Viewing Thread:
"Radeon cards all that?"

I have a new P4 2.8 with 800 Mhz FSB PC with 512Mb DDR Ram (at the mo). It's one of those Shuttle PCs, SB61G I think. Can't use it till Xmas though.

Anyway, I'm going to be putting my Geforce4 Ti4600 (128Mb) card in it as you know the on-board graphics are going to be pretty standard. I have been satisfied with this card for some time now, and although I'm not getting benchmark results like the ones stated in the other thread, it does the job. It can run Max Payne 2 and XIII with everything cranked up - and this is only on a P4 1.7 with 512Mb NON-DDR Ram.

This new PC is going to be AGP 8X compatible and I was wondering whether to go for one of these Radeon 9800's etc. A lot of you seem to have them and no-one seems to have a bad thing to say about them.

The hardest paces the card will go through will be running graphics-heavy games, no video editing or anything else graphics-dependent.

Do you reckon it's worth it to upgrade from NVidia (who I thought led the market) to ATI (crap last time I checked - a long time ago)?

Thanks

gamezfreak wrote:
> I owned a Cyrix 255mhz for 5 years until about 3 weeks ago when I
> built me new system.
>
> This'll is fine for now. But i'm concerned about this whole PCI
> Express interface which means getting a new motherboard. Oh and did
> you know those cheeky boogers are making a new form factor to replace
> ATX.
>
> It's imaginativly called "BTX"

Ha! Well I fully plan to keep my bits 'n' bobs until at least 2 years from now... I plan to upgrade my graphics card twice in that time but otherwise nothing else.

I mean the time it takes them to write next gen games these days is so long that the next generation of Quake, Doom and half life will only be the subject of forums in 2 years time, so theres no panic ... :-)

*Thats my PC philosophy

I owned a Cyrix 255mhz for 5 years until about 3 weeks ago when I built me new system.

This'll is fine for now. But i'm concerned about this whole PCI Express interface which means getting a new motherboard. Oh and did you know those cheeky boogers are making a new form factor to replace ATX.

It's imaginativly called "BTX"

Yup, my former GeForce 3 could still run Call of Duty damn well.

I don't care to be honest. I could delay getting a new PC, again, and get one with a Pentium 5 in 6 months time. But if I wait a year I could get an even faster one.

You don't need to upgrade more than once every three generations and you would still have decent performance.

Icarus wrote:
> nVidia and ATI have also made an agreement not to release their next
> "major" graphics cards until next year. How nice eh?
>
> And they will be using the new PCI Express interface, faster than
> AGPx8.

*Groan

ANOTHER motherboard upgrade...

:-(

nVidia and ATI have also made an agreement not to release their next "major" graphics cards until next year. How nice eh?

And they will be using the new PCI Express interface, faster than AGPx8.

Theres a new wave of graphics cards on the horizon...I have read of a beast with 2 parallel graphics processors <-essentially the power of two cards on one board.I believe its being designed by some offshoot of S3 (remember the ill fated "savage" cards anyone?)

Im hanging onto my very caable radeon 9600 until then... the aim being of course to get meself a cheap radeon 9800XT or PRO when the time comes.

*cheap skate

I have a Mobility Radeon 9600, and it runs good.

I used to have an FX5600, and what a monster it was (the bad type).

well, i bought meself a Tyan Tachyon 9600Pro and i am very, VERY pleased with it, considering it's the same price...

Just like to add that I took delivery of my spangly new 9800 pro today (upgrading from an FX5600), and it's a beaut!

Shoved her in, installed Catalyst 3.9 drivers, and got a 3dmark03 score of 5540 straight away with no tweakage whatsoever. Oh, and it is noticably quieter than the FX as well - lovely jubbly! :D