro and the 9600xt are pretty much identical in price, and at around $150 for the 128MB versions, that's a nice price spot for me.
There's also a 9800Pro for about $230, is there much improvement there?

There's almost too many choices!

[isochar]

A retail 9800 pro will be sold at CompUSA tomorrow for $199 AR. IMHO worth the extra $50 over the 9600s.

[bsdgeek]

I think there's a refurb 9800NP at Newegg for around $180.

Act fast if it's still there.

[isochar]

Here's what I was looking for... should make your decision easier:

http://tech-report.com/etc/comparo/graphics/

[Admiral]

The 9600Pro and 9800Pro don't have the overdrive feature the XT has. Not too keen on the auto overclock part of it but the hardware monitoring is a nice addition.

As for the 9800Pro being worth, maybe in the case where you want to play games at high resolutions with AA and AF. You also have to juice it directly from the PSU while the 9600 takes power only from the AGP slot.

Here the price difference is 200$ or more between the 9600* and 9800*, I guess for the 50-80$ you'll have to pay it's worth it.

[Wombat]

Originally posted by isochar
A retail 9800 pro will be sold at CompUSA tomorrow for $199 AR. IMHO worth the extra $50 over the 9600s.

Thank you very much for the heads up!

I just ordered that. $299 down to $229 at checkout, $30 mail-in rebate, free shipping, plus tax. About $245 charged to my card, and I'll get $30 of that back.

[Wombat]

Just an update: I went to tell a friend about the 9800, and it's already sold out on CompUSA's site. My order is in, but "open," so I hope I get it.

[Wombat]

Hooray! I just got the e-mail saying it shipped. I was afraid CompUSA might have oversold.

[Byock]

You will love it. I have a 9800Pro AIW, and have been happy as a cat chasing a leaky cow.

[Wombat]

Okay, got it running last night with the Catalyst 4.2's. Cranked up the resolution and details on a bunch of games, and they sure look purdy.

What else should I know about this card? Must have programs? Game settings/tweaks?

[Admiral]

You could disable fast writes if you have problems with textures flickering in OpenGL or system hanging with sound looping and/or a blue screen (with nothing on it).

There isn't much of a quality difference between Performance (bilinear) anisotropic filtering and Quality (trilinear) to justify the framerate hit, but that is for you to decide.

As for programs, since I'm not satisfied with ATI's game profiles approach, I use RadLinker for clock and settings. You just right click on a game executable and create a RadLink to it and then customize that shortcut. It's also useful because you can overclock the card just for a specific game instead of having it overclocked all the time. If you don't like RadLinker you could just download RadClocker (included in RadLinker) as an overclocking tool, it shows up in the display properties along with the other ATI tabs. I think it's also the overclocker of choice for the Omega drivers pack (comes/came bundled with).
For fast AA, AF and vsync switching there's !aTuner, works with both nVidia and ATI cards.
There's also the Rage3D Tweak and Riva Tuner, never got to use them though since I'm more than happy with RadLinker.

edit: Forgot about refresh rates. Most of the time ATI's built in refresh override works (under Displays/Monitor/Attributes) but there are a few occasions where you have problems, like ingame resolution changing or switching between widowed and full screen for OpenGL games where the refresh rate resets to 60Hz. You could use Refresh Force, the only game I had problems with was KOTOR if I use a higher than 85Hz refresh rate.

edit 2: spelling and some tools I forgot about, like:
ATITool, another overclocking utility, has options for separate clock profiles for 2D and 3D, built in artifact tester...
Driver Cleaner, if you want to be extra safe and don't particularly trust ATI's own uninstaller. Does a great job, to the point where some people reported they needed reactivation for XP
Also useful in getting rid of remaining Creative, nVidia, SIS and other drivers.
Some bios editing and flashing tools if you fancy bios overclocking or want to do other bios modifications.