Fig

Baffled by the choice so more questions:

What's better, ATI or NVidia? Why?

How do I tell a "proper ATI" from any other. Is it as simple as the name on the box?

How much ram do I need on the card?

What difference will I see by buying a card for say £200.00 over one for £100 or less?

Sorry, so many questions.

ChrisB

Which is better? Horses for courses. ATi win some benchmarks, NVidia others. If play one game lots, then look at the stats to see which wins on that game.

Not sure what you mean by "proper ATI". ATI make some of the cards, others are made using ATi designs by people like Sapphire and some people make their own custom designs but still use the ATi chipsets.

I can't see a case for buying a card with more than 128MB on at the moment.

The more you spend, the higher the frame rates you'll get in the games. If you're not a hardcore gamer but still like a blast now and again, I'd suggest looking at Radeon 9600XTs or maybe stretch to a NVidia 5900XT.

Fig

"Proper ATi" was picked up from another thread - I guessed ATI made some cards themselves whilst other made cards based on the ATI chipset. Is there any benefit of buying one over the others, or maybe a particular custom design to avoid?

ChrisB

If you trawel some of the hardware forums, you'll probably find some cards have a few stories about fans failing or brand X over clocking better (which usually comes down to RAM choice on some of the Radeons ie 9800).

My Dad's got a PowerColour 9600 - was the cheapest of the 9600s when he was buying.

lightning101

I have several PC's running various cards - speed is similar at same price brackets.


The major thing in ATI's favour is the video playback quality 3-4 times better and smoother than Geforce. Same file playing on both.

You can also enlarge film to full screen on both but Geforce would't be worth watching.

Ig you can still get one, try one of the Tachyon with hardware overclocking and all grpahical utilities - can overclock by 150mhz with good cooler.

Roland_STI

I have a Geforce FX 5600, before which i had a 4600Ti. Ill be going ATI 9800XT next

kamikaze

all depends if you play games or not

if you dont you might as well buy a 30 pound card
a 200 pound card would be a for a gaming enthusiast
however 100 pound still buys decent performance and should be fine for most people

StickyMicky

ive just payed £85 for a 256mb ddr card geforce fx5600

took it home,ran unreal 2003and put all thesettings on msx, worked fine,searched on google and found out i could increase the core speed by 100mhz and the memory by 50mhz

bargin card imo

Fig

Don't leave me in suspense........

Which card and where from?

StickyMicky

ohh sorry

its a sparkle 256mb ddr geforce fx 5600 xt card, it was bought from a computer fair local to me on sunday, loads of the stalls had them in.

i did a bit research and alot of people said they were crap?

all i know is that it pisses all over the 32mb nvidia mx 100/200 card which was installed (seriosly over clocked and running a extra fan lol)

cong

i got a 9600xt 128mb ram but it will beat the 5600 anytime remember its not quantity its quality and in all cases the 9600xt will beat the 5600 and beat the the 5700 aswell and it only costs about £100 iirc

StickyMicky

my 5600xt has 256mb tho?

lightning101

The 256mb of ram mainly loads large texture maps - does not accelerate anything.


A 64mb card could beat a 256mb card - e.g. 64mb Ti4800 could stuff a 256mb geforce 5600 on anything bar directX9 specific polygon rendering.

cong

the processor is much faster then the 5700 and the ram is faster then the 5700 iirc so all in all its better but has less ram eg. i have 1000mhz proccessor but 512mb 133mhz ram
on the over hand i have a1000mhz processor with 256mb 333mhz ram, the one with the faster ram will always win