x800 vs. 6800 series...2D image quality??

[Imyourzero]

I will be looking to get one of these cards when I upgrade my rig to an A64 system in the next couple of months. I'm having a really difficult time deciding on which card to go with because the benchmarks are impressive for both cards and vary greatly depending on which game they are running.

I haven't seen any mention of the 2D quality of these cards. 2D quality is pretty important to me since the majority of time spent on my computer is at the desktop in Firefox, DVD Shrink, etc.

Back when I bought my 9700 Pro, ATI had the edge over the nVidia cards in 2D quality and basically I want to know if this is still the case. Matrox and ATI have traditionally fared better than nVidia in image quality, though I saw on HardOCP that the 6800's image quality in Doom3 was slightly better as far as jaggies and texture quality. Does anyone have any news on the 2D aspects of these cards?

 

[GeneralGrievous]

ATI has better 2d.

 

[Pete]

I could've sworn this exact question was asked not one week ago, and 6800 owners said their signal quality was fine.

 

[Link]

ATI still has slightly better 2d, but nVidia has caught up a lot.
I know this because I was using 9800pro until 3 days ago.

 

[Imyourzero]

Originally posted by: Pete
I could've sworn this exact question was asked not one week ago, and 6800 owners said their signal quality was fine.

Of course it will be "fine," I mean I don't think it would be terrible by any means. But if you had 2 Windows desktops side by side in a comparison, the ATI might be noticeably better/sharper. This was the case in the past and I was just wondering if it still held true.

Another question--are all the 6800 cards of the same series pretty much identical in speed? In other words, would the 6800 GT's by PNY, XFX, Leadtek, etc. all be roughly equal in speed? I know the Gainward Golden Samples are the exception as they are typically faster...so is picking up a card just a matter of deciding which card design and bundle you like the best? Back in the GeForce 2/GF3 days when they did a big roundup of the Asus/Leadtek/Visiontek/etc. cards, they were all usually within a few frames per second of each other but some stood out as slightly better performers for reasons beyond me.

 

[Gurck]

Originally posted by: Imyourzero

Originally posted by: Pete
I could've sworn this exact question was asked not one week ago, and 6800 owners said their signal quality was fine.

Of course it will be "fine," I mean I don't think it would be terrible by any means. But if you had 2 Windows desktops side by side in a comparison, the ATI might be noticeably better/sharper. This was the case in the past and I was just wondering if it still held true.

Another question--are all the 6800 cards of the same series pretty much identical in speed? In other words, would the 6800 GT's by PNY, XFX, Leadtek, etc. all be roughly equal in speed? I know the Gainward Golden Samples are the exception as they are typically faster...so is picking up a card just a matter of deciding which card design and bundle you like the best? Back in the GeForce 2/GF3 days when they did a big roundup of the Asus/Leadtek/Visiontek/etc. cards, they were all usually within a few frames per second of each other but some stood out as slightly better performers for reasons beyond me.

IIRC BFG's 6800GT comes factory OC'd, ie. a warrantied overclock. Other than that they should all be fairly similar, with some brands making better overclockers than others.

 

[Bar81]

Originally posted by: Imyourzero

Originally posted by: Pete
I could've sworn this exact question was asked not one week ago, and 6800 owners said their signal quality was fine.

Of course it will be "fine," I mean I don't think it would be terrible by any means. But if you had 2 Windows desktops side by side in a comparison, the ATI might be noticeably better/sharper. This was the case in the past and I was just wondering if it still held true.

In my experience that is still the case. My BBA X800 Pro is clearly sharper than both BFG 6800 GTs I've tried (and since nVidia is sourcing all the cards for everyone atm then it will hold true across the entire brand range of 6800 cards)

 

[Imyourzero]

OK I figured as much, but since nVidia's 3D quality was said to be better in Doom3 I wondered if their 2D was superior as well. The differences in 3D quality between the two brands of cards is something people are less likely to notice, since most games are constantly in motion, but when you're sitting there staring at a Windows desktop you may notice more of a difference in 2D quality.

Here's another question since I don't want to start another thread...as far as the 6800 series cards, is the only difference between the GT and the Ultra clock speed, while the vanilla 6800 is underclocked and has fewer pipelines? If so, the GT would appear to be the best buy since it doesn't take up an additional PCI slot and power connector like the Ultra. I've already seen some people reaching Ultra speeds with the GT cards, so is there any real reason that the Ultras take up an additional slot and require another power connector?

 

[big4x4]

In my experience recently with ATI and Nvidia, I have found that my bfg 5900 actually had much cleaner and crisper text than the 9800 pro I have now. From what I heard, it depends on what company makes it (using higher quality components). I cannot speak for the new ones, but they can't be much different from eachother.

 

[Shad0hawK]

Originally posted by: Imyourzero
I will be looking to get one of these cards when I upgrade my rig to an A64 system in the next couple of months. I'm having a really difficult time deciding on which card to go with because the benchmarks are impressive for both cards and vary greatly depending on which game they are running.

I haven't seen any mention of the 2D quality of these cards. 2D quality is pretty important to me since the majority of time spent on my computer is at the desktop in Firefox, DVD Shrink, etc.

Back when I bought my 9700 Pro, ATI had the edge over the nVidia cards in 2D quality and basically I want to know if this is still the case. Matrox and ATI have traditionally fared better than nVidia in image quality, though I saw on HardOCP that the 6800's image quality in Doom3 was slightly better as far as jaggies and texture quality. Does anyone have any news on the 2D aspects of these cards?

when it comes to 2d(or IQ in 3d apps for that matter) matrox looks better by no small margin...these guys had "16x" AA and still the best AA method i think...almost 3 years ago and the 2d by matrox on a nice monitor is simply stunning..head and shoulders above both ATI and Nvidia. if only they could keep up FPS wise...i would be a definate matrox "fanboy" all the way

no matter what card you like though i would say 75%(or more) of the 2d equation is the monitor and what refresh rate it likes the best for 2d.

one last thought i wanted to add, no matter what card you have your overall picture quality usually will be improved by downloading the actual monitor driver from the manufacturer instead of using the generic windows driver...a very easy thing to overlook, but you guys knew that

 

[GeneralGrievous]

If so, the GT would appear to be the best buy since it doesn't take up an additional PCI slot and power connector like the Ultra. I've already seen some people reaching Ultra speeds with the GT cards, so is there any real reason that the Ultras take up an additional slot and require another power connector?

The 1 slot cooler is a disadvantage. The card reaches 80 C under load for most people, some even get 90 C.

The Ultra has a 2 slot cooler, is clocked at 400/1100 as opposed to 350/1000, and comes dual DVI.

 

[JBT]

Agree with general here. I would RATHER have a two slot cooler for my GT and even two molex connectors if it can make it that much better in terms of OCability. Oh well. I plan on getting some Water cooling sometime soon so I won't need either.

 

[kylebisme]

ati cards have very good 2d, nvidia doesn't make cards. people that make cards with nvidia chips have varing quality control standards, and many of them don't stack up to ati's cards when it comes to 2d image quality. if you want a nvidia based card with 2d that stacks up to ati's stuff, i recomend leadtek.

 

[Imyourzero]

Originally posted by: TheSnowman
ati cards have very good 2d, nvidia doesn't make cards. people that make cards with nvidia chips have varing quality control standards, and many of them don't stack up to ati's cards when it comes to 2d image quality. if you want a nvidia based card with 2d that stacks up to ati's stuff, i recomend leadtek.

Yeah, I had the Leadtek GeForce 3 Ti500 and was very satisfied with the 2D quality. I remember I got that card because it performed well in benchmarks and in a review they said that Leadtek used high quality parts to make the 2D portion of the card better than the competitors.

 

[Bar81]

Originally posted by: TheSnowman
ati cards have very good 2d, nvidia doesn't make cards. people that make cards with nvidia chips have varing quality control standards, and many of them don't stack up to ati's cards when it comes to 2d image quality. if you want a nvidia based card with 2d that stacks up to ati's stuff, i recomend leadtek.

You have no clue what you're talking about. NEITHER ATI or nVidia make their own cards. Rather they outsource them from places like TSMC. EVERY 6800 card is exactly the same as they are ALL outsourced by nVidia themselves; the only thing the respective companies add is the cooler. Later on, individual companies will begin to outsource their own cards based on their own design but that isn't now. Get your facts straight before you spout your nonsense.

 

[big4x4]

Originally posted by: Bar81

Originally posted by: TheSnowman
ati cards have very good 2d, nvidia doesn't make cards. people that make cards with nvidia chips have varing quality control standards, and many of them don't stack up to ati's cards when it comes to 2d image quality. if you want a nvidia based card with 2d that stacks up to ati's stuff, i recomend leadtek.

You have no clue what you're talking about. NEITHER ATI or nVidia make their own cards. Rather they outsource them from places like TSMC. EVERY 6800 card is exactly the same as they are ALL outsourced by nVidia themselves; the only thing the respective companies add is the cooler. Later on, individual companies will begin to outsource their own cards based on their own design but that isn't now. Get your facts straight before you spout your nonsense.

OUCH!

 

[kylebisme]

Originally posted by: Bar81

Originally posted by: TheSnowman
ati cards have very good 2d, nvidia doesn't make cards. people that make cards with nvidia chips have varing quality control standards, and many of them don't stack up to ati's cards when it comes to 2d image quality. if you want a nvidia based card with 2d that stacks up to ati's stuff, i recomend leadtek.

You have no clue what you're talking about. NEITHER ATI or nVidia make their own cards. Rather they outsource them from places like TSMC. EVERY 6800 card is exactly the same as they are ALL outsourced by nVidia themselves; the only thing the respective companies add is the cooler. Later on, individual companies will begin to outsource their own cards based on their own design but that isn't now. Get your facts straight before you spout your nonsense.

since when did TSMC start makeing anything but chips? or are you the one that has trouble keeping his facts straight?

 

[kylebisme]

oh and i never said that ati makes cards, i said that ati cards have very good 2d quality. when i say this i am talking about the cards ati sells themselves, as they are manufatured to ati's specs which insure that quality.

 

[ZimZum]

For one thing ATI allows very little if any deviation from their reference design, by 3rd party manufacturers. Hercules stopped production of ATI cards basically for that reason.

 

[sharkeeper]

Ati badly needs better colour controls to rival nV's digital vibrance. Their dib-blit acceleration is also slower than nV's.

If you use DVI, clarity doesn't matter across the board unless you have a faulty card.

Cheers!

 

[Bar81]

Originally posted by: sharkeeper
Ati badly needs better colour controls to rival nV's digital vibrance. Their dib-blit acceleration is also slower than nV's.

If you use DVI, clarity doesn't matter across the board unless you have a faulty card.

Cheers!

Based on my experience as I stated above that is definitely *not* the case, the ATI DVI is noticeably clearer.

 

[Bar81]

Originally posted by: TheSnowman

Originally posted by: Bar81

Originally posted by: TheSnowman
ati cards have very good 2d, nvidia doesn't make cards. people that make cards with nvidia chips have varing quality control standards, and many of them don't stack up to ati's cards when it comes to 2d image quality. if you want a nvidia based card with 2d that stacks up to ati's stuff, i recomend leadtek.

You have no clue what you're talking about. NEITHER ATI or nVidia make their own cards. Rather they outsource them from places like TSMC. EVERY 6800 card is exactly the same as they are ALL outsourced by nVidia themselves; the only thing the respective companies add is the cooler. Later on, individual companies will begin to outsource their own cards based on their own design but that isn't now. Get your facts straight before you spout your nonsense.

since when did TSMC start makeing anything but chips? or are you the one that has trouble keeping his facts straight?

Learn what outsourcing means. Try www.dictionary.com

 

[Link]

upto 120C, it's ok.

 

[FluxCap]

I compared them side by side and you could not tell a difference between my 9800 Pro and my 6800 GT on a CRT in regards to 2D.

 

[kylebisme]

Originally posted by: Bar81

Originally posted by: TheSnowman

Originally posted by: Bar81

Originally posted by: TheSnowman
ati cards have very good 2d, nvidia doesn't make cards. people that make cards with nvidia chips have varing quality control standards, and many of them don't stack up to ati's cards when it comes to 2d image quality. if you want a nvidia based card with 2d that stacks up to ati's stuff, i recomend leadtek.

You have no clue what you're talking about. NEITHER ATI or nVidia make their own cards. Rather they outsource them from places like TSMC. EVERY 6800 card is exactly the same as they are ALL outsourced by nVidia themselves; the only thing the respective companies add is the cooler. Later on, individual companies will begin to outsource their own cards based on their own design but that isn't now. Get your facts straight before you spout your nonsense.

since when did TSMC start makeing anything but chips? or are you the one that has trouble keeping his facts straight?

Learn what outsourcing means. Try www.dictionary.com

lol, i know what outsorcing means. again, TSMC makes chips, they don't make cards, outsorced for nvidia or anyone else. other companies make cards, one of them being leadtek.