*Who needs a Radeon?*

[Phuz]

I'd like to adress the Radeon minority here.

Who needs Radeon?

ATi (Radeon 64DDR) Vs. nVidia (GF2 GTS 64) ----> Win2k/Win98Se -----> Performance & Stability

And

We all know the Radeon hardly "hold a candle" to the GeForce GTS performance wise, so I don't need to point that out.

But the Radeon has better 2D Quailty right..? Not always.
The 2D on nVidia cards is bad only on aperature grille monitors.
Do some side by sides with shadow mask monitors (like a Samsung Syncmaster?)

Not flames please, I really want to understand. :disgust:

-Phuz

edit <puts on flame suit>

 

[TravisBickle]

ahem, it seems that in 32bit and with DX8 or bump mapping features the Radeons are right in there with the GTS. i think the texture features of the Radeon are pretty sometimes but the card is a bit flaky to me and the fsaa weak. nvidia probably has better driver options for it and the benefit of gaining serious speed by dropping to 16bit. but a DDR LE is so much cheaper than a GTS!

 

[Howard]

<< The 2D on nVidia cards is bad only on aperature grille monitors.
Do some side by sides with shadow mask monitors. >>



You tested this yourself?

 

[Howard]

<< We all know the Radeon hardly &quot;hold a candle&quot; to the GeForce GTS performance wise, so I don't need to point that out. >>



Pure, undisguised flamebait.

 

[Phuz]

 

[Rand]

How about people that want the best DVD performance possible?
I doubt anyone can argue that ATi cards have long had fantastic hardware DVD acceleration. Aperture grill monitors ARE the majority, sorthe Radeon would have better image quality on the majority of monitors and NEVER have I seen ANY proof at ALL that the GeForce looks any better on a Shadow Mask CRT than on a Aperture Grill CRT.

Besides, price performance wise the Radeon LE certainly looks a hell of a lot nicer to me than any NVidia card.
Also, the Windows 2000 drives while still not up to par have improved DRASTICALLY since Anand did his Win2k gaming performance roundup.

I'm far from a fan of the Radeon but there are good points to it, and there are definitely areas where the Radeon looks better then the GF series.

 

[Phuz]

Those aren't extremly sinifigant reason though!



<< ...and there are definitely areas where the Radeon looks better then the GF series. >>



And what areas are those?

 

[Rand]

I already stated areas in which the Radeon is better. If you would read through my previous post you would see that, however I will expand upon that in this post also if you wish.

If your not playing games then the GF series doesnt even look all that great. Radeon has better 2D, better DVD, more features.

Try doing some CAD work on the GF series, it's certainly pretty fast in those areas also but it has severe graphical flaws in those programs that undermine it's performance. Graphical flaws that the Radeon does not have.

And if you wanted a cheap video card for gaming what would you pick, the GF2 MX or the Radeon LE?
I would take the Radeon LE anyday, and I suspect most people would also.

What if you want a card that has all the bells and whistles the the All In Wonder Radeon?
Even the Asus &quot;Deluxe&quot; series of GF cards doesnt have as many extras as that card has. So if you want decent gaming performance and a card that can do pretty much anything else then the AIW Radeon looks awfully appealing.

I like the GF2, in general I would take it over the Radeon any day. But as I keep pointing out, the GF2 is not the be all and end all of video cards and there are certainly areas it isnt all that great.

 

[KpocAlypse]

I went for a g400 to a Radeon 64 Vivo, ANd i'm sure not complaining about performance(in w2k no Less)

constant 60-71 fps in CS, &quot;with everything on for looks in RadeonTweaker&quot;. haven't tested tribes 2 yet(don't know command line command for fps), but i can say that it looks darn pretty, with no visiable lag or problems.(been playing for the last couple of days)

2500 score with p3 700/256meg no overclock

2d is similar to my g400

DVD playback is just plain amazing..

So i might not have the raw power of a GF2 ultra. But for my use, it works pretty well. Not to mention that after rebate it costs me about 150 bucks...

 

[demenion]

<< I'd like to adress the Radeon minority here.

Who needs Radeon?

ATi (Radeon 64DDR) Vs. nVidia (GF2 GTS 64) ----> Win2k/Win98Se -----> Performance &amp; Stability

And

We all know the Radeon hardly &quot;hold a candle&quot; to the GeForce GTS performance wise, so I don't need to point that out.

But the Radeon has better 2D Quailty right..? Not always.
The 2D on nVidia cards is bad only on aperature grille monitors.
Do some side by sides with shadow mask monitors (like a Samsung Syncmaster?)

Not flames please, I really want to understand. :disgust:

-Phuz

edit <puts on flame suit> >>



the Win2K comparison article is dated February 20th, 2001, and was using the 3100 drivers.

The 3116 and 3124 drivers are much improved in performance and is around 2 % slower in OpenGL compared to the latest Win9X drivers for the Radeon. D3D performace is just as fast or even faster then Win9x.

sh1tty performace in win2k is no more.

the people who say that Win2k drivers suck are usually people who don't even own a Radeon..

128x Anisotropic Filtering setting for OpenGL games look amazing....

Especially Serious Sam, Counter-Strike and Quake 3.

3rd Texture Unit (But I think the only game that uses it right now is Serious Sam)

Also the stated 2d and DVD quality.

To ME the colors on the Radeon look a lot better then a GTS (I used to own a 64 MB GTS 2). I can really notice especially when on another system with a GeForce in it.

And the Radeon LE is the best budget card right out right now, and the 64 MB VIVO is a good price for a 64 meg DDR card with video in and video out.

 

[Phuz]

ohhh.. the DATE of that article ruins my arguement
When will there be a new comparison

 

[EvilDonnyboy]

Jeez. Why do Nvidia (trying my best to not say &quot;nVidiots&quot owners must always try their best to make EVERYONE agree that Nvidia is the best in the world bar none, nobody should ever own a card thats not maxe by Nvidia.

Why Nvidia cards mite rok for u, but it mite suk for others. Whats the point of this thread, other than to say &quot;why are you Radeon owners so stupid? Radeon suks peroid, theres no reason to get a Radeon over a GF2&quot;. Well there are reasons to get a GF2 over a Radeon. But also, there are reasons to get a Radeon instead of a GF2. That should be obvious. So for ur preference is a GF2, for others it may be a Radeon. Why can't u leave it at that?

 

[Zucchini]

who said it was better?? i just can't get a gts for 77bux As for the monitors.. i hate shadow mask monitors

 

[Wingznut]

If you are so happy with your nVidia, and already convinced that it's better than a Radeon... Why bother with such a thread? To convince others of your opinion? What's the point?

I bought a new video card last month. I narrowed down my choices to a GF2 64mb PRO and a Radeon 64mb DDR VIVO. I chose the Radeon, and I'll tell you why:

• I wanted hardware DVD decoding.
• I didn't want to play the &quot;GF 2D quality lottery&quot;.
• So, if what you say is true about bad 2D being an issue on ApGrille's, then I'm particularly happy with my decision.
• Both 2D and 3D image quality is arguably better. And if the Radeon is not better, it certainly isn't worse.

So, to summarize... I'm giving up a few fps for the benefits listed above. I can play Giants at 1280x1024x32 with all details maxed, without slowdown. What benefit is it to me to be able to have a few more fps? Especially in lieu of the above points?

 

[Pete]

Hey, flamebait, try to contribute to the signal portion of these forums, not the noise part. You didn't have an argument--the date of Anands article makes no difference. What, did you think you'd change Radeon owners' minds with a stupid flame? And if you're going to flame, at least try to spell correctly, so you minimize the amount of things we can pick on you for.

Why don't you venture out to sites other than Anandtech and look up some info on your own?

 

[Phuz]

How typical of some of you to say i'm an nVidia owner, I was asking WHY since nVidia cards are more popular. I wasn't flaming.

 

[arod324]

I say that people who want near Geforce GTS 2 performance, for half the price should go for a Radeon DDR LE. I have this card, and I just say it rocks for it's pricerange, and will beat some cards above its price range. Personally, I have not had a SINGLE driver problem with the Radeon's, and the 2D quality is awesome for me, and if I ever got a DVD drive, I'm sure that the DVD will be as good as the people have mentioned. To me the reason why people like nvidia, is because of just the name. I mean, if you most people (average joe that knows a little about computers, but not like an anandtecher or geek) about a KyroII, or a Geforce 2 GTS, 9 times out of 10, I would bet the would choose the GTS, since they would be able the same price. However, to this person's mistake, they would have bought a worse card, just because it had the name.

 

[BFG10K]

The article you linked to is both old and it doesn't back up any of your statements.
Generally speaking you'll have to do better than that if you want to argue with ATi lovers.

 

[oldfart]

<< We all know the Radeon hardly &quot;hold a candle&quot; to the GeForce GTS performance wise, so I don't need to point that out. >>


Do we really? You are sure about that? Lets see. I'll use my own example. I have a Radeon 64 DDR. It goes for about $180 or so currently. A GF2 64 goes for about $190. Fair enough comparison? I run Win98 on a PIII @ 933 with DX8 and 7099 drivers. I'll use a recent article to show a few numbers. You can find it here. My standard of a good game setting is 1024 x 768 x 32. This is a nice middle of the road setting. I'll compare the most recent drivers that they used in the testing. 11.00 on the GF2 and 7089 on the Rad64. I'll use a processor close to my own, a PIII 1 Gig. From the article:


GF2/64 | Rad/64

Q3 demo002:
88.4 | 80.6

Unreal (average)
79.3 | 82.5

Expendable
85.7 | 82.5

FAKK2
67.4 | 60.9

Here are some UT scores from Anands recent GF MX test:

GF2/64 | Rad/64
84.52 | 87.87

Here are some Serious Sam scores from the same article:

GF2/64 | Rad/64
47.2 | 50.1

Of course there are tons of variables, different processors, overclocking the cards, etc. I just picked out a few typical examples. The results are pretty consistent on other combos as well.

I think &quot;hardly hold a candle&quot; is pretty far from the truth.

 

[Phuz]

That's why I said:


<< ohhh.. the DATE of that article ruins my arguement >>

 

[KpocAlypse]

<< I was asking WHY since nVidia cards are more popular >>



Time to fire back! Well not really fire, but.....

Overall, ATi probally kills Nivida in total card sales..But then there is the issue of this forum being more &quot;nivida&quot; frendly. Well there probally a pretty good answer for that.
One, i think there is a good population of gamers in these forums, and well, most gamers will probally get a GF based card because they want the fastest game performance. Two, I quite honestly wasn't too impress with the radeon when it first came out, and was pretty anti ati at the time cuz of the rage chip being kinda crapy, but it is one product that has simply gotten better with age. TO a point that i just bought a 64meg Vivo last week.
And i think that you will see an increased presence of ATI cards due to its cheap cost high speed ratio. Also, my view, and possiably others has improved somewhat by the radeon.(in comparison to the rage series chip, which i had no love for)