Video Card Upgraders...IMHO I Found the Best Bang for the Buck!!

[Skimmer]

WARNING!! LONG POST!! WARNING!!

To all G200/G400 owners (or anyone else for that matter) wanting to upgrade,

I've been a Matrox fan for years and have been waiting patiently for Matrox to come out with a new card that keeps its superior 2D while upping 3D to rival that of the current competitors (i.e. the G800).

Well, I decided to stop waiting and jumped on a.....ATI Radeon 32MB DDR!! Now some of you may flame me for this purchase (shame on me) but I'm writing this to tell you that, so far, this card is excellent!! So for those out there yearning for an upgrade, here is a brief look at the last couple of days of Radeon ownership.

Perspective...I have a PIII, 19 inch Sony, Win98, upgrading from a G400 but also have a Voodoo 3000 and TNT2 Ultra in other systems. I have also bought but returned a CL GF2 and GF2 MX.

Radeon summary

1. 2D quality: Ranking the video cards (1-10) I own or purchased but returned:

G400: 10 (still tops)
Radeon: 9 (great at low res...solid at high)
Voodoo 3000: 8.5 (prefer the Radeon by a nod)
CL TNT2 Ultra: 5 (marginal even at low res)
CL GF2: 3.5 (returned...awful on a Trinitron, ghosting, focus probs, etc.).

Only issue here is if you have on of the latest Trinitron flat screen monitors. It seems like there is a possible “shimmering” problem. I don’t have this problem but if you would like to read more head on over to:
http://www.rage3d.com/forum/Ultimate.cgi?action=intro and check out the very long thread on the topic.

2. Video driver stability:

So far not one crash or blue screen (Win98). Drivers have many options for tweaking although D3D is a bit weak. All I can say is ATI has really done a good job with these drivers...and this card is only a few months old!!! This is a good sign that the drivers can get faster with more features since stability is probably a minor issue at this time.

Tested a total of 20 games for Opengl and D3D compatibility. Not one crash although I have found a few minor quirks.....example is System Shock 2 gamma adjustment does not maintain its setting and W&W will not run in D3D. Overall I would say this card is NOT any worse in compatibility than the G400 or GF2. In fact, my experiences with the GF2 and reading the nVidia newsgroups about all the problems people are having with the Det 6.3x drivers it’s possible the latest Radeon drivers may be more trouble free.

3. 3D image quality:

Excellent. I thought the G400 was the best....and it was until now. I put it ahead of G400 and Geforce 2 in quality (as many reviews of this card have also found).

4. 3D speed:

Excellent. As expected I'm getting 2-2.5x fps increase over my G400. It's also comparable to Geforce 2 in 32 bit. Although as many reviews have stated there is no big 16 bit framerate increase....but why would someone want to play in 16 bit today? I remember Nvidia/Nvidia fanatics trashing 3dfx because the Voodoo 3 could not do 32 bit. Now they are trashing the Radeon because of low 16 bit performance.....hhhmmm...Nvidia owners are playing games in that unacceptable 16 bit setting????

For those of you interested in seeing the Radeon performance against a G400 Max just head on over to:
http://www.avault.com/hardware/getre...ew=atiradeon64

5. Finally, the main reason why I jumped on the Radeon...the price!!

You can buy a 32MB DDR Radeon for as low as $149 (ex. Best Buy w/rebate). No Geforce 2 (non MX) or Voodoo 5500 can touch that one.

Oh sure, some may say Radeon gets beat badly by the GF2 Ultra...it better at $499 (http://www.pricewatch.com).

For those of you still reading here are a few more reviews for those interested:
http://www.review-zone.com/hardware/...56/page1.shtml
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/hardwar...w_radeon_32mb/

So for the best all-around card that delivers great 2D, excellent 3D, is as stable as any video card on the market today and won't break the bank I'll give my vote to the Radeon....very impressed so far and I hope it stays this way.

Regards,

Jeff D.

p.s. I was going to sell my G400.....the deal fell thru and now I decided to keep the card....it’s still excellent in its own right. I think I’ll replace my Voodoo 3000 in my other system instead.

[dZeus]

thanks for letting us know that the Radeon drivers are not as bad as we thought they would be..

[Big Al]

The Radeon all-in-wonder looks really neat. Would their most likely be macrovision hacks for something like this?

[Gurm]

It depends. The last AIW had macrovision hacks, but they were based on the fact that ATI put all the macrovision code in a single file (called ATIMACXX or something simple like that) and if you just deleted the file it turned off Macrovision.

Since then they have rectified that problem, so the likelihood now is slim unless someone disassembles the drivers.

- Gurm

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Listen up, you primitive screwheads! See this? This is my BOOMSTICK! Etc. etc.

[Humus]

I've just gotten my Radeon 64MB Vivo and I must say it rox!
I play UT @ 1600x1200x32 max textures and get 45 fps, and I'm sure I can go higher if I buy a new CPU since UT is very CPU limited. And if I go down to 1024x768x32 I only gain 1 or 2 frames so my CPU is definitly the bottleneck.

I also found that the 3d quality is better than G400. I started a small OpenGL application I've written some time ago and where I'd see banding at my G400 I couldn't notice it at all at my Radeon!

[LAMFDTK]

Can just this one time PLEASE no one start a "Video Card WAR" and let this crap die! please let this sink to the bottom and let Master Skinner go to another forum and defend his extrodinary purchase.

No follow-up's please

[xortam]

Sorry LAMFDTK, I don't want to see another skirmish either but Skimmer seems to be objective and I would like to hear what they have to say. Skimmer, what speed PIII are you running? When you compare the Radeon against the G400, are you referring to a standard 32MB G400, not a Max? I'm surprised you said you only get a few FPS more. Can you provide some specific benchmarks? I'd like to see Q3A benchmarks (note settings) at various resolutions/color depths. I play Q3A and have run benchmarks against it so its a good comparison for me. How is the quality of the TV out for DVD playback? Is it as flexible as the G4xx cards in setting custom resolutions on TV out?

[Humus]

A small update, my 45 fps in 1600x1200x32 in UT jumped to 58 fps when I ran without bots! I need a new CPU!

[Brian R.]

I find it interesting that Skimmer says the 2D quality of his GF2 sucked. Mine is fine (Prophet 2 64 MB). I guess there is alot of variability. This isn't the first time I heard this complaint.

As far as his post goes, it is an honest opinion and there should be no problem with it.

Just got my G450 and put it in my wife's computer in place of the MAX. I can't tell the difference in 2D quality (not a great monitor however). Took the MAX and installed it in my gaming computer in place of the Prophet 2. Wow, I had forgotten the beautiful 2D and 3D I was missing. Now that I have been playing online, the gameplay isn't affected as much since the lag in the internet overshadows, for the most part, any loss in fps. Haven't noticed a difference in UT at 1024x768 medium detail across the board.

MAX = Great board

G800 = Next video card

Prophet 2 64 MB = Great Q3A video card

[This message has been edited by Brian R. (edited 08 October 2000).]

[xortam]

Brian R., I'm in no hurry to upgrade from my Max due to other constraints as well. I'm running on a 17 month old PIII/450 and a v.90 link. The video card is not the bottleneck. I haven't quite gotten motivated enough to upgrade or o/c the CPU so there should be plenty of time to see how the G800 is doing before I feel the need to change video cards.

[Brian R.]

Waiting is always a good idea with computers if you can.

[superfly]

Actually if you go to the q3config folder,you'll see a setting that goes like this:

set r_ext_compress textures.

It's usually set to 1 if the card supports it(s3tc),but since you got 64mb of memory on your video card,you can easily set to 0,and the visual quality improves quite a bit.

The performance hit is negligable(2~3 fps),even when using high quality textures(32 bit),q3 uses about 30 megs worth of textures in a couple of levels,add about 12mb for frame buffer(at 1024*768 32 bit triple buffered),and you'll still have 20+ megs available that aren't even being used yet in any game.

[Himself]

How is the bump mapping support on the Radeon? I read it supports EMBM, but you never know with video card companies.

[Joel]

I would like to know about it's dual monitor sup.... Opps, sorry, wrong card.

Joel

[Skimmer]

HOLD ON!!!

I did not want this thread to start trashing video cards!!

I only posted for:

1. To let people who are interested in upgrading their video card that there is, IMHO, an option out there other than Geforce for the gamer looking for speed and 2D/3D image quality.

2. Clearing the air about some of the mis-information on the Radeon.

If I offended anybody then I'm sorry. I better let this thread die.......

WOW! that's what you get for trying to be objective and pass along some info about a product......remember I NEVER trashed Matrox
or the G400 I own...still have it....excellent card.

Regards,

Jeff