No Parhelia card present in the mad-onion hall of fame

[Wombat]

You don't even know that now. nVidia does some funky stuff with FPS. My Matrox cards look smoother and faster than my GF3 did, even though the Matrox cards were running around 25-30fps, and the nVidia card was at 35-40fps, according to fraps. Whatever nVidia is doing, it's shady.

[rugger]

I be honest though,

If you just want to play games (and not wank over 3dmark results and the like) virtually any card will do. (possibly even old TNT2s)

I have yet to find a game that does not run acceptably on my Geforce DDR. I don't get ultra high resolutions, or lots of eyecandy, but I don't have any problems running in 32-bit colour with decent textures. Yep, that includes games like UT2003 and NOLF2.

I will probably replace my card soon (tm), since I want more eyecandy, and the newest games are really stressing my old card out though.

Wombat, I think the problem is that the Geforce 3 had Nvidia written on it, while the Parhellia had matrox written on it. To fix this, simply grab a texta and scrub out the Nvidia on the GF3, and replace it with Matrox (make sure you write it correctly, otherwise it won't work)

[Greebe]

Not to knock you rugger, but I have seen exactly what Wombat is sayin and it is rather nasty when you compare it to a Matrox's Smooth-O-Vision.

[DirtFarmer]

Originally posted by UberLord

So how do we know which is the fastest card that gives the best experience for Game X then?

Who gives a shit. If your looking for the best game experience in Game X smoke a joint, play the game and piss on the benchmarks.

[Greebe]

Originally posted by DirtFarmer

Who gives a shit. If your looking for the best game experience in Game X smoke a joint, play the game and piss on the benchmarks.

Shame that doesn't work on the banding issue...

and no I'm not going to drop some acid just to feel better about it

[DirtFarmer]

Originally posted by Greebe

Shame that doesn't work on the banding issue...

and no I'm not going to drop some acid just to feel better about it

So the pot has been tried at Matrox Labs?? Damn, I guess I have to wait for the hardware fix.

[Greebe]

Just remember to bring papers

[rugger]

Originally posted by Greebe
Not to knock you rugger, but I have seen exactly what Wombat is sayin and it is rather nasty when you compare it to a Matrox's Smooth-O-Vision.

Wasn't that Matrox Band-o-vision

I have few problems with stuttering. If it stutters all the time, your simply pushing your video card too hard and should scale it back. Doesn't matter what the fps meter is saying.

The parhellia probably does have an edge in the smoothness department, it does have a 256bit bus after all. I have trouble though believing that the Nvidia and ATI cards are as bad as you say. That is probably because I use the damn things quite often without stuttering problems.

[Greebe]

I'm not simply implying the Parhelia tho... the G200 all the way up are like that

[Wombat]

Wombat, I think the problem is that the Geforce 3 had Nvidia written on it, while the Parhellia had matrox written on it.

Notice that I said nothing at all about a Parhelia. This is about a <B>G450</B> looking faster than a GF3Ti500.

I loaded up a few games, did the "rotate in place quickly" thing, and the G450 showed a much smoother transition, while the GF3 seemed to update at like 5fps, even though Fraps said otherwise.

We already know that nVidia uses "unusual" frame buffer pointers to output to the RAMDAC. I'm saying that I suspect them of pushing out old frames and calling it another notch on the FPS counter.

[rugger]

Originally posted by Wombat
Notice that I said nothing at all about a Parhelia. This is about a <B>G450</B> looking faster than a GF3Ti500.

I loaded up a few games, did the "rotate in place quickly" thing, and the G450 showed a much smoother transition, while the GF3 seemed to update at like 5fps, even though Fraps said otherwise.

We already know that nVidia uses "unusual" frame buffer pointers to output to the RAMDAC. I'm saying that I suspect them of pushing out old frames and calling it another notch on the FPS counter.

As I have said, I haven't had that problem. With either the G400 or the Geforce DDR

That is an awfully big accusation your making there. Do you really need to dig yourself such a big hole to bury yourself in.

But this is a matrox forums, and I see no reason to further fight this out. (since brand loyalty is something I don't feel like fighting today)

[Wombat]

Yeah, it's a big accusation. But it's against a company with plenty of previous sleazy moves. Haven't they already used the GDI (is that the right acronym?) clock to boost FPS readings?

Rags? I know your information overlaps with mine here.

[gordo-uk]

Originally posted by Wombat
My Matrox cards look smoother and faster than my GF3 did, even though the Matrox cards were running around 25-30fps, and the nVidia card was at 35-40fps, according to fraps.

That is certainly the case with morrowind on my PC.

[gordo-uk]

Originally posted by UberLord


So how do we know which is the fastest card that gives the best experience for Game X then?

The bottom line is, they all do.

Any of the top line graphics cards will give you great looking games and good performance all I am saying is you should not rely on what the FPS reader is telling you.

Its easy to fall into a false reality, thinking "i only get 30FPS in that game, he gets 60FPS, my card is crap, I must get a new one".

[The PIT]

Well I got a G400 at work which I run UT on at lunch. 1024 * 768 native res of the lcd details set to high although I have to run at 16bit colour cos it chokes a bit at 32 bit. This probably due to the celery 633 it's running on more than else. Otherwise it's fast enougth not jerky and really smooth. Not bad for an old card.