Recent switch from Nvidia to ATI?

[Soleron]

@IDC

"Drivers are not an issue" != "Drivers have no issues"

 

[Idontcare]

@IDC

"Drivers are not an issue" != "Drivers have no issues"

Yeah, you guys are right. What was I thinking, silly me.

 

[MangoX]

My Iphone4 seems to have updates every week... hmm... looks like its time to jump ship...

 

[aigomorla]

AMD is the only responsible company in the market today compared to NV and Intel.

Define responsible?

Each and every vendor has a section where they royally mess up.

So saying 1 is more responsible then the other is totally camping the band camp.

Want me to really get started with ATi?

Well how about this on a typical Nvidia card, you dont need to wait 2 weeks for them to send to china and back on your RMA.

Infact, if your stateside, tell me a vendor greater then eVGA?


OP, as i said, when ur looking at 500+ dollar cards.. and u got 2 of them, so almost 1100 dollars in GPU... t

You look at warrenty / RMA. Because if those die, u want the best service possible.
And trust me, ive lost cards on both ends... ATI + NVIDIA.
There is no super card company which has 0 fail rates.

So i look at RMA turnaround time.
eVGA i get a new card in 2 days.
ATI - 2 weeks.

Sorry this is why i went Nvidia... yeah i paid for it..
But if something dies... i wont be crying for 2 weeks.. it will be 2 days while my premium RMA is started with advance replacement.

 

[SickBeast]

I actually made the switch from ATi to nVidia about 3 years ago and I haven't looked back. I do find that the nVidia drivers are better overall, and I've been happy with the performance of their GPUs.

Right now I still see the GTX 460 as a tremendous value. A pair of them in SLI is a great deal as well. AMD has competing parts, but I've heard that SLI is a little bit better than Crossfire, and the nVidia GPUs tend to produce less heat, which is useful with multiple GPUs.

I don't think now is a time where we will see a mass exodus of people switching brands. Both companies have excellent products right now, particularly in the midrange where it's an all out war.

The one reason I think nVidia's numbers are going to start to slip is because of the Fusion chips where the GPU is integrated. 95% of people are going to think that integrated graphics are "good enough". That really kills off a lot of nVidia's market.

 

[Jacky60]

I've been with ATI since my 8800GTX overclocked. Not brand loyal I just go with whoever gives me most bang per buck assuming same image quality etc. I had problems installing my 6990's but only because I stupidly left remnants of previous driver installs in the machine. Now she's sweet and I get 70fps unigine 1920/1200 Extreme tessellation 16AF 8xAA.

 

[Athadeus]

I think everyone agrees that evga is the video card vendor with the best support. However, the price/performance of the cards they sell makes them a difficult choice compared to the price/performance of cards from AMD GPU vendors. If AMD GPUs had a moderate or higher failure rate, then support would be a more significant issue, but I know that they have a very low failure rate from having worked with many hundreds of systems.

This GTX500 series seems to be one straying farther above AMD's HD6800 series in price/performance than many previous generations. I am really hoping that Kepler and HD7k series are closer, not to promote more price competition, but to make selecting by features the major factor.

 

[Spike]

I considered the 570 but went with the 6970 right at launch with the hopes that more performance would be forthcoming down the road. At this point I'm not sure where I stand, sometimes I regret not getting the 570 and other times I really like the 6970. Once I add my third monitor the 6970 will have been my only choice (between the 2 that is) but apart from that I'm still torn, 5 months later.

 

[tincart]

The golden rules:

Anecdotal evidence of driver problems is never a good source from which we might produce statements about driver stability in general.

The opposite is also true. Anecdotal evidence of a lack of driver problems is not a good source for making statements about driver stability in general.

 

[Madcatatlas]

Define responsible?

Each and every vendor has a section where they royally mess up.

So saying 1 is more responsible then the other is totally camping the band camp.

Want me to really get started with ATi?

Well how about this on a typical Nvidia card, you dont need to wait 2 weeks for them to send to china and back on your RMA.

Infact, if your stateside, tell me a vendor greater then eVGA?


OP, as i said, when ur looking at 500+ dollar cards.. and u got 2 of them, so almost 1100 dollars in GPU... t

You look at warrenty / RMA. Because if those die, u want the best service possible.
And trust me, ive lost cards on both ends... ATI + NVIDIA.
There is no super card company which has 0 fail rates.

So i look at RMA turnaround time.
eVGA i get a new card in 2 days.
ATI - 2 weeks.

Sorry this is why i went Nvidia... yeah i paid for it..
But if something dies... i wont be crying for 2 weeks.. it will be 2 days while my premium RMA is started with advance replacement.

Sorry but this is some funny fail. Why the heck are you comparing RMA between a graphics card producer and a graphics card vendor/AIB?

Incase you didnt know, AMD has several AIBs etc and im sure youll find a list and read up on their RMA terms etc. Since your such a fan of evga, maybe xfx has something for you.

edit: so yeah, you payed for a faulty reasoning is what im reading.

 

[Gikaseixas]

Of course, this it is self-evident, yes? They both have driver issues, hence the existence of driver updates that go beyond the hardware release cycle itself.

Both companies have monthly drivers updates but the way you laid out your argument it seemed only AMD did it. Go back and read your own post.

I made that statement and it's correct. AMD drivers are very stable, robust and don't suck at all compared to nVidia's. Yes that's the benchmark we have to use don't you agree??

 

[aigomorla]

Sorry but this is some funny fail. Why the heck are you comparing RMA between a graphics card producer and a graphics card vendor/AIB?

Wait.. so when u end up looking at 500+ dollar video cards, dont you look at RMA? Or do you naturally assume its never going to die?

Because lately, i never assume that.

Ive had to RMA a 580GTX believe it or not.
Ive had to RMA a lot of ATI cards more then once.

NO VENDOR IS PERFECT. So you look at which vendor has the better people support no?

so tell me then which ATI vendor doesnt have a RMA turnaround time of that?

XFX still has a long turn around time... its DAY and NIGHT vs. eVGA.

Most of them require you to send to vendor, which then sends it off to china.. then when they get it back, they send it back to you.
This has been my experience with ALL high end AMD cards.



Now if ur looking at budget level cards, then yeah the RMA service isnt important.

But if ur looking at 400-500-600-700 dollar cards... oh boy... i hope you considered it having a possibility of dying b4 its refresh period.
So you should consider RMA.


now dont get me wrong... im not pushing 1 or the other.
Im just stating when i was commited in investing that much in my gpu sector, i actually considered RMA.

And its saved me once.. as i said. Ive already LOST 1 580GTX... it just randomly died, and eVGA took care of it right away.
And they didnt even care about the aftermarket sink I had as long as there was no user damage on the pcb, which is VERY important to someone who waterblocks everything.

Most vendors VOID warrenty the moment u swap the stock heat sink.

 

[SickBeast]

The lifetime warranty is good to have on a GPU. I find that they are the next most likely thing to die in your computer after your PSU and hard drive. They're way less reliable than CPUs and motherboards IME.

The RMA experience is important, but what's more important is that you're covered by a decent warranty. No matter what, an RMA is a PITA because you'll be without a computer so long as you don't have a spare GPU lying around (which most people don't).

aigomorla, what brand was your GTX 580? They sound like a good company to deal with.

 

[Elfear]

Considered a pair of 570s or 2GB 460s but ultimately went with 6950s. They offered better performance for 1600p and cost less (vs. 570's). Looking back it was a great decision since the 570's lack sufficient vram and the 460's lack sufficient horsepower.

Aigo - I'm not sure your RMA arguement is as valid as you think. Certainly the ease of sending a card in is important when your card fails but for most people that happens so infrequently that it is a non-issue IMO. Judging by the amount of RMAs you've had are you sure it isn't from extreme cooling issues or insane amounts of voltage?

It's purely anecdotal, but in 7 years of swapping cards every 6 months or so I've never had one fail, be it Nvidia or AMD/ATI. Most I have modestly overvolted and some I have watercooled so I'm not easy on my hardware. I've also built dozens of systems for work and for friends and I can think of only one GPU dying because it was really old and the fan failed.

 

[mezzeron]

I had always had Nvidia cards untill the 5870 came out. Got the Sapphire Vapor-X and was blown away. Never had any issues, and was the quietest card ive ever had. I recently switched to a GTX 580. Great performance, but i really wasnt totally blown away by it the way i was the 5870. And it has reference cooling which im not a big fan of. In process of watercooling anyway so it doesent matter much.

I wish i had waited a little bit and got the 6970. A Sapphiire of course.

But, now im making a setup for my racing rig, and going to go 3 monitors, so ill prob get one. 1 6970 wont max everything but it will get the job done (i hope.)

Not a fanboy of any camp. But i love for my Nvidia cards to be EVGA, Sapphirre for ATI.

 

[Obsoleet]

Define responsible?

More WHQL driver updates.

 

[Obsoleet]

My Iphone4 seems to have updates every week... hmm... looks like its time to jump ship...

Yup, updates mean the product is a fail. No one likes or uses an iPhone because they require so many updates.

Get a Microsoft Kin (Geforce) instead, you don't want an iPhone.

 

[Mistwalker]

I made that statement and it's correct. AMD drivers are very stable, robust and don't suck at all compared to nVidia's. Yes that's the benchmark we have to use don't you agree??

I assume it wasn't what you said so much as the tone that is the issue:

Drivers are not an issue and if somebody tells you they have an issue, then he/she is full of it.

Not only is this a gross generalization, it's a pretty antagonistic way to make your point.

People are pretty sensitive on this board, be careful with hyperbole and sarcasm--someone is bound to take it the wrong way.

For my two cents, I also get tired of people with no firsthand experience bashing AMD's drivers (I personally haven't had an issue in three years) but I'm only one user. This thread isn't about defending your purchasing decisions or reasoning anyway.

 

[Gikaseixas]

Agree with you Mistwalker, some egos do get hurt easily...

 

[Keysplayr]

Agree with you Mistwalker, some egos do get hurt easily...

Did you also agree when he said, "it's a pretty antagonistic way to make your point." ??

 

[akugami]

Why would you make such a statement when referencing a company that has a monthly (and sometimes even more frequent) driver release schedule plus hotfixes?

If the drivers weren't an issue, wouldn't that driver update frequency and hotfix, patch, beta release frequency be a lot closer to zero?

Obviously there ARE driver issues, hence the frequent updates to the drivers.

But why try and act like it isn't true? Every product out there that can be updated has an update cycle to it, from your mobo's BIOS to the security updates for your OS to the firmware for your SSD to the drivers for your GPU. If everything was perfect then there'd be no need for updates, but nothing is ever perfect and thank god we get updates to correct the less acceptable problems in time.

I'll agree with you that ATI does have driver issues, as does nVidia. I just disagree with the legions of nVidia fanboys (not you) who make it sound like ATI's drivers are so buggy as to be unusable. And there are some who do that even now when it hasn't really been true for years.

It was probably not your intention but a monthly driver update cycle does not mean their drivers are bad or has lots of issues. At least not anything glaring most of the time. I think it's more of a different driver update philosophy but I'll go further and say that it is AMD trying to dispel the persistent comments about the quality of their drivers.

 

[Borealis7]

the ATI drivers argument sounds to me like "i have several beers every other night, and one time i puked. so beer is obviously bad."

how can you say beer is bad??

 

[Mem]

Define responsible?

Each and every vendor has a section where they royally mess up.

So saying 1 is more responsible then the other is totally camping the band camp.

Want me to really get started with ATi?

Well how about this on a typical Nvidia card, you dont need to wait 2 weeks for them to send to china and back on your RMA.

Infact, if your stateside, tell me a vendor greater then eVGA?


OP, as i said, when ur looking at 500+ dollar cards.. and u got 2 of them, so almost 1100 dollars in GPU... t

You look at warrenty / RMA. Because if those die, u want the best service possible.
And trust me, ive lost cards on both ends... ATI + NVIDIA.
There is no super card company which has 0 fail rates.

So i look at RMA turnaround time.
eVGA i get a new card in 2 days.
ATI - 2 weeks.

Sorry this is why i went Nvidia... yeah i paid for it..
But if something dies... i wont be crying for 2 weeks.. it will be 2 days while my premium RMA is started with advance replacement.

I think its a bit more complex then what you actually make it out to be since it depends on brand and also country you live in,so honestly I would not say its a case of Nvidia or ATi ,but brand and country you live in plus their RMA policy and turnaround.

Talking of RMA which has never been an issue for me,I think the only card I had that was ever faulty was Leadtek 7800 card,all my other ATI /Nvidia cards have never gone faulty.
I still have GF2 MX and ATI 9700 cards going strong on my Linux rigs.

I could easily live without a card for a few weeks,especially when in my case I have quite a few PCs and Nvidia based gaming laptop.



I do prefer(slightly) ATi over Nvidia, only because I like their regular driver updates and I have had less problems over the years with ATi ,end of the day each to their own.

Btw I think we can all live without a card for 2 weeks if we had too,ie go out with your GF/wife enjoy life since its not the end of the world .

 

[MangoX]

Btw I think we can all live without a card for 2 weeks if we had too,ie go out with your GF/wife enjoy life since its not the end of the world .

Well if you're a Raid Leader then you *must* have your graphics card

 

[Mem]

Well if you're a Raid Leader then you *must* have your graphics card

Good raid leader has a deputy ,heard of management .