G400 MAX or GeForce

[Borg]

just MAX !...

T&L is not cmplete in GFORCE & no actual games support it ..but EMBM or DH ohhhhh yeahhhh !...& with PIII450 or above ..or ATHLON you should have enugh FPS D3D or OGL 1024x768x32.. !

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PIII450@504(fsb@112),P2b,128mb,Matrox Mill-G400 32SH,Diamond MONSTER Sound II ,IntelliMouse Explorer (yahoooo! no fu..hm hm. ball any more ...)

[Borg]

just MAX !...

T&L is not cmplete in GFORCE & no actual games support it ..but EMBM or DH ohhhhh yeahhhh !...& with PIII450 or above ..or ATHLON you should have enugh FPS D3D or OGL 1024x768x32.. !

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PIII450@504(fsb@112),P2b,128mb,Matrox Mill-G400 32SH,Diamond MONSTER Sound II ,IntelliMouse Explorer (yahoooo! no fu..hm hm. ball any more ...)

[Dionysis]

Zebra just go and get your G400MAX.I too gave my CL GeFarce back..
With Matrox G400 MAX you get the BEST possible image quality in a video card..plus enough frame rates in order to run any game you want..

[dwright]

I got a great deal on a Geforce that had been returned to my local pc store. I took it home and replaced the G400max - everyhting went ok. I have a 19" ViewSonic PT795 which I run at 1280*1024 it's a great quality picture. The Geforce was not as crisp at this resolution and the colours were a little washed out. I tested out the Guillemot for a day, put the G400max back (I perfer the sharper picture). I gave it to my son (he loves fast games). His display is an Acer 79g AG (1024*768) and it looks great.
Conculsion: Geforce for fast games and resolution up to 1024*768. G400 for reading (high resolution) and games (but slower than Geforece). If you have not been spoiled by the G400 then you would think the Geforce was good.

[Minder]

OK, here are my 2 cents...

I used to have a G400Max for about half a year (has been the fastest card when i bought the computer). But finally all the trouble (crashes, AGP errors, just running in AGP 1x mode etc.) drove me to buy a CL Annihilator Pro.

I plugged the card in (4 weeks ago)...and not a single graphics related crash since then...

Speed:
in Q3a I get about 20% more fps on my p3600 in 1024x768 32bit/32bit trilinear full textures high geometry, compared to the G400 with 800x600 32bit/16bit bilinear. And q3a feels smoother, as the geforce does not slow down when there's lot of gibs on the screen.
Image quality in quake: way better because i can use 32 bit textures...

Image Quality in 2D:
I've to admit that on my Nokia 446Xpro the picture quality of the G400 was a little bit better. But if i would not have used a G400 before, i would think the geforce image quality is perfect.

DualHead:
OGL only worked with DH disabled. Made no sense for me, as I've to work a lot with OGL...

And get me right. I loved my G400. But all the trouble with AGP settings, putting the card out/in/out/in just to make shure it sits fine in the AGP slot, and then again crashes even with the AGP1x fix...

[mj12]

Well first of all I don't own both YET. I'm looking at the GeForce2 only because the G400 or the G450 won't cut it anymore. All I hear is image quality. Can owners of both cards post some pics from the same spot in a couple different games and/or desktop with say word up with text, etc. high res. at say 1280 in the games and 1600 in desktop would be great. I want pictures. As for comparable benchmarks look here. http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=1231

[Zebra]

Well, I run my 19" at 1600x1200, so I could use a crisper picture, although the text on the GeForce seem fine to me since I have not been spoiled by a G400.

[dZeus]

Well, I own a Dell P990, which has a 19" Sony Trinitron tube, and I run my desktop at 1600x1200 always. Once, a friend came over with a Asus Geforce card. I connected it to my monitor and set the res. to 1600x1200.... man, I almost had to throw up! My advise: go to a PC store, take the biggest baddest screen they have and compare yourself by connecting it to the G400 and the Geforce, preferably side by side..... (if you're used to the G400, you don;t even need side by side. The difference is HUGE)

[paulcs]

I find the G400's image quality to be superior to nVidia's boards, particularly in 2D situations. Since, when I boot my computer, I eventually end up at the Windows desktop and not at the Quake3 menu, this is important to me. Most of my computer time is spent in non-gaming situations, so I always have a Matrox product in my primary system.

In 2D or 3D situations, I find Matrox boards to be particularly good at color management. I think Matrox handles this better than anyone, hands down. I really think there is a big difference, and if you can't see it, well, maybe it's your monitor.

Having said that, I've found the image quality of nVidia boards to vary from manufacturer to manufacturer. I think Guillemot does a pretty good job as far as this is concern. On the other hand, I really dislike the 2D output I've seen with Asus boards I've owned or seen in action. This seems to be a hardware issue, because using nVidia's reference drivers doesn't seem to make a difference.

Image quality is Matrox's calling card. It's what made their reputation and separates them from the rest of the pack. If you had to up the resolution to 1600x1200 to see the difference, I doubt they'd have this reputation or be as successful as they are.

NVidia's OpenGL support is very strong. They sit on the board and help shape the direction of the API. If you play games based upon the Quake 2 and 3 engines, you'll probably notice a difference. Also, apparently, there is finally a game that takes advantage of T&L: Soldier of Fortune. I've read that the GeForce's T&L implementation is a little crude and the GeForce2 will do this better.

You might want to wait a while before doing anything drastic. The G450 will, hopefully , be out in a month. It should be a little faster than the Max, and the benchmarking equivalent of "sticker shock" may not be as great.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net