2900XT close in price to the 8800GTS...

[Marty502]

Just realized these two cards are pretty close in price.

I know, ATI drivers are... shoddy, and that's being polite. But eventually they'll iron them and the 2900XT is a faster card.

Seriously, as a long term investment is there any reason why I should prefer the Nvidia? Don't think so, but I'd appreciate some light on this. Thanks.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: Marty502
Just realized these two cards are pretty close in price.

I know, ATI drivers are... shoddy, and that's being polite. But eventually they'll iron them and the 2900XT is a faster card.

Seriously, as a long term investment is there any reason why I should prefer the Nvidia? Don't think so, but I'd appreciate some light on this. Thanks.

Actually you have it backwards. ATI's drivers are far better than anything Nvidia releases these days.

If you need Linux get Nvidia. If not then look at what you play and examine the differences between the 2 cards. On Xp either will probably be ok. When you move to Vista I wouldn't touch Nvidia's drivers with a 30' pole.

 

[Marty502]

Really? I've read that ATI's Vista drivers are a mess, even worse than Nvidia's. I'm wrong?

And no, I'm a pretty basic user. Never ever touched Linux. Guess I'll go the ATI way then!

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: Marty502
Really? I've read that ATI's Vista drivers are a mess, even worse than Nvidia's. I'm wrong?

And no, I'm a pretty basic user. Never ever touched Linux. Guess I'll go the ATI way then!

again look at what you play. Not all the problems with Nvidia's drivers affect everyone equally.

I have an HD2900xt on order because I feel safer with what I play with ATI's drivers. Alot of people have mentioned issued with the MMO I play while using 8800 series of cards. No issues on ATI. It's determined to be a driver thing.

 

[Marty502]

What I play? A bit of everything, from shooters to hardcore racing sims, and of course I'm aiming at having a solid UT3/Crysis/DX10 rig within my budget.

The thing is, I'm trying to do a long time investment, and the 2900XT should be a much better performer over time than a 8800GTS, 320 or 640. Not to mention I don't have any plans on changing my monitor - 17 CRT, max res at 72 HZ is 1280x960 - so I shouldn't be missing the extra 128 RAM on the 8800 GTS 640. I think raw power would be better. So I guess it's a closed deal then?

Thanks for your input.

 

[dds14u]

cmdrdredd:
The Nvidia drivers for Vista really are NOT that bad...where's your proof. Nvidia has always kept drivers up to date and are constantly resolving issues. For example, when BioShock came out, out came an optimized driver.

OP:
If you can find one at a similar price, would say go for it.

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: Marty502
What I play? A bit of everything, from shooters to hardcore racing sims, and of course I'm aiming at having a solid UT3/Crysis/DX10 rig within my budget.

The thing is, I'm trying to do a long time investment, and the 2900XT should be a much better performer over time than a 8800GTS, 320 or 640. Not to mention I don't have any plans on changing my monitor - 17 CRT, max res at 72 HZ is 1280x960 - so I shouldn't be missing the extra 128 RAM on the 8800 GTS 640. I think raw power would be better. So I guess it's a closed deal then?

Thanks for your input.

Welcome to AT Forums.

Bolded above in your post. What makes you think this is true?

 

[happy medium]

Originally posted by: Marty502
What I play? A bit of everything, from shooters to hardcore racing sims, and of course I'm aiming at having a solid UT3/Crysis/DX10 rig within my budget.

The thing is, I'm trying to do a long time investment, and the 2900XT should be a much better performer over time than a 8800GTS, 320 or 640. Not to mention I don't have any plans on changing my monitor - 17 CRT, max res at 72 HZ is 1280x960 - so I shouldn't be missing the extra 128 RAM on the 8800 GTS 640. I think raw power would be better. So I guess it's a closed deal then?

Thanks for your input.

With this monitor the 8800 320mb is more than enough. You don't need the 2900xt, save your money.

 

[Arkaign]

Yeah, it is hard to recommend $300ish and up for a new video card at this moment, with the new stuff hitting so soon.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

haha u should upgrade ur monitor before upgrading anything else in your system @ 17"

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: LOUISSSSS
haha u should upgrade ur monitor before upgrading anything else in your system @ 17"

Not everyone has space/wants/needs a huge monitor.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: dds14u
cmdrdredd:
The Nvidia drivers for Vista really are NOT that bad...where's your proof. Nvidia has always kept drivers up to date and are constantly resolving issues. For example, when BioShock came out, out came an optimized driver.

OP:
If you can find one at a similar price, would say go for it.

They're still subpar. One person mentioned there are no VIVO support in Nvidia's releases. You think that is acceptable? http://forums.anandtech.com/me...=2087319&enterthread=y

That's a link to the post mentioning video in not working under x64. While I haven't seen this issue personally it does not mean things like this do not exist.

Bioshock is a TWIMTBP game so it's not surprising for Nvidia to release a specific driver for it. They do pay to stick that logo on the packaging. Also note that the same day, ATI had a similar release. While Nvidia's release fixed performance issues, ATI's release affected incorrectly rendered textures and such. Likely broken by the fact that the game is specifically programmed with Nvidia in mind. Maybe, maybe not. Like I said, not all issues apply to every user. I still recommend looking at your budget, what resolution you use, and planning accordingly.

In my case Final Fantasy XI does not work correctly under vista with the 8800 series of Nvidia cards due to something in their driver that does not run dx8 code properly and slows down to 10fps (unplayable). The game is quite old to be sure, but after research I found that the HD2900xt does not suffer this issue. Again, I reiterate this is not in every case. Some 8800 users report no trouble. However, I chose one over the other because I am playing it safe.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: Marty502
What I play? A bit of everything, from shooters to hardcore racing sims, and of course I'm aiming at having a solid UT3/Crysis/DX10 rig within my budget.

The thing is, I'm trying to do a long time investment, and the 2900XT should be a much better performer over time than a 8800GTS, 320 or 640. Not to mention I don't have any plans on changing my monitor - 17 CRT, max res at 72 HZ is 1280x960 - so I shouldn't be missing the extra 128 RAM on the 8800 GTS 640. I think raw power would be better. So I guess it's a closed deal then?

Thanks for your input.

I'm talking about looking at benchmarks for specific games you intend to play. Check out the resolution you play and see what card offers more for your money in what you will be doing. Sure you can say "at 1920x1200 this card is faster" but if you don't play at that resolution then you may not even care if one card gets 30fps vs 27fps. Feel me?

 

[Zenoth]

Ever since I've installed ForceWare 163.44's it came to my mind that nVidia CAN (and just did with those) create GOOD drivers. Those drivers made an immense difference for me in terms of overall stability in XP, and I keep reading at nVnews about the benefits of that driver in Vista. Not to mention that it's a BETA driver. I'm pretty sure that, finally, the future of ForceWare drivers for both XP and Vista (but mostly Vista) IS looking good from now on.

Believe me nVidia is really getting better over time. At least they don't actually get worse ... that would be atrocious.

 

[skyofavalon]

mwave is selling the 2900XT for $299.99,used though,if your looking to save a few bucks.I bought one today.

 

[Sylvanas]

Nvidias lacklustre Vista X64 drivers are the reason I changed to the 2900, either the GTS or the 2900 will be a good choice.

 

[Piuc2020]

I don't understand why people whine so damn much about drivers...

You guys all live in a fantasy world.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: Piuc2020
I don't understand why people whine so damn much about drivers...

You guys all live in a fantasy world.

Because when the game you play runs at 10fps because the drivers don't work correctly, it becomes a problem.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: skyofavalon
mwave is selling the 2900XT for $299.99,used though,if your looking to save a few bucks.I bought one today.

That's for a refurbished model with a 15day warranty only.

 

[swtethan]

Originally posted by: cmdrdredd

Originally posted by: Piuc2020
I don't understand why people whine so damn much about drivers...

You guys all live in a fantasy world.

Because when the game you play runs at 10fps because the drivers don't work correctly, it becomes a problem.

never had a game do that


<--- ultimate 64

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: swtethan

Originally posted by: cmdrdredd

Originally posted by: Piuc2020
I don't understand why people whine so damn much about drivers...

You guys all live in a fantasy world.

Because when the game you play runs at 10fps because the drivers don't work correctly, it becomes a problem.

never had a game do that


<--- ultimate 64

I said before, not everyone and not in every game. The issue of texture memory being eaten up and then the fps dropping steadily to below playable levels remains to be fixed. Nvidia said it should be fixed by this month. Here's hoping. It affects one of the games I regularly play, Final Fantasy XI. An older game, but one that should not run at 10fps on the newest hardware.

 

[n7]

nV's x64 Vista drivers aren't that bad anymore.

Okay, i'd still say ATi is better for Vista (aside from CF), but aside from a few glaring issues, nV's have improved alot.

Granted, the fact it took them half a year to be relatively decent is pretty sad, but if there's one thing i've learned, it's that nV doesn't really care about the consumer when it comes to drivers.
They didn't back with XP, as it took half a year to fix the DEP + A64 + UT2k4 BSOD issue, & they don't now.
All one has to do is look at the nForce 3 AGP mobo users who can't properly use Vista to see understand how little they care about the user.

That bashing aside, nV does make awesome hardware, & they've improved a ton in Vista, which is why i kept my 8800 GTX instead of keeping the HD 2900 XT 1 GB.

 

[tuteja1986]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003

Originally posted by: Marty502
What I play? A bit of everything, from shooters to hardcore racing sims, and of course I'm aiming at having a solid UT3/Crysis/DX10 rig within my budget.

The thing is, I'm trying to do a long time investment, and the 2900XT should be a much better performer over time than a 8800GTS, 320 or 640. Not to mention I don't have any plans on changing my monitor - 17 CRT, max res at 72 HZ is 1280x960 - so I shouldn't be missing the extra 128 RAM on the 8800 GTS 640. I think raw power would be better. So I guess it's a closed deal then?

Thanks for your input.

Welcome to AT Forums.

Bolded above in your post. What makes you think this is true?

Because Nvidia will release a G92 very soon and totally forget about the 8800 user like they have with 7900 users or totally forgotten 7950gx. Nvidia will make sure that game works on 8800 seires but tweaking it for performance after G90 release is very unlikely. ATI on the other hand wouldn't be releasing a GPU for a long time so they will tweak the crap out of 2900 to fight against G92 in midrange. If you see old gpu benchmark , The X800 and X1900 blow away its nvidia counter part in new games like bioshock.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: tuteja1986
ATI on the other hand wouldn't be releasing a GPU for a long time so they will tweak the crap out of 2900 to fight against G92 in midrange.

Stop me if I am wrong, but isn't ATI planning to launch a 2950 Pro or some such this fall? Unless you're referring to a new GPU architecture?

I would like to say that ATI and Nv dropped the ball on the DX10 midrange this generation, and like another forum member said, whomever releases a decent midrange DX10 card first stands to make a lot of money.

 

[mruffin75]

Originally posted by: Marty502
Just realized these two cards are pretty close in price.

I know, ATI drivers are... shoddy, and that's being polite. But eventually they'll iron them and the 2900XT is a faster card.

Seriously, as a long term investment is there any reason why I should prefer the Nvidia? Don't think so, but I'd appreciate some light on this. Thanks.

Shoddy?? I'm running Vista 64-bit with a 2900XT and the drivers are fine,.. haven't had a problem so far...