9800 AA/AF question

[high]

I'm a little new to the high end gfx market (had a 9200 before this card) and am wondering about AA/AF. What does each of them do and which one or will both hurt performance? (i've heard af does not affect performance and aa does) Lastly, what are the optimal settings for my card clocked at 426/340??? Should I just crank it to 6xAA, 16xAF or are there *optimal* settings?

 

[Matthias99]

I sort of recommend the "search" function, as this has been discussed many times before.

Both AA and AF use filtering techniques to make the rendered image from the video card look better. AA (Antialiasing) helps smooth out "jaggies" -- aliasing artifacts created when diagonal lines are drawn on a computer screen. AF (Anisotropic Filtering) removes certain filtering artifacts that are created when you view textured surfaces at an angle.

They both give you a performance hit. On ATI cards, low levels of AF are essentially "free" -- in most games, the video card has enough spare bandwidth that turning it on doesn't really slow anything down. However, even 2xAA has a noticeable impact on performance (and visual quality).

I run my 9800Pro (430/375) at 4xAA/16xAF, usually. 6xAA seems to make little visual difference in most games, but hurts framerates. To each his own, though.