What I think about the ATI Radeon 8500

[AzraelDemitri]

Christmas is fast approaching and I can replace my year old GF2 MX. I've been reading and looking at so many reviews about what I could replace my old card with.

I want a high end video card. The choice goes down to a GF3 Ti 500 against the ATI Radeon 8500.

Of course the GF3 Ti 500 has better drivers and performance.
ATI fans could say: "As of now. Wait for the new drivers and see the Radeon 8500 kick GF3 Ti 500 butt."
Nvidia fans would answer back: "By that time, there would be a new product."

I always thought that I would compare the ATI/Nvidia battle with the AMD/Intel one and chances are, I cannot. Why?

Although AMD like ATI is considered as the second best/underdog/next choice to Intel and Nvidia, AMD can compete and gets people satisfied. Their cpu's perform better in both theoretical and real world benchmarks. That is where I don't see ATI do their work. Bad drivers, unsupported features, and unstable performance pretty much puts ATI in the doubtful list of a typical buyer like me.

But I admit that I am inclined to buy the Radeon 8500 because it just has so much to give and costs so much less. The doubt in me lingers... "Is waiting for the new drivers to come out everytime worth the wait?" "Incremental performance boosts would make me happier?"

For me, yes it would. I feel that there would be no monumental changes in the world of graphics cards for the next few months and if ever there would be one, what I would buy now, would still be considered "blazing fast" until the next card comes out.

I hate to admit that I'm going to buy an ATI Radeon 8500 because of the price. I pity ATI because obviously, the production and research cost that went to the making of the ATI Radeon 8500 costs more than they are charging us right now. I just hope that they do come out strong in the end, just what AMD is trying to do, and not end up like 3dfx did.

So ATI, dammit get those drivers out

 

[epod]

At least their latest drivers have a lot of things fixed. Mipmapping w/ Trilinear filtering is still horrid. Trilinear filtering with anisotropic doesn't even exist.

Besides those two things, everything else works and it looks splendid. I just played and beat Return to Castle Wolfenstein on the hardest difficulty, and it was.. awesome =) .. looked AWESOME.

 

[Hawk]

well, think of it this way. By the time the new Nvidia product comes out, it'll cost MORE than the Ti500 and that is more expensive than the 8500 already. So you are paying less for a card that will last longer (if those predictions are true).

But nowadays it really doesn't matter which one you get, especially since you are upgrading from a GF2 MX, both will improve your performance dramatically, assuming you have like a 1GHZ+ CPU.

 

[jfunk]

Another thing is, does it really matter if the performance is as high as GF3 or not?

Thats one thing I don't get about all this video card debating stuff going on....

Who gives crap if your game of Q3 is running at 120FPS or 80FPS????

In my experience as long as I'm over 40FPS I can't tell the difference anyway, so as long as the card is fast ENOUGH, let the other features and price decide....


j

 

[ss284]

You must have bad eyes because i can easily tell the difference between 60 and 75 fps.

About the ATi radeon 8500, I hate its drivers more than I hate creatives... maybe.
I would trade it for a GF3 with dualhead anyday (sadly that isnt gonna happen)

-Steve

 

[PointlesS]

I thought ATI proved themselves on how their drivers are maturing with the last driver set...no one really believed they would be able to pull off a "nVidia" and get a boost of about 15-20 frames...but they did....I hope they can pull off another one for my radeon 8500

 

[Hawk]

yep, I think 100 fps and 120 fps means nothing, besides, I would sacrifice 20% speed for eye candy anyday (assuming it's still above like 50fps sustained).

 

[ShadowHunter]

If you by the ATi, I guarentee you will regret it. Very ugly, and hardly played any faster then my old Radeon did.

 

[Orbius]

Lol ugly, the one thing that isnt really contested is that the Radeon has brighter and crisper image quality.

 

[SpeedTester]

<< If you by the ATi, I guarentee you will regret it. Very ugly, and hardly played any faster then my old Radeon did. >>



Hardware will only run as good as the person who sets it up.

 

[AA0]

I really have to comment on it being unstable, it is everything but. My 8500 has never crashed a game, or the computer nor has any other ATI product since the rage 128s (before that, thats where those awful driver rumors come from).



shadow hunter is probably playing halflife or hes on something.

 

[AGodspeed]

Do some research first.

During our tests with a Matrox G450, G550, ATI Radeon VE, Radeon All-in-Wonder, the WinFast Ti 500 showed better image consistency than any other card. While the Matrox cards were already displayed razor sharp text, the WinFast slightly passed it in terms of resolution scaling. At 1600x1200x85Hz, lines and text on the WinFast Ti 500 exhibited no noticeable ghosting or blur while the G550 showed very faint signs of edge blurriness

The myth of better 2D should be considered close to completely bullsh!t because of Leadtek's smart decisions. I guess that's another one you can't claim now AA0.

 

[AA0]

one review says it has a great 2d, although they didn't compare the 8500, so you never know. And I never accept anything from just one review. The 8500 has a nice ramdac too, I'd like someone to test both, people have been saying that the new ATI drivers surpassed matrox as well in 2d.

The real problem is other GF cards are still crap, and you have to pay $320 for that one, not worth it imo. People always take the cheaper cards.

The 3d quality is still worse, unless you tweak it.

 

[ss284]

g400 is crisper than my 8500.
And my friends radeon 32 ddr plays back dvds better.

-Steve

 

[Zarich]

I have owned both cards.
A visiontek Ti500 and a retail Radeon 8500.

Let me say that anyone who remotely believes that the ti500 has inferior IQ in the 2d game or the 3d game if fooling themselves. The 2D iq at 1024x768 is equal across the board. If you are running at 1600x1200 that may be another story (seek help). The 3d IQ on the ti 500 is far superior to the 8500. First off the filtering technicques on the ti500 are much better then the 8500. Secondly the color saturation on the 8500 is way to bright and thus very unrealistic. 3rdly the texture shimmering is worse on the 8500 then the ti500. Finally the gamma on the 8500 sucks.

Also speed wise. I play dark age of camelot. PLay it on the 8500.. everything shimmers practically.. and it runs okay on a 1.2ghz thunderbird. Play it on a ti500.. yes somethings still shimmer, but not near as many.. the lighting is more accurate and it runs perfectly smooth with no slowdown anywhere.

The 8500 is definetly cheaper. The drivers are fine. But for my money I take the ti500 for stability, compatibility and 3d IQ.

 

[tlemmon]

I went thru 4 different GF3 cards in search of crisp 2d text. I finally found one. The Leadtek TDH GF3. This card is awesome, and while it may not beat the Matrox, (very close tho) it?s definitely better than the Radeon 8500 I tried (agonized) with. Nvidia seems to have better stability with their drivers than ATI _ever_ will. I do not care if ATI claims they are trying to fix the problem. It?s nice to have bells and whistles, but what good are they if they are cracked and make no noise? (figuratively speaking). I don?t think I will ever get another ATI card.


-t



Once bitten... twice shy...
twice bitten.. stay out of the damn water!

 

[AGodspeed]

The 3d quality is still worse, unless you tweak it.

I think you need to get over this AA0. GeForce3 cards have just as good if not better 3D speed AND image quality than the 8500, and 2D is not an issue if you get the right manufacturer (like Leadtek or Gainward). Like Zarich, I've used both the 8500 and Ti500 (and regular GeF3), and have noticed that there's little difference, and if anything the GeF3's have better 3D image quality and again, 2D is not an issue with the right manufacturer. I won't even mention the driver issues (even though they aren't terrible, why deal with it at all if you can get a better for the same if not better price).

 

[tazdevl]

Well, I've had a GF3Ti200, couple of GF3's (Gainward's worth noting) and a 8500. 8500 is my first ATI purchase, been a loyal nVIDIA customer since the TNT2.

I occasionally get a small issue or two with my 8500, but all in all I'd have to say it's a pretty good card. 1280X1024 I can say it's 2D IMO is better than any of the other cards I've owned on my 22" Mitsu 2040u.

As long as I consistenly get over 75FPS, I'm happy. Don't need 170 FPS to play a game and my monitor won't refresh that high... so who cares. As to the whole Ti500 issue... if you buy one knowing you're going to pick up a new card in the next round, you're a fool with too much time and money on your hands.

ATI should have a new driver rev out soon... we shall see what happens. I think they are battling some internal issues and mindsets that have been around for a while. Being a non-student for a few years and having worked in the corporate for many moons... I know that trying to solve these issues takes time. In many cases a couple years. The new Prez is a great guy, formerly of SGI, and if anyone can turn it around, it's him.

There should be a new driver rev out soon from ATI, we shall see how they do in round 3.

 

[AA0]

3d quality isn't even a issue, if you read any articles discussing it (since the quake thing is fixed), ATI 3d quality is far better at defaults. You have to start to take performance hits just to get a GF3 upto the same defaults at the 8500.

Both have the ability to have the same 3d quality, but soon as you do that, the Ti500 performance gap is no longer a gap.

 

[scootmaster]

i had a radeon and people said there would be go drivers and there never were and still are not. The 8500 will never have good drivers either, smoothvision sucks, go to rage3d.com and look at everyones problems. When i have my radeon i spent tons of time trying to make it work waiting and waiting and not to mention waiting for new drivers with no improvment in any, it seems like they go backwards.

i just purchased a gainward geforce 3 powerpack with vivo and i have no problems with it. Its fast FFSA works great at 4X with most stuff at 1024x768. And the 2D image quality is the same if not better than my radeon. Now i can play my games and not try to fix them all the time.

 

[The_Lurker]

"That is where I don't see ATI do their work. Bad drivers, unsupported features, and unstable performance pretty much puts ATI in the doubtful list of a typical buyer like me."

I'm always amused by these unwarranted comments. I have known people that own a Radeon LE (me ), Radeon 7500, Radeon 8500, GeForce 2's, TNT2's, TNT's, Matrox G400's, and everyone of them can tell you they've have their share of problems w/ EVERY SINGLE ONE of those cards, be it driver related, hardware related, or just user related. The fact is w/ ATi's drivers right now, they're working just fine. Yes, Mipmapping and trilinear filtering w/ Anistropic filtering is so far non-existent, but the drivers aren't unstable, and perform sub par. I dont even know where you're getting the "unstable performance" comment from.

"The 3d IQ on the ti 500 is far superior to the 8500. First off the filtering technicques on the ti500 are much better then the 8500. Secondly the color saturation on the 8500 is way to bright and thus very unrealistic."
The color saturation on the R8500 is hardly "unrealistic". If you think looking at things w/ cataract, then sure it's "unrealistic" and the Ti 500 is right up your alley. The reason the Radeon's looked nicer was because of the color saturdation. ALthough you can fix the GeForces color problems by using a color calabration tool. Perhaps it's just you though, *shrug*.

I guess in the end is whether you're willing to pay extra dough (lotsa extra dougH) for the Ti 500. THe Ti 200 would be a much better choice if you're going to go w/ a GeForce 3, although bear in mind then, the Radeon 8500 can beat out the Ti 200 (unless you oc to near Ti 500 speeds where then it'll inch out the R8500). Guess it's what you look for. The extra 20 fps in Q3 when ur screaming at 120fps? or save the dough and have an extra meal or two?