GF4 @ 300/661 vs. Radeon 9500 Pro @ 355/630

[rogue1979]

Got a Radeon 9500 Pro in two days ago, flashed to an unlocked bios and it is now running 355/630. I have been doing back and forth testing with my Geforce4 Ti4200 128MB at 300/661.

Both score over 12,000 in 3DMark.

I run all my games at 1600 x 1200 no FSAA, so that's what I tested in.

The GF4 is using the Omega 1.1.82 driver, so I could not mess with the anisotropic settings, though they are optimized for image quality.
For the Radeon 9500 Pro I used the Catalyst 3.0 and DirectX9 anisotropic filtering on 16X quality. This is with Win2K Pro on a 1800MHz Athlon.

First of all, in order to score 12K the GF4 could only do this with the 41.09 Dets, the Omega 1.1.82 only scores 10,500.
This made little difference, in actual games the benchmarks were almost dead even.
The Radeon 9500 Pro had the slight advantage in UT, pulling an average of 175fps vs. 165fps for the GF4.
The Unreal 2003 Demo benchmark was almost identical, GF4 flyby 72, botmatch 42.
Radeon 9500 Pro flyby 68, botmatch 44.
Janes WW2 Fighter, Quake 3, Giants, Need for Speed Porsche Unleashed, Colin McRae Rally 2, Mech 4 Black Night & Vengeance, Crimson Skies and a few more were the games I tested. Some of these don't actually have fps counters, so i just had to "eyeball it".

All of these games were very close in speed and image quality. Both ATI and Nvidia drivers performed great, although the detonator rendered everything perfectly, the Cat 3.0 had a few small graphical glitches in Porsche Unleased. Definately 9500 related, because I have two 8500's running the same game in the next room and they render perfectly.

Image quality overall was equal, with the usual ATI superior sharpness and the usual Nvidia superior color saturation and contrast. This is a tough call, basically boiling down to personal preference. I was expecting the 9500 Pro to have the overall speed advantage, but no so.

I still like the Geforce4 more, while others might prefer the Radeon 9500 Pro. But for those of you trying to make a decision, either way will be a good choice.

 

[MournSanity]

Take into account that the 9500 Pro is cheaper and supports Direct X 9. That will make the Radeon look much more appealing to people.

 

[Killrose]

You need to download FRAPs (i think it is) it will give you in-game framerates in all games.

FRAPs

 

[SickBeast]

there's no comparison...the ati is better in every respect, especially so with regards to image quality.

 

[nick1985]

cheaper eh? you can get 9500's for $110 like 4200's??? i think not...

 

[Tab]

Huh? You can get a GeForce 4 Ti4200 128MB for $120? I would take a 9500 Pro over a GeForce 4 because of the Direct X9 Support. It'll come in handy for feature games.

 

[gregor7777]

I used the Catalyst 3.0 and DirectX9 anisotropic filtering on 16X quality.

So essiantially it was a 4200 (no AF/AA) vs a 9500 Pro at 16x AF? That doesn't sound like a very fair test. And they were still about dead even?

 

[jiffylube1024]

Originally posted by: gregor7777

I used the Catalyst 3.0 and DirectX9 anisotropic filtering on 16X quality.

So essiantially it was a 4200 (no AF/AA) vs a 9500 Pro at 16x AF? That doesn't sound like a very fair test. And they were still about dead even?

Yeah I'm also puzzled about this. If this is true then the Radeon has won, hands down (16X AF vs. no AF)

Originally posted by: hypersonic5
Take into account that the 9500 Pro is cheaper and supports Direct X 9. That will make the Radeon look much more appealing to people.

I don't think so. The Radeon 9500 Pro is NOT cheaper than a Ti4200 right now. The ATI card is better, without question, marginally better, but let's not get so excited about it we start making things up.

 

[bunnyfubbles]

The 9500 Pro vs the Ti 4600 @ stock settings the 9500 Pro wins despite having a slower core and ram. Usually with these R300 chips users have been able to scale up their core a lot more than their ram, this doesn't seem to bother either the 9500 or the 9700 as each are already very efficient with their memory (this is why the 9500 Pro can outperform a Ti 4600, which has superior memory bandwidth, even with intensive memory bandwidth settings enabled such as high resolutions and FSAA and/or AF pumped up).

I really see no reason to go the way of the GF4 if you can afford the 9500/Pro or even the 9700/Pro (although the latter is a no brainer). The only reason I could see someone logically going with a GF4 over a Radeon would be if they simply cannot afford the Radeon and need to go for a Ti 4200. Even then you still need to spend around $150 for the card which forces such an option into a very very very small niche of the video card market. Seems odd that anyone would ever have a budget that limits them from getting a fast Radeon but would allow them to afford a Ti 4200. Digging deep and investing in the 9500/Pro I would think would be the better way to go. If you are willing to take the time to tweek a Ti 4200 into a Ti 4600 level board, then you can do the same thing with a 9500 of which you can even possibly tweek that board into a 9700/Pro. Really now that I think about it, even the Ti 4200 is losing ground as the 9500 is a perfectly good option in that niche...

 

[rogue1979]

The Geforce4 does have anisotropic on! I said I was using the Omega 1.1.82, and I don't know exactly what the anisotropic is set on, but the drivers are tweaked for maximum image quality. Quite honestly, the Geforce4 without the Omega drivers does not match up to Radeon image quality. Before I found the Omega drivers I would have dropped the GF4 for the Radeon, but there is a big improvement, at the expense of a 10% speed hit.

The whole point of the comparison was to compare the two cards with settings that allow equal image quality. I could have taken the ATI or Nvidia and turned down the image settings on one or both to gain extra speed. I used 1600 x 1200 with no FSAA because that is the way that I play my games. Other people using different settings might get different results.

I agree the Radeon 9500 Pro has a strong point with DirectX9 support. I expected the Radeon 9500 Pro to be faster and look better. I was suprised to see that neither happened. I put the effort in to the Radeon 9500 Pro as well, removed the heatsink, applied artic silver and flashed to an unlocked bios and overclocked the crap out of it. I thought this card was gonna replace my Geforce4. But now that I have seen both right in my face, I like the Nvidia more. It was a tough decision and took me two days of constant testing to make. I have no favorites, my previous card was a retail Radeon 8500 128MB @ 312/306. I admit part of my decision was based on the fact that the 9500 had a few glitches in Porsche Unleashed, which by the way, the 8500 or GF4 doesn't have.

One thing I suspect strongly, is the benchmarks favor the Radeon over the GF4. But in real world gaming at real users settings, the GF4 is faster than people give it credit for. I compared my old Geforce3 Ti200 @ 250/525 to the retail Radeon 8500 128MB that replaced it and noticed the same trend.

Just remember, while benchmark reviews help to determine which card we want to buy, it is in no way the same thing as actually comparing different video cards in your own machine with the settings you prefer. Not even close. When a video card I want to try drops to a reasonable price, I buy it at a good deal and give it a go. If I don't like it, I put it on Ebay and make most of my money back. It sometimes costs me a few bucks, but I figure that I am really saving money by actually getting the card that works best for me.

 

[gregor7777]

Rules to follow when using the Nvidia Omega Drivers:
1- The drivers can be installed just by upgrading your current
drivers, there is no need to uninstall previous ones, they
are made in a way that all your previous settings will be
erased when they are installed.
2- When possible use default settings.
3- If you selected the Quality Option when first installed,
in the Additional Properties page, in the Direct3D
Settings tab, the MipMap Detail will be BLANK, DON'T
CHANGE IT!, if you change it the extra detail level in
D3D will be gone (Change it to Best image quality ONLY
if you don't like the extra detail in D3D)
4- In the Additional Properties page, in the OpenGL
Settings tab, Anisotropic filtering will be disabled, leave
it like that, since the detail level in OpenGL was increased
there is no need to enable it, if you do games may have a
big performance hit.
5- Don't use any tweakers to change the settings, they will
override my settings and make my work useless. Use only
when you need to change a specific tweak for a specific game
to make it work.
6- The only settings that will not harm my work are FSAA,
v-sinc and overclocking.
7- To uninstall the drivers simply run the uninstall process from
the Add/Remove programs in the Control Panel, restart and then
install the drievrs you want.

Are you sure about the AF being on with all games w/Omega drivers. He seems to contrdict.

 

[SpeedyGonzales]

The R9500pro has 2 advantages over the TI4200:

1.) DirectX9 support, however we do not yet know how a R9500pro will perform using DX9 features
2.) Superior speed with all combinations of AF/AA settings, you will only notice this, if the game is not completely CPU limited and when using high AF/AA levels.

At least in central Europe the R9500pro is a bit more expensive, than a quality Ti4200. But I think it is the same in the US.

I like the Radeon architecture (I have a 9700pro), however I don't believe, that upgrading to a 9500 pro from a TI4200 is really worth it. The performance gap is too small, and although a 9500pro is a good card, it is still bandwidth limited. I would either go with a 9700pro or wait for the the R350 coming in spring.

I upgraded from a TI4200 to a 9700pro, because I enjoy running 1280*1024 with 4AA/16AF. I am not sure, if the 9500pro can do that for all games, therefore the investment into a 9700pro was ok for me, just swapping to a 9500pro would not have been good enough. When upgrading from an older card (older than a TI4200), I would always prefer the more modern 9500pro over the TI4200.

Cheers
Speedy

 

[rogue1979]

I think you're right about the Omega and anisotropic settings, but it looks dang good, better than the standard detonator with anisotropic turned on. This is using the quality driver choice of course.

 

[rogue1979]

I had a Sapphire 9500 non pro in here a few weeks ago and hard modded it to a 9700. Unfortunately, it had 3D artifacts when all 8 pixel pipelines where enabled. So I put it back to a stock 9500 and overclocked it. Amazingly the core hit 390MHz and the 3.3ns Samsung hit the normal 630MHz. I sold it promptly and only ran a few games on it. But with both of them overclocked the speed of it seemed close to the 9500 Pro, not a big difference. I am suspecting that 8 pixel pipelines need a 256-bit memory bus to really make a big difference.

 

[GratefullySaved]

A little OT, but where can you get a Ti4200 for $110 - $120 - I'm looking to buy one immediately, preferably one that easily OCs to Ti4600 speeds (everybody say "duh" I know)

All help is really appreciated - anyone can e-mail me at jason@jasontolis.com if they'd like.

 

[ShoNuff]

 

[GullyFoyle]

Originally posted by: GratefullySaved
A little OT, but where can you get a Ti4200 for $110 - $120 - I'm looking to buy one immediately, preferably one that easily OCs to Ti4600 speeds (everybody say "duh" I know)

All help is really appreciated - anyone can e-mail me at jason@jasontolis.com if they'd like.

Go to the For sale/Trade forum and search for 4200. You'll find several selling for $110 shipped.

.or.

Go to Newegg.com -> Shop by Category -> Video Cards -> Advanced Search[Chipset=Nvidia Geforce4 Ti4200][Max Price=130] -> Click [Search] -> 1 card $110 delivered, 7 cards under $126 delivered. At least 4 of them are 8X AGP