Radeon owners...are you satisfied with your card?

[Spoooon]

I posted earlier about a suggestion for a possible upgrade. I'm not considering a 32 meg DDR Radeon. Are you REALLY satisfied with your card? Confident that Ati will improve on their relatively dismal driver support? I need honest opinions here, and not zealot propaganda.

The games I'm currently playing are:
Quake III
Deus Ex
Baldur's Gate II
MDK2
Everquest

 

[MustangSVT]

im happy with mine. but if u are worried about driver updates, go with Nvidia cards. with prices under $150 for GTS, you wont be dissappointed and they do have better driver updates and lot of drivers to choose from.

radeon's strength is in it's superior visual qualty and MUCH better DVD playback. It's not bad for a gaming card, but still if u want the fastest number cruncher, Geforce2 wins it.

 

[Spoooon]

Thanks for the info Mustang. I'm not really interested in the most powerful solution. I'm really just concerned with price vs. performance. Do I really think a GTS is worth paying 30 dollars more for? I'm not sure that I do anymore. I don't really need to get 1000fps at 1600x1200 or anything like that. Good 32 bit performance at 1024x768 is what I'm looking for. And so far, it seems like the Radeon fits the bill. From what I've read, it will be a significant upgrade for the money I'm spending (I sold my MX for 100, so the card should only cost me around 40 dollars). Anyone else?

 

[SendTrash]

Hmm... I am pretty happy with my Radeon AIW... I waited so long for this card. But if I had to do it over, I would consider the GeForce 2 64.. Since they are both in the same price range. Radeon is not the card if you like to cite benchmarks, but if you want to play games and do other stuff like record video and TV (which I have found infinitely great) then consider the All in Wonder, it really does everything.

 

[Taz4158]

<< Thanks for the info Mustang. I'm not really interested in the most powerful solution. I'm really just concerned with price vs. performance. Do I really think a GTS is worth paying 30 dollars more for? I'm not sure that I do anymore. I don't really need to get 1000fps at 1600x1200 or anything like that. Good 32 bit performance at 1024x768 is what I'm looking for. And so far, it seems like the Radeon fits the bill. From what I've read, it will be a significant upgrade for the money I'm spending (I sold my MX for 100, so the card should only cost me around 40 dollars). Anyone else? >>



Sounds like you have the right priorities for a Radeon. Which do you prefer? A big brutish V8 which wins on some straightaways or a great handling technologically superior V6 that will dominate the V8 when the you get into the curves and tricky stuff?

 

[UsandThem]

I love my AIW Radeon.

The driver support for me is fine (I run Windows 98SE and have a BX motherboard) so my system is as stable as it has ever been.

They are getting their act together with Windows2000 now too (can't blame them though, a lot of companies were very slow to get great drivers out for that OS)

NVIDIA does do a lot more driver updates, but I always hated installing their drivers and then having to update them every week when I had my Geforce2 card.

If you want the &quot;gaming&quot; Radeon go with the 64 MB version if you are able too. The 32 MB version is good but not great. Plus the 32 MB is clocked at 166/166 Mhz where the 64 MB is at 183/183 I believe.

People tend to forget how much a problem NVIDIA and AMD had with the Athlon and the VIA and AMD chipset motherboards. They had to run the cards in 1X. I don't know if they ever provided a fix for that one.

 

[Spoooon]

Well, my MX has been in AGP 4x mode since day one. I can't afford the 64 meg Radeon, so it isn't an option for me. Besides, shelling out for the 64 meg Radeon sort of defeats the whole point of me getting a Radeon anyway. If I really wanted super FPS, I'd just get the 32 meg GTS. I just hope driver support is adequate. I ordered a 32 meg DDR Radeon from buy.com for $134.90. I went ahead and paid for 2nd day air so it will get here quick. I hope I like it.

 

[GakValadep]

I'm very happy with my Radeon card, it's very powerful and, the most important thing, its quality and performance (image, colors and speed) are excellent; I don't know another cards but Radeon is a very good one.

 

[SleepyTim]

I think you will be very happy with the Radeon. It has GeForce2 GTS speed in 32-bit gaming (a little slower sometimes, a little faster sometimes, depending on the game and resolution), it has better image quality for 32-bit gaming, better 2D desktop image quality, great features, and the best DVD playback around. The Win98 drivers are excellent and the Win2K drivers have steadily improved and are now within 10% of the Win98 performance. The only significant advantage the GeForce2 GTS would have given you is 16-bit performance. You will be playing in 32-bit with this card though. That's what the card was designed for and that's what it does best. The 32-bit performance and image quality is fantastic.

I have a GeForce2 Ultra in one rig and 64MB Radeon in the other. While the Ultra is faster, the Radeon is still plenty fast and offers visual quality for 32-bit gaming that the Ultra just can't match. They are both awesome cards though, and I wouldn't trade either one of them. Anyone who tries to knock the Radeon is just being silly. While the Ultra is the undisputed speed champ, the Radeon is also excellent, and the most well rounded card. I also ordered the 32MB Radeon for my little brother's Christmas present and got the same deal as you. For that price you will be shocked at the level of performance and quality you are going to get. Even that 32MB version will give you near GTS speed in 32-bit high resolution, and many nice extras that no other card has. For the price you paid, you are going to be very happy man.

I love my Ultra. It's a crazy fast monster card. However the Radeon impresses me just as much and that's why I have them both. I even upgraded my second machine so I could have this setup, and do some serious LAN gaming with the best of both worlds. Anybody that says the GeForce2 or Radeon cards suck for any reason is just trying to blow smoke, and make their own card look better. They are both such great cards that any normal person (especially gamer) would be thrilled to have any version of either one of them.

 

[bluemax]

Another question to Radeon owners: How does your new FSAA work with your games, compatible? For that matter, do all your games work well? Have any examples of games that don't work properly with the Radeon cards?

 

[Spoooon]

<< For the price you paid, you are going to be very happy man. >>


Excellent. Now, I can't wait for them to ship the card. It should get here at the same time as my 256 meg DIMM.