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I can't believe it!

M

Mitzi

Diamond Member
For the last couple of weeks/months I've been having issues trying to get my PC (which is getting pretty old) to work with Premiere Pro - the machine constantly freezes when scrubbing on the timeline, other than that its 100% stable. The video card in it is a GeForce4 4600.

On the weekend I found my old Matrox G400 in the loft so I just swapped them over to see if it makes a difference and WHOO! I can't believe the difference in image quality, how much snappier things feel in general AND the scrubbing problem seems to have disappeared!

This has to be the best downgrade I've ever done!

I remember Matrox in their day were renown for their image quality so my question: do any of todays cards have the same sort of quality that Matrox has/had? (I have no idea how their latest cards run)

BTW - I'm not a PC gamer anymore so I couldn't give a damn about what framerate I'd get in Doom 3!

 
Well, if you like Matrox's image quality, then pick up a Parhelia. They run games OK, just as long as you don't want to crank up the settings in the game, and they don't do DX9 well, but, since your not a PC gamer, then it shouldn't matter to you. I believe that I read somewhere that it performs about the same level as a Ti 4600, and maybe a bit faster, but not much. As I said, if you like the 2D IQ of Matrox, then the Parhelia should do OK for you. If you don't want to upgrade, well, then stick with what you have.
 
Matrox is probably still the gold standard in analog signal quality, and you certainly pay a premium for it (if not in price, then in comparatively deficient 3D speed). ATi tended to occupy the middle ground, with good signal quality but lower performance than nV. nV used to be the fastest but plagued with the most signal quality problems (likely due to substandard or suboptimal parts).

Nowadays, the difference in analog signal quality is probably much less pronounced, so you should be safe buying whichever IHV you prefer (for other reasons). ATi seems to have the edge over nVidia in terms of high-end DVI signal quality (I don't remember if Matrox was tested, but you can Google both ExtremeTech's and THG's "DVI Compliance" articles to find out). On the flip side, past tests at Firingsquad have shown nV to have the edge over ATi in 2D speed. So, there are still trade-offs, but I don't think they're as significant anymore.

As for your slowdowns in Premiere Pro's scrubbing, did you try different nVidia video drivers? Later ones may have helped that. I also thought the GF4 was comparable to the G400 in 2D speed, if I remember that Firingsquad article correctly. Maybe drivers could've helped there, too.

If you don't game and value signal quality over all else, you may as well just stick with Matrox. ATi and nV are successful for integrating fast 3D performance with typical 2D chores, so they're more likely to spend their time and money on 3D than 2D.
 
Thanks for the information, very useful!

A while back I tried a number of different Nvidia drivers and finally settled on the old 43 series drivers though they still also froze fairly frequently. As it stands I've been using Pro for a couple of hours now with the G400 and I'm delighted with the the speed and stability - it hasn't froze once! I think I'll stick with the G400 for the time being at least though I think I do need more extensive use/testing to be 100% sure about the stability issue.

Thanks again
 
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