Help Deciding on Dual Head Card....GeForce2 MX the best?

[Mr.Diggler]

G400/G450 are not an option. They don't work with the i850 chipset.

Are there any other choices than the GeForce2 MX with TwinView? I hear the 2D sucks on it and 2D is more important to me than 3D.

I don't really want to mess around with two cards and trying to get drivers to work. Price is not that much of an issue, I'm willing to pay $300 if needed or more, whatever.

Primary uses in order:

1. Office Apps and Surfing (i.e. 2D very important)
2. DVD Playback (monitor only, no TV out needed)
3. Some games

Now, I run the 21" monitor at 1024x768 and the 19" at 800x600. Is the poor 2D quality of the MX card going to be noticeable?

Please help, I want to buy a card very soon.

thanks

 

[Priit]

Almost any videocard should be more-less good till 1024x768 (not i810 thought). IMHO using 1024x768 on 21" monitor is a bit overkill, at least 1280x1024 would be normal (but that's just my opinion). And on 1280x1024, most of the Nvidia-powered cards starts to suck. Why G400 doesn't work with i850 ?

 

[bluemax]

The Radeon VE "hydravision" will give you a buch better 2D display than the MX-twinhead thing. 3D performance is a fair bit better than the G450 as well. I'd go for the VE before MX dial. :Q

 

[Mr.Diggler]

Priit:
I have no idea why the G400 cards don't work with the i850 chipset, neither does Matrox. They gave up trying to fix it and didn't give the impression that anything is going to be done in the near future for it. I guess they consider it a gamer's chipset and a bad choice for the G400 cards anyway...probably right.

I don't think I could take 1280x1024, maybe I'll try again though...I'm most comfortable with 1024x768. Anything higher and I can't handle the headaches from squinting at all the small things on the screen.

bluemax:
Ah yes, I had forgotten about the ATI offering. Wasn't that supposed to be a really crippled card and something to avoid though? I never paid attention to why so maybe I'm mistaken. I guess if it is crippled but still better than the MX, it doesn't matter.


Thanks guys.

 

[bluemax]

3D Performance may not be quiiiite as good as an MX, but close. The trick is that its dual-display is far more reliable. Anand has a review on it... don't have the link right now.

 

[Mr.Diggler]

bluemax:
Sounds like the perfect thing to hold me over until the G800 is released. I'll go read the review and then probably see if anyone will sell one on the FS/T forums. Wow, just looked at the retail price, even more cheapo than the G2MX.

 

[Mr.Diggler]

I'm a moron, I should have checked reviews on Anand's first...I'm just so used to avoiding that part of the site because it loads soooo slooow. There's a Dual Head Comparison article up for almost two months now.

Dual Head Comparison

Summary...bluemax was right. I'm getting the Radeon VE and it looks like I won't be losing much from the G400. The GeForce2 MX would have been a mistake for me.

 

[Wag]

I have the Geforce MX dual-vga from Cardexpert. The one thing Nvidia offers is the ability to show overlay full screen to the 2nd monitor.

No other card can display overlay in the 2nd monitor, much less DVDs. I use the 2nd VGA output to feed my HDTV. The 2nd output quality is good as long as you don't run it up that high. I use it at 1280*720/60Hz and it's nice.

 

[pidge]

I can't believe it won't work on an 850 chipset.

Oh well. I wasn't planning on moving up to the Pentium 4 anytime soon anyways.