Radeon Vivo VS. "Radeon"

[chako]

Hi. I need help buying a 3d card, and but this might not be "just another message".
Before you think i'm crazy because of the prices i'll metion you in a bit, i ask you to consider that i live in Argentina, south ameria, and actually that's the biggest problem.
Even with and AMD thunderbird C 1.2 Ghz at $265, and memory prices as low as $179 a memory dimm pc2100 (pc-266) 256 Mb cas3, 3d cars are very expensive here (Hercules 3D prophet III - GeForce 3 costs... $875!!!!!!!).

My needs are:
tv-out
excellent 2D
excellent 3d (this ins't going to be a big problem since my monitor's best res. is 800*600).

I am thinking in one "ATI RADEON 32 MB DDR AGP 4X BOX" (directly from the newspaper); an "ATI RADEON VIVO 64 MB" for $295 and an "ATI RADEON 32 MB" for ¡¡¡$150!!!, and the last 2 cards are from the same computer store.

If you think that the publicity isn't clear enought, you're right. And the people who sell this cards know them less that I, i mean, they can't tell me EXACTLY what card are they talking about (...). (One note: here e-commerce doesn't exists, almost).

So, witch card you think I have to buy? Witch are the differencies between the Radeon Vivo, the normal 32 MB radeon and the Radeon LE?

Thanks and excuse for my ass-english.

 

[Rand]

The 64MB VIVO Radeon is clocked at 183/183 in Retail Box, and 166/166 is OEM. Comes with DDR-SDRAM and the VIVO capabilities. Some newer Retail 64MB VIVO Radeon's are coming clocked at 195/195 but those are still in the minority.

The regular 32MB DDR Radeon is clocked at 166/166 in both OEM and Retail, uses DDR SDRAM still.

The Radeon LE is clocked at 148/148 and only sold in OEM format. Also uses DDR SDRAM as do the above cards. It also has HyperZ disabled by default in DirectX and enabled in openGL. HyperZ can be enabled by a relatively simple registry hack. Many people have had very good luck in overclocking the LE.

The Radeon 32MB SDR card is a Redeon clocked at 166/166 and sold as an OEM product only, comes equipped with conventional SDR SDRAM.

The Radeon VE provides Dual Monitor support, only has one pixel pipeline compared to the Rgular Radeon's 2. use's a downgraded 300MHz RAMDAC compared to the regular radeon's 360MHz RAMDAC. It also uses DDR SDRAM but on a 64bit memory bus, yielding theoretical bandwidth equivalent to that of the SDR Radeon. Is clocked at 166/166 in both Retail and OEM.

The All in Wonder Radeon is clocked at 166/166 in both Retail and OEM. Equipped with 32MB DDR SDRAM. provides Video In/Out and also provides a TV Tuner.

Those are all the desktop variants of the Radeon for the PC.
There are of course also varients for the Mobile platform and for the Mac.

 

[Bestill]

chako, enable your private messaging in your profile. Click profile at the top of this message board, then click the ON button next to Allow Private Messages.

 

[NicColt]

Very well said Rand.

 

[ProviaFan]

FYI, in case you didn't know, VIVO = Video In/Video Out. That might be the deciding factor, if you need that capability or not.

 

[peroni]

<< The Radeon 32MB SDR card is a Redeon clocked at 166/166 and sold as an OEM product only, comes equipped with conventional SDR SDRAM.q]


Actually SDR version it's clocked at 160/160 in the OEM version.
There is also a Retail version (at least in Europe) dunno how far is the memory cloked on this one.

 

[ProviaFan]

I have a retail Radeon SDR PCI...bought it at an Office Depot in the U.S.A. I've never bothered to check what it's clocked at yet. It comes in a box with a taranchula (sp?) on it.