How far are you satisfied with Nvidia products?

[BFG10K]

The hardware is fantastic but the drivers suck utter balls.

http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showtopic=21028

There are numerous issues that have been around since the November 06 launch, many of which are in TWIMTBP titles, and we haven?t had an official driver since December 07 for the 8xxx series.

Instead all we get are leaked beta scraps that do nothing except address issues surrounding Crysis patches.

To add insult to injury, 9xxx cards are getting new official drivers for reviews while 8xxx cards are left in the cold.

Meanwhile ATi have been releasing monthly WHQL drivers for their entire supported line-up since 2002. In fact in some years they released more than 12 official drivers.

These days it seems like nVidia releases more video cards than drivers.

 

[vanvock]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
The hardware is fantastic but the drivers suck utter balls.

http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showtopic=21028

There are numerous issues that have been around since the November 06 launch, many of which are in TWIMTBP titles, and we haven?t had an official driver since December 07 for the 8xxx series.

Instead all we get are leaked beta scraps that do nothing except address issues surrounding Crysis patches.

To add insult to injury, 9xxx cards are getting new official drivers for reviews while 8xxx cards are left in the cold.

Meanwhile ATi have been releasing monthly WHQL drivers for their entire supported line-up since 2002. In fact in some years they released more than 12 official drivers.

These days it seems like nVidia releases more video cards than drivers.

QFT

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: bryanW1995

Originally posted by: nRollo

Gee, only 4 of the 5 choices are slams at NVIDIA. :roll:

I honestly don't understand posts/polls like this, would seem to be pointing us down the road Keys was trying to avoid with his stickied post at the top of the forum.

yes, the poll looks to be anti-nvidia in nature. but have you noticed thus far that only 19 posts are decidedly anti nvidia while the other 38 are either fairly or completely satisfied. Most of us are highly technical in nature, so really it's not much of a stretch to say that "fairly satisfied" is a pretty positive statement.

Well, hell - "even" i voted for "fairly satisfied" as a former owner .. that IS positive!

if i was "awesomely satisfied" i wouldn't have AMD in my rig
-but then i am not 'very satisfied' with NVIDIA's pricing .. tehy appear to me to lack in bang-for-buck

 

[BenSkywalker]

I am very satisfied atm. Utterly blown away by how poor ATi's IQ was compaed to nV's(been runnng a 1800xt for quite a while- even in very outdated game that staggering improvement in basic filternig was honestly shockinig).

-but then i am not 'very satisfied' with NVIDIA's pricing ..

I have to ask, why not? At what price or perfomance point is nVidia not ahead of ATi at least a measurable amount? At the high end the 3870x2 is bested by SLI 8800s for less, toe to toe with 9600GTs which are significantly less. The 8800 is besting the 3870 easily in its' price range, and the 9600GT is handily trouncing the 3850. At any given price point it seems that nVidia has the best performing part at the moment. Not that I am particularly fond of this line of thought any more, I picked up a 9800Pro when it was the best deal, and that card broke half my games. Then I picked up a 1800xt which had a driver issue that killed the board(fan would not spin up- driver would never make it, could never fix it). So just because they happen to be the best price point wise, it certainly doesn't mean I think it would auto be the best, just at this particular moment it seems that nV is hands down in a dominant position for price/performance.

 

[NoStateofMind]

Originally posted by: Aberforth
I thought it would be nice to create this survey, if you own a nvidia graphics card I'd like you to vote how far are you satisfied with it. Like if you've spent 600 bucks on a graphics card - were you expecting 100% value for money or were you ready to cope with numrous hardware/software and performance issues that are going to occur?

Before voting, please consider the following categories:

Performance, Value for money, reliability and product lifespan.


I've just read nvidia is going to acquire VIA...That's right pals, they are in talks with VIA. During the past few years we've seen various attempts by big companies to acquire smaller ones like

AMD ---> ATi
MS ---> Yahoo! (in talks)
Nvidia ---> PhysX
Nvidia ----> VIA (in talks)

and so on. So we can conclude as revenue increases incompetency increases aswell, this creates a window of oppurtunity for new players which is not a bad thing after all.

Update: Fixed poll issue

Good deal. This is what I mentioned they should do about a year ago to combat AMD/Intel in the coming CPU/GPU war. Glad to see they took my advice

Anyone hiring?

EDIT: Ok, it wasn't a year ago but almost 5 months to the day.

13th post down.

For nVIDIA to stay competitive they need to purchase VIA Technologies Inc.

EDIT: This would make it good for the consumer and allow nVIDIA to stay in the discreet graphics card segment and attack the CPU market. Three prominent companies offering GPU and CPU solutions would be great if you ask me

Yes I want you to pat me on the back and tell me how great I am

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: BenSkywalker
I am very satisfied atm. Utterly blown away by how poor ATi's IQ was compaed to nV's(been runnng a 1800xt for quite a while- even in very outdated game that staggering improvement in basic filternig was honestly shockinig).

-but then i am not 'very satisfied' with NVIDIA's pricing ..

I have to ask, why not? At what price or perfomance point is nVidia not ahead of ATi at least a measurable amount? At the high end the 3870x2 is bested by SLI 8800s for less, toe to toe with 9600GTs which are significantly less. The 8800 is besting the 3870 easily in its' price range, and the 9600GT is handily trouncing the 3850. At any given price point it seems that nVidia has the best performing part at the moment. Not that I am particularly fond of this line of thought any more, I picked up a 9800Pro when it was the best deal, and that card broke half my games. Then I picked up a 1800xt which had a driver issue that killed the board(fan would not spin up- driver would never make it, could never fix it). So just because they happen to be the best price point wise, it certainly doesn't mean I think it would auto be the best, just at this particular moment it seems that nV is hands down in a dominant position for price/performance.

it appears that you got some defective AMD HW; and G80 also had driver issues - for many many months after launch

But .. what IQ problems?


x1900 fixed that AFAIK ... and G80 and r600 are *so close* as to give me headaches ... i am actually running IQ comparisons - right now - on r600 through it's driver revisions and it looks very good and is improving. i want to continue right on comparing with 3XX0 series .. IQ looks awesome! extreme Crossfire filtering is a real plus on older games.

As to pricing, i am talking specifically for *me* ... i am pretty Egotistical, although i am sure you didn't notice
--i couldn't find a *single* NVIDIA card - before today - that would really beat my $480 frankenfire in my rig @ 16x10 including Ultra or 3870x2.


Now that GX2 is released, a [soon to be] $350 3870x2 upgrade in my own rig will also equal it's performance at 16x10/16x12.

i don't want a crappy SLi MB ... i have the best already .. so i can't pick NVIDIA multi GPU .. at any price

 

[Extelleron]

My last two cards have been nVidia; 8800GTS 640MB and now 8800GT 512MB. Before that I had an ATI X1900XT 512MB and an ATI 9600 128MB.

In my eyes, picking X1900XT over nVidia offerings didn't even require thinking... nVidia was outclassed with the outdated 7-series architecture and that really shows in modern games. That's not mentioning no HDR+AA support and lower IQ than ATI's offerings.

With G80, nVidia really stepped up their game and I think everyone, including ATI, was surprised. Their problem at this point is not hardware, but drivers... nVidia's driver support simply sucks, there's nothing else that can be said. With nVidia, there's always 5 different beta drivers floating around the web and you never know which one to use. And you can never just use the official driver, because it is always seriously outdated even when it is released. Then you have the minor, but still important, issues that have plagued nVidia's cards for the better part of two years now since G80 launched.

An example of this can be found right now... do I use the 169.44 beta that supposedly goes along with Patch 1.2, or do I use a hacked version of the 17x.xx drivers? Which one is newer? Chances are, the 169.44 beta works best with Crysis and the 17x.xx betas work better with everything else. So am I to switch between drivers before I switch games?

With AMD... there is no messing with 10 different drivers, there is one official driver and maybe a hotfix for a new game release or issue that needs fixing between releases.

 

[BenSkywalker]

it appears that you got some defective AMD HW

The fan would spin up at boot no problem, sounded like a hair dryer. I could pop open CCC and see my temps at 90C with a perfectly silent fan, fire up Riva and sure enough, fan wasn't spinning up. Would stay at ~20% at all times. It was BBATi- so defective hardware is certainly reasonable, but the fan would spin up just fine at boot.

But .. what IQ problems?

Set AF to max and play something other then a corridor shooter. I play WoW a decent amount, there are tons of surfaces everywhere around you pretty much all the time with erratic angles- ATi's boards exhibit disgustingly poor IQ when it comes to base filtering- very clearly inferior to the 6600 I have in one of the kids rigs and slap me across the face with a 2x4 inferior to the G92.

--i couldn't find a *single* NVIDIA card - before today - that would really beat my $480 frankenfire in my rig @ 16x10 including Ultra or 3870x2

You made the post tonight though, so I'm not quite getting what you mean exactly. At the ultra high end nVidia simply caves ATi's head in, but you don't want to spend that much...? Is that what it comes down to?

Now that GX2 is released, a [soon to be] $350 3870x2 upgrade in my own rig will also equal it's performance at 16x10/16x12.

i don't want a crappy SLi MB ... i have the best already .. so i can't pick NVIDIA multi GPU .. at any price

But the soon to $340 9800GX2 is still a better deal.....?

So IF the 3870x2 sees a large price cut AND you ignore the 790 AND you alread have a couple hundred dollar vid card in your system AND you are ok with not having top of the line performance but still want a lot faster then any single GPU solution then nVidia isn't a good deal if you game at 1600x1200- is that what you are saying?

 

[zylander]

Ive used nVidia products in every one of my builds and have always been satisfied. Ive been using nForce chipset boards since nForce 2 and Ive been using their video cards since the first GeForce. Never had any problems and I will continue to buy form them.

 

[Captante]

With the exception of the inexcusable 8800-seris Vista drivers delay I would go 100% because thats the only time I've had significant problems with any Nvidia product ... as it stands I had to vote fairly satisfied, but the poll could use more options.

 

[BFG10K]

I play WoW a decent amount, there are tons of surfaces everywhere around you pretty much all the time with erratic angles- ATi's boards exhibit disgustingly poor IQ when it comes to base filtering

Just curious, what specifally was the issue with IQ? Was it shimmering, unfiltered surfaces and/or something else? I have heard of shimmering issues on ATi boards in WoW.

Also did you try tinkering with Cat AI?

 

[nemesismk2]

Nvidia release good video cards but they are too expensive for the performance they offer. AMD/ATI offer almost as good performance for 40%-50% cheaper price!

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: BenSkywalker

it appears that you got some defective AMD HW

The fan would spin up at boot no problem, sounded like a hair dryer. I could pop open CCC and see my temps at 90C with a perfectly silent fan, fire up Riva and sure enough, fan wasn't spinning up. Would stay at ~20% at all times. It was BBATi- so defective hardware is certainly reasonable, but the fan would spin up just fine at boot.

Wow, sure sounds like a HW issue to me. i'd have RMA'd it

But .. what IQ problems?

Set AF to max and play something other then a corridor shooter. I play WoW a decent amount, there are tons of surfaces everywhere around you pretty much all the time with erratic angles- ATi's boards exhibit disgustingly poor IQ when it comes to base filtering- very clearly inferior to the 6600 I have in one of the kids rigs and slap me across the face with a 2x4 inferior to the G92.

Defective card ? x1800 wasn't THAT bad

--i couldn't find a *single* NVIDIA card - before today - that would really beat my $480 frankenfire in my rig @ 16x10 including Ultra or 3870x2

You made the post tonight though, so I'm not quite getting what you mean exactly. At the ultra high end nVidia simply caves ATi's head in, but you don't want to spend that much...? Is that what it comes down to?[/quote]

instead of dumping my current Xfire, i am going to spend $350 for basically a 3870X3 solution - that will compete nicely with a GX2 - and kill it at 8xMSAA, evidently

Now that GX2 is released, a [soon to be] $350 3870x2 upgrade in my own rig will also equal it's performance at 16x10/16x12.

i don't want a crappy SLi MB ... i have the best already .. so i can't pick NVIDIA multi GPU .. at any price

But the soon to $340 9800GX2 is still a better deal.....?

So IF the 3870x2 sees a large price cut AND you ignore the 790 AND you alread have a couple hundred dollar vid card in your system AND you are ok with not having top of the line performance but still want a lot faster then any single GPU solution then nVidia isn't a good deal if you game at 1600x1200- is that what you are saying?

Yes, i did say it was "for me" ... all i have to do is dump my 2900p for a 3870x2 - iot *will* get cheap! - and i will get GX2 performance in my rig at 16x12 .. for a LOT cheaper .. i am not insane enough to buy a brand new just-released SLi nForce MB just to see if they really improved it ... and i LIKE dual-LCDs
:roll:

quite simple and logical really
-for me

 

[BenSkywalker]

Just curious, what specifally was the issue with IQ? Was it shimmering, unfiltered surfaces and/or something else? I have heard of shimmering issues on ATi boards in WoW.

Say you are looking at a gently rolling hill right in front of you, you would have a texture that looked like it had about a -4 lod bias right next to one that had one that looked to be a +3, this wasn't isolated- it was everywhere. So much so that eventually I got used to it, started thinking it was a game specific problem. When I popped in the 9600 and set all AF options to max and fired up the game is was like- whoa- HUGE improvement in IQ. As far as what I tried, Cat AI, AF filtering options, Omega drivers, could never get it to look right. The AF just plain sucked. Now, it was actually a lot better then the R9800Pro which is pretty sad. With the 9600 it feels like Ti level AF quality, but without the HUGE performance hit. It's night and day.

Defective card ? x1800 wasn't THAT bad

No, it's the hack that ATi uses for AF. Their angle dependancy rarely shows up as major issue in something like a corridor shooter, it is all over the screen in something like WoW. Those that know me well know how much of a big deal base filtering is for me, heh, that was one of the first things BFG mentioned to me when I picked up a 9600- it drives me absolutely nuts to have improper base filtering. Shaders may now cover a very large portion of the screen, but base filtering still covers more- if it is wrong then your overall IQ takes a rather drastic hit.

instead of dumping my current Xfire, i am going to spend $350 for basically a 3870X3 solution - that will compete nicely with a GX2 - and kill it at 8xMSAA, evidently

When is it going to hit $350? Five years from now? Twenty? Seriously though, what I hear you saying is that if ATi does what you want them to do then they will be a better deal for you then what nVidia is currently doing. Also, you say you won't buy a new SLI mobo on the chance that it may not be better, but you will do just that with the 3870x2? You know it isn't the fastest, but that doesn't phase you however going with a new mobo would? In no way am I trying to knock your choice at all man, don't get me wrong, I'm just looking at how your decision relates to the broader populace

 

[Tweakin]

Originally posted by: hooflung
My 7800GT drivers in Vista 64 suck. The drivers in general have gone down hill since the 8 series was birthed tbh.

While that may be true, not much really "works" in Vista....

 

[NYHoustonman]

Put me in the 'drivers suck' boat.

I want those Crysis performance improvements from the 170 series damnit X(... Without having to mod .inf's...

 

[ajaidevsingh]

Originally posted by: NYHoustonman
Put me in the 'drivers suck' boat.

I want those Crysis performance improvements from the 170 series damnit X(... Without having to mod .inf's...

Same here!!! I was thinking AMD aka ATI sucked at software!!

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: BenSkywalker

Just curious, what specifally was the issue with IQ? Was it shimmering, unfiltered surfaces and/or something else? I have heard of shimmering issues on ATi boards in WoW.

Say you are looking at a gently rolling hill right in front of you, you would have a texture that looked like it had about a -4 lod bias right next to one that had one that looked to be a +3, this wasn't isolated- it was everywhere. So much so that eventually I got used to it, started thinking it was a game specific problem. When I popped in the 9600 and set all AF options to max and fired up the game is was like- whoa- HUGE improvement in IQ. As far as what I tried, Cat AI, AF filtering options, Omega drivers, could never get it to look right. The AF just plain sucked. Now, it was actually a lot better then the R9800Pro which is pretty sad. With the 9600 it feels like Ti level AF quality, but without the HUGE performance hit. It's night and day.

Defective card ? x1800 wasn't THAT bad

No, it's the hack that ATi uses for AF. Their angle dependancy rarely shows up as major issue in something like a corridor shooter, it is all over the screen in something like WoW. Those that know me well know how much of a big deal base filtering is for me, heh, that was one of the first things BFG mentioned to me when I picked up a 9600- it drives me absolutely nuts to have improper base filtering. Shaders may now cover a very large portion of the screen, but base filtering still covers more- if it is wrong then your overall IQ takes a rather drastic hit.

instead of dumping my current Xfire, i am going to spend $350 for basically a 3870X3 solution - that will compete nicely with a GX2 - and kill it at 8xMSAA, evidently

When is it going to hit $350? Five years from now? Twenty? Seriously though, what I hear you saying is that if ATi does what you want them to do then they will be a better deal for you then what nVidia is currently doing. Also, you say you won't buy a new SLI mobo on the chance that it may not be better, but you will do just that with the 3870x2? You know it isn't the fastest, but that doesn't phase you however going with a new mobo would? In no way am I trying to knock your choice at all man, don't get me wrong, I'm just looking at how your decision relates to the broader populace

Well, HD3870x2 dropped from $470 to $420 overnight .. i expect another $70 drop within a month. i am looking for a NewEgg sale ... LMK [anyone] if you see one. My CC is ready.

i don't need a new MB ... i already have a Xfire MB .. i am going to keep my HD2900xt and stick a HD3870x2 in there and dump the Pro.

i am going to actually compare IQ between r600 and r670 - it really interests me .. But i have ZERO idea about x1800 series ... i had x1950 and HD2900 which *don't* have anything you mention

i simply can't relate to the horror you are describing in IQ