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Although I've heard about Matrox cards for years, I only just recently saw one in action, (a Millenium P750), and I was most impressed.
I'm in the process of configuring a whole new system and have been trying to decide on a video card. My current card is a GeForce 4 Ti4200 64MB. I chose it back in 2002 because it seemed to offer a good balance of what I wanted: a) Very good 2D/3D image quality in a variety of scenarios; b) gave me dual monitor support (one LCD via DVI & one CRT via VGA); c) good performance for gaming (for games at the time); and d) flexibility, decent features, and a decent software bundle.
My needs have changed a bit over the years. What I'd like in a video card are as follows:
1. Excellent 2D workstation performance;
2. Excellent DVD playback on my PC; (not on my TV).
3. Some sort of hardware motion compensation or mpeg2 decoding on the chip to take some of the load off the system's CPU.
4. Dual monitor support -- doesn't have to be dual DVI, although I think I'd like that.
5. Would like to play some 3D games. This is the lowest priority. I don't play any really heavy-duty games like Doom III, so I don't need a ton of power or 256MB of VRAM. I do enjoy some adventure and role-playing games, though, so when I do game, I like to be able to play at a decent resolution, i.e. minimum 1024 x 768 and decent speed.
In one of the other threads, I read this posted by Thunderfoot:
I've thought of that, and it sounds great, but I'm not yet ready to jump onboard Intel's new platform.
Anyway, based on my needs/wants, what would your recommendations be?
It seems to me I could:
1. Get a Matrox P750 card; (but gaming ability would probably be minimal).
2. Get a Matrox Parhelia 128 MB (although I've read they run hot; is that right?) (Decent for the non-hardcore gamer like myself?)
3. Get another "compromise" type card as I did in 2002. For example, a GeForce FX 5900XT has been highly recommended as having excellent 2D and 3D image quality. (I haven't tested it for myself.) Various ATI cards have also been recommended.
4. Get a Matrox card along with a PCI graphics accelerator. Would that help?
5. Get a Matrox AGP card and a PCI mid-range gaming card. I'm not sure how a PCI card would perform.
6. Get a Matrox PCI card (not too many of them) and an AGP gaming card. This doesn't sound wise, since my main priority is for superior 2D performance.
Any ideas/suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
-- Jerry
I'm in the process of configuring a whole new system and have been trying to decide on a video card. My current card is a GeForce 4 Ti4200 64MB. I chose it back in 2002 because it seemed to offer a good balance of what I wanted: a) Very good 2D/3D image quality in a variety of scenarios; b) gave me dual monitor support (one LCD via DVI & one CRT via VGA); c) good performance for gaming (for games at the time); and d) flexibility, decent features, and a decent software bundle.
My needs have changed a bit over the years. What I'd like in a video card are as follows:
1. Excellent 2D workstation performance;
2. Excellent DVD playback on my PC; (not on my TV).
3. Some sort of hardware motion compensation or mpeg2 decoding on the chip to take some of the load off the system's CPU.
4. Dual monitor support -- doesn't have to be dual DVI, although I think I'd like that.
5. Would like to play some 3D games. This is the lowest priority. I don't play any really heavy-duty games like Doom III, so I don't need a ton of power or 256MB of VRAM. I do enjoy some adventure and role-playing games, though, so when I do game, I like to be able to play at a decent resolution, i.e. minimum 1024 x 768 and decent speed.
In one of the other threads, I read this posted by Thunderfoot:
As for Matrox... My plan is to get a motherboard with 2 16xPCI-Express slots so I can have a Parhelia variant in one and a gaming powerhouse in the other.
Anyway, based on my needs/wants, what would your recommendations be?
It seems to me I could:
1. Get a Matrox P750 card; (but gaming ability would probably be minimal).
2. Get a Matrox Parhelia 128 MB (although I've read they run hot; is that right?) (Decent for the non-hardcore gamer like myself?)
3. Get another "compromise" type card as I did in 2002. For example, a GeForce FX 5900XT has been highly recommended as having excellent 2D and 3D image quality. (I haven't tested it for myself.) Various ATI cards have also been recommended.
4. Get a Matrox card along with a PCI graphics accelerator. Would that help?
5. Get a Matrox AGP card and a PCI mid-range gaming card. I'm not sure how a PCI card would perform.
6. Get a Matrox PCI card (not too many of them) and an AGP gaming card. This doesn't sound wise, since my main priority is for superior 2D performance.
Any ideas/suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
-- Jerry
Anyway, my case is well-modded with fans strategically placed to cool off any hot-running cards. So, with the info you provided, I feel much better. I don't think I'll need PAugustin's mod with the Zalman cooler, although I'm definitely going to file away that info. Good stuff!
, if they don't want them, ok, but they should understand that some people buy money not only for fps 
. And nobody noticed the performance increases with later drivers and later games, compared to the Gf4 Ti cards (The card was first enough for actual games and it is often faster than Gf4 in later games). That's the way it always goes, if some the first reviews are bad (not all were that), people become blind... sad.
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