My very last question about video quality GF4 - RADEON

[Texun]

I am upgrading from a 64M GF2 Pro to something else. I just received the 64M OEM RADEON and the image quality and detial is better in Jedi Night Outcast but I am having second thoughts about the deal. I wish now I had ordered a 128M card for the overhead that future software will demand, and I have already requested an RMA to send the R8500 back. My question is, should I get the 128M GF4TI-4200 or the 128M R8500LE? Price is important, but not as important as doing this thing right. I can go with either card as long as I know it will be a card I can keep for a while. I could stay in the $100 range but I would probably be looking for something else within a year and that is exactly what I want to avoid.

The GF4TI would be faster in the end, but I want a card in the $100-$165 range that delivers excellent image quality. Your thoughts?

NOTE: One more thing I wanted to mention - I am not an overclocker and I am not big on comparrisons that show one card within a couple of percentage points over the next. But what set me off with the RADEON was my Mad Onion score of 2614 which is almost half of what I got with my GF2. The games play okay and the downloaded drivers installed without a hitch, but I have read several posts where people were advised to do a clean install of XP when swapping from nVidia to ATI. That may help, but my thoughts on that are far to conservitive to accept that as a fix. I deleted all nVidia drivers and also edited them out of the registry. I have tons of apps and tweaks loaded on XP and I do not want to reformat unless I am forced to do so. Crashes are inevitable and I will have to do it eventually, but I personally do not see that as an acceptable fix for the problem.

Thanks

 

[Lizardman]

newegg has a 8500le 128 for 107 shipped. Thats as cheap as you can get.

 

[AnAndAustin]

Well if you'd rather stick to around $100 the Rad8500 cards are excellent. GF4TI4200 cards ($130-150) are clocked far below their true potential to promote the more expensive 4400 and 4600 cards and you'd be mad not to set the clocks a little higher, it is VERY easy and has no risk if you don't go biserk. If you really don't want to o/c then get a Rad8500 card. 128MB is well worth having too, certainly worth an extra $20.

As to image quality things are VERY close, for AA the GF4 is much better, for Aniso the Rad is faster but the GF4 is better quality, TVout is MUCH better on Rad, dual display is great on both, but do double check esp on Rads. True ATI Rads are well worth going for, you usually have to compromise on some (not all of) image/build quality, speed, o/c'ability and dual display if you go for a 3rd party Rad card so do check.

Just as a note, what CPU are you running? You won't gain much from these fast cards if you are far below 800mhz as your CPU will largely cripple them, enabling AA and Aniso will help to use up the untapped gfx power.

 

[Texun]

Thanks Austin:

Here is what I did.... got the RMA for the Rad and ordered one of a Gainward 4200TI with 128Megs @ 4ns. I'm not much for OC'ing other than to test the limits. I seldom ever leave my computer cranked to 11 but I do like to have a little head room now and then. I may RMA the Gainward for the Leadtech Winfast after looking at those heat sinks. I am not without video (still have 2 GF2's here - one that I pulled from this machine and one in P4) so I have time to give them the Gainward a look and feel test, but I have pretty much settled on nVidia for what I need. The image quality on the ATI is great and I can see why people go for them. $109 will buy a very strong card.

I am not a heavy gamer, I just don't like limits and I hope the days where I have to look at the specs on the game before buying it are over, at least for a few months. As far as the PC that I will be using the new card in, it is an XP1700, MSI K7T 266A with 512DDR which should be okay for a while. I HOPE!

Do you know if the GF4-128 will have more long term potential than the RAD-LE128?

Thanks for the detailed reply. This board has the very best people. Thanks for being one of them.

 

[AnAndAustin]

texun cool, I'm happy I helped.

ATI are excellent for image quality but you should find GF4TI cards easily just as good, they've come a long way since the GF3 and GF2 days. 4200-128 4.0ns is normally set to 250/444 with 280/500 being pretty damn safe and a whole lot faster, expect about 300/550 when pushed but it is wise to back off a few notches when you find your cards limit. As for swapping the Gainward for the Leadtek, I'd suggest against it, firstly Gainward are a stronger company and secondly RAM HS make no diff apart from asthetic pleasure, pretty, but pretty pointless.

Your config sounds excellent and you should find all things and esp gaming VERY nice indeed.

Rad8500LE 128MB is an excellent card at an excellent price, but the 4200 128MB will have a longer life and cope better with both older and newer games. Plus when you want to sell your 'old' card on the 4200-128MB should fetch a nicer price too. ATI have hurt the Rad8500 by releasing the poorly names Rad9000 cards, whereas nVidia have said (IIRC) there will never be a GF5, boding well since GF4TI would seem to be the top of the well-known GeForce pile. In terms of the future, Rad8500 and GF3 cards taper out after Ath1.4ghz (P4 1.6ghz) while the 4200 continues to improve in leaps and bounds.

HOORAY, that's by far the longest post I've been able to make for weeks, after reinstalling WinXP I have been severely limited in the size of an individual response, I thought it was Java but it turns out it was Telewest Broadband, I needed to route through a proxy server, and now I can delete stuff from my Hotmail account too!