Worth upgrading to a g400 max???

[SuB]

i now have a v3 3k (sux by the way) and have 2 monitors 17" nokia 447xpro and 22" iiyama pro510. Since 2d on the 22 isn't perfect and want to upgrade to a better 2d/3d card.

But is it worth the money since t&l matrox cards are coming up.

[Brian R.]

My opinion is to buy the MAX. You may never get rid of it. Wait until you have a significant need for a better card to sell it. May be years. Great card.

[Thundrchez]

IMHO, hardware T&L has a long way to go before becomes standard throughout the industry. DX7 doesn't really support it, and most games do not support it, and every game is going to want to use it slightly differently than the first round of hardware assist implements it.

The G400 looks MUCH better than a v3. Heck, even my ol' G200 looks much better than voodoo, except the voodoo rocked in the performance arena. The G400's performance is very nice with beautiful pictures.

Personally, I did not go with the MAX, but just a regular G400 32M dual head. IMHO, the dual head isn't perfect for a second monitor, but it is OK. Dual head kicks ass with DVD NTSC signal, though.

[Dyre]

Once you use Dual Head w/ 2 monitors for more than a week its hard to go back... I get sad everytime i have to disable the 2nd monitor to play games... My friends love to come over and use it. Its great. Web Surfing absolutly rocks, and working w/ Photoshop Rules! All the tools on one screen with the other totally devoted to the image. Its sooooooo cooool. Plus the 1024x768 TV-OUT is great at LAN parties on a 45" TV! Muahahhahahahhahahahahhahahah Makes my Ge-Force DDR friends cry!


Muauauhahahahhahahahahhahahahha


Till they smoke my ass at 1280 and up resolutions. : ( Ohh well, i need a new CPU.

Greg

------------------
PIII 450 @ 464
generic BX6 motherboard
G400 MAX : )
Maxtor 13 gig UDMA 33
Maxtor 13 gig UDMA 66
Creative 36x CD-ROM
HP 2x2x6x CD-RW
64 megs PC100 RAM
Intel 10/100
Soundblaster 32 AWE
DiamondMAX 56k
Logitech Wireless Desktop (best $50 ive ever spent)
1 92mm Sunon Fan
4 80mm Sunon Fan's

[MartinS]

Thundrchez, what do you mean when you say that the dual head isn't perfect for a second monitor ?

I'm currently torn betwen getting a G400 32DH and a Creative TnT2-Ultra. I've been a Matrox fan for ages now(Mystique->220->G200), but I must admit I wasn't impressed with the G200 support/performance wise, image quality is lovely tho' which is why I'm face with the decision.

The advantage to me was the dual head for 2 monitors as I use Photoshop/3d Studio quite a bit (but not enough to go mad on a OpenGL specific card). Can anyone tell me how a G400 32DH works in 3DS max with 2 monitors in NT4 - is it ok ? are the GL drivers getting sorted out ?

The other option was tnt2-u with TV out for games/dvd + a cheaper second PCI card for another monitor.

[Goc]

Hi Martin...
What Thunderchez ment with the Dual head not being ideal for the second monitor, is a different (=slower,weaker) RAMDAC on the second head... you get a picture with lesser picture quality than the main head. As I gathered from different sources but mainly from MURC is that not every board is affected with this problem. There is a serie of boards with second head showing all colours tilted to the blue area of the spectar, but that can be easily corrected using gamma corr. (someone correct me on that one if I'm wrong)
Anyway, I've got a MAX in one of my rigs and it's got an excellent pic. quality on both monitors (17" Videoseven CRT 0.25 mm)
Although the drivers for NT aren't in the best shape for the time being, I strongly believe things will sort out in that arena to so a G400 board is a must!

__________________________________________
Yep... my MAX is the 4A version but I have a board that only supports 2X transfers... sheeesh, big deal...

[MartinS]

OK, thanks.

So from what I'm picking up there seem to be different 'flavours' of the 32DH cards. Is there a way for me to identify which card I'm buying. Look for the 4A version serial Numbers seems the way for 4X, but is there a batch with better overclocking potential etc. I picked up from somewhere that some of the 32DH's have a white connector for a cooler and these are Max's which only just failed burn-in is this correct.

[smokva]

Hey GocDude
Where did you buj your 4X MAX.
I'm trying to find one myself.

BTW: Veceg seronje i lazova od tebe nema(This is only for Goc, don't worry if you can't understand it, he can)