Best Video Card for Gamers

[TripleRLtd]

I searched the forum and found a few over a year old.
So, how about a new "discussion"?
Facts:
Customer with WinXP and only 128mb DDR (which WILL be upgraded as that is a no brainer).
"Old" Geforce 2 card with 32 mb ram.
3D Games are slow with hesitation of frames, etc.
Intel 845 board.
My issue: I don't do games, as most of my customers are businesses, and I stopped using ATI cards a long time ago due to hardware/driver issues.
But, over the last year or so I have seen how ATI cards are winning all the accolades and benchmarks.
Talked to a tech at my supplier (he is a big gamer) and he is an Nvidia fan, citing the same issues that haunted ATI long ago.
So, why all the great reviews, specs, and benchmarks?
ATI's still problamatic, or what?
Anyway, what is the best card for gaming under $150 (unless I can convince him to shell out more).
I would prefer gamers opinions here as I check all the sites already.
I want hands on, OK.

[silencio]

I searched the forum and found a few over a year old.
So, how about a new "discussion"?
Facts:
Customer with WinXP and only 128mb DDR (which WILL be upgraded as that is a no brainer).
"Old" Geforce 2 card with 32 mb ram.
3D Games are slow with hesitation of frames, etc.
Intel 845 board.
My issue: I don't do games, as most of my customers are businesses, and I stopped using ATI cards a long time ago due to hardware/driver issues.
But, over the last year or so I have seen how ATI cards are winning all the accolades and benchmarks.
Talked to a tech at my supplier (he is a big gamer) and he is an Nvidia fan, citing the same issues that haunted ATI long ago.
So, why all the great reviews, specs, and benchmarks?
ATI's still problamatic, or what?
Anyway, what is the best card for gaming under $150 (unless I can convince him to shell out more).
I would prefer gamers opinions here as I check all the sites already.
I want hands on, OK.

I still won't buy an ATI because of various driver/lockup issues with DVDs, video input, etc. But, like you said, word on the street is that they're faster and the next gen will be here sooner than NVIDIA which will make the current cards cheaper. Personally, with game coders soon switching over to DX9 I think we're in a grey area where it would be smarter to wait. That said, I bought an MSI 5900 FX Ultra about 8 weeks ago and 4000 shares of ATI back in January.

I can only figure that somewhere along the road my mind was usurped by that Dogbert management book.

[BOHICA]

Great time to revisit that question, IMHO. Who has the bigger, er, ya: NVIDIA or ATI? The answers today are no where near as clear as they have been prior to the last 12 months or so.

Your conclusions are right on as far as the consensus goes in the gaming hardware community. ATI has held a slight edge in most benchmarks for the last 12 months now, but ATI continues to be plagued with driver and hardware compatibility "issues" out the ying-yang. That was mostly with DX8 games.... the picture is about to change, literally. DX-9 titles are looming on the horizon and that really does make a difference, as the links below will begin to illustrate.

I am an avid gamer, and have been for decades. Yes, decades, which means I am old It also means I have more money to blow on cool gaming toys! :butt:

There are real pros and cons of ATI vs NVIDIA.

NVIDIA has the "Detonator" drivers which is part of their Unified Driver Architecture, which is simply goregeous! And what is more amazing, unlike M$ and DotNot, they actually pull it off quite nicely! Keeping NVIDIA drivers updated is about as painless as it can be. (Not perfect mind you, but damn close.)

ATI has the "Catalyst" drivers, and updating them takes an act of Congress. No not really, but it is a multi-step process that is probably beyond the scope, or patience, of most users and is also probably a continuing source of their "issues". If you don't follow their step-by-steps EXACTLY you won't update the drivers completely, and may even render them useless. Joy! (If your customer is techno savvy, this is certainly not a daunting task, but if he is not, be prepared to be on the friggin phone listening to the whines..."my screen is all black when the video switches from desktop to the game..." over and over again until your head explodes! )

In my world, fps (frames per second) are everything, and for the last 3 odd years, NVIDIA was the KING, no question, no doubt, NVIDIA. During the last 12 months, NVIDIA's throne has been successfully challenged from a raw numbers perspective. The biggest reason, IMHO, that ATI has failed to ursurp the throne from NVIDIA is that their drivers are still cheese. That and the fact that their manufacturing capacity just isn't there (that may be changing as well, ATI has new deals with ASUS, which can refab the whole frikken electronics world with their capacities!!) This lead to a real pain in the butt when trying to get a high-end ATI card, and by the time you could get one, NVIDIA would throw out the next thing, which was readily available, and so on. Even during the last several years, ATI has had a slight edge in image quality, IMHO. But the sacrifice in FPS was simply not worth the tiny little igits in the eye-candy.

That was the DX-8 and earlier world, enter DX-9, and things really begin to look interesting.

Something I had noticed over the last few E3 shows was that many of the "next great thing" games (translation: DX-9 titles) were being demonstrated on ATI hardware. It was DooM-III in 2001, 2002, and now, 2003, it is DooM-III, HL-2 and a few other top titles, all showing their shiz on ATI Radeons....hmmm, why is that? Part of it is obvious, ATI bought it. They shucked out the sheckles to "co-market" at the shows, and in the case with ValvE and HL-2, they have an OEM "bundle" agreement to sell the vid-cards with the game. And the other part, as will be illustrated later, is performance, and eye-candy. If I am Gabe Newell of ValvE software, and I am trying to sell a new high-end game, I want it to look and perform the freaking best it can, because as we all know, sizzle and sex sells. Even if NVIDIA offered a little more than ATI (which is not the case) for the rights to co-market, fact is, my DX-9 title looks and performs better on the ATI board, so it is almost a no-brainer. So the picture becomes cloudier on what to tell your customer.

If he wants primarily to play the new DX-9 games coming out this holiday season and beyond (my bet he does), then ATI has the Throne, at least until NVIDIA comes out with it's next generation hardware. If he has to have a new rig NOW, then ATI. If he can wait until sometime next year to see what NVIDIA can do, then the question will need to be re-examined then. NVIDIA is a 900 lb gorilla, the bloody nose they have now with DX-9 benches is going to light a fire under their :butt:, and they will have to respond, or they will lose market share, and if that happens, the previous posters 4000 ATI shares may be worth something!

More Info:

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...1261768,00.asp

Mostly a repeat of the above:

http://techreport.com/etc/2003q3/valve/index.x?pg=1

And an interesting ditty on how NVIDIA has been cheating on the benchmarks in general:

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/news/news_6028894.html

The other economic "reality" is that high-end video boards for gamers are a tiny fraction of the video board market. If this question was about what to put in a desktop, the answer then, IMHO, is NVIDIA.

/end rant

[TripleRLtd]

Great time to revisit that question, IMHO. Who has the bigger, er, ya: NVIDIA or ATI? The answers today are no where near as clear as they have been prior to the last 12 months or so.

Your conclusions are right on as far as the consensus goes in the gaming hardware community. ATI has held a slight edge in most benchmarks for the last 12 months now, but ATI continues to be plagued with driver and hardware compatibility "issues" out the ying-yang. That was mostly with DX8 games.... the picture is about to change, literally. DX-9 titles are looming on the horizon and that really does make a difference, as the links below will begin to illustrate.

I am an avid gamer, and have been for decades. Yes, decades, which means I am old It also means I have more money to blow on cool gaming toys! :butt:

There are real pros and cons of ATI vs NVIDIA.

NVIDIA has the "Detonator" drivers which is part of their Unified Driver Architecture, which is simply goregeous! And what is more amazing, unlike M$ and DotNot, they actually pull it off quite nicely! Keeping NVIDIA drivers updated is about as painless as it can be. (Not perfect mind you, but damn close.)

ATI has the "Catalyst" drivers, and updating them takes an act of Congress. No not really, but it is a multi-step process that is probably beyond the scope, or patience, of most users and is also probably a continuing source of their "issues". If you don't follow their step-by-steps EXACTLY you won't update the drivers completely, and may even render them useless. Joy! (If your customer is techno savvy, this is certainly not a daunting task, but if he is not, be prepared to be on the friggin phone listening to the whines..."my screen is all black when the video switches from desktop to the game..." over and over again until your head explodes! )

In my world, fps (frames per second) are everything, and for the last 3 odd years, NVIDIA was the KING, no question, no doubt, NVIDIA. During the last 12 months, NVIDIA's throne has been successfully challenged from a raw numbers perspective. The biggest reason, IMHO, that ATI has failed to ursurp the throne from NVIDIA is that their drivers are still cheese. That and the fact that their manufacturing capacity just isn't there (that may be changing as well, ATI has new deals with ASUS, which can refab the whole frikken electronics world with their capacities!!) This lead to a real pain in the butt when trying to get a high-end ATI card, and by the time you could get one, NVIDIA would throw out the next thing, which was readily available, and so on. Even during the last several years, ATI has had a slight edge in image quality, IMHO. But the sacrifice in FPS was simply not worth the tiny little igits in the eye-candy.

That was the DX-8 and earlier world, enter DX-9, and things really begin to look interesting.

Something I had noticed over the last few E3 shows was that many of the "next great thing" games (translation: DX-9 titles) were being demonstrated on ATI hardware. It was DooM-III in 2001, 2002, and now, 2003, it is DooM-III, HL-2 and a few other top titles, all showing their shiz on ATI Radeons....hmmm, why is that? Part of it is obvious, ATI bought it. They shucked out the sheckles to "co-market" at the shows, and in the case with ValvE and HL-2, they have an OEM "bundle" agreement to sell the vid-cards with the game. And the other part, as will be illustrated later, is performance, and eye-candy. If I am Gabe Newell of ValvE software, and I am trying to sell a new high-end game, I want it to look and perform the freaking best it can, because as we all know, sizzle and sex sells. Even if NVIDIA offered a little more than ATI (which is not the case) for the rights to co-market, fact is, my DX-9 title looks and performs better on the ATI board, so it is almost a no-brainer. So the picture becomes cloudier on what to tell your customer.

If he wants primarily to play the new DX-9 games coming out this holiday season and beyond (my bet he does), then ATI has the Throne, at least until NVIDIA comes out with it's next generation hardware. If he has to have a new rig NOW, then ATI. If he can wait until sometime next year to see what NVIDIA can do, then the question will need to be re-examined then. NVIDIA is a 900 lb gorilla, the bloody nose they have now with DX-9 benches is going to light a fire under their :butt:, and they will have to respond, or they will lose market share, and if that happens, the previous posters 4000 ATI shares may be worth something!

More Info:

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...1261768,00.asp

Mostly a repeat of the above:

http://techreport.com/etc/2003q3/valve/index.x?pg=1

And an interesting ditty on how NVIDIA has been cheating on the benchmarks in general:

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/news/news_6028894.html

The other economic "reality" is that high-end video boards for gamers are a tiny fraction of the video board market. If this question was about what to put in a desktop, the answer then, IMHO, is NVIDIA.

/end rant

Well, "phew", a little more than I expected...
...but EXACTLY what I needed!!!
(Besides the links...you see I have read then all)...
...I wanted a "users' xp, a real "gamers" experience.
That is what you've given me,
as well as a WHOLE lot of editorial.
But hey, I asked and I got.
THANKS.
But, I am surprised at the "lack" of gamers on WinDrivers.
Anybody else?
The drivers+ issue is what turned me away from ATI in the first place (four years ago), as well as many others, and from your post, it SEEMS like nothing has changed.
Well:
tell me true now.!
HAS anything changed?
If I sell an ATI card which is faster=FPS, will I be on the phone with my customer every day or what?
THAT is what I am asking of Windrivers gamers...
...experience...hands on!!!
Tell me.
And thanks Bo, you are alright.

[Radical Dreamer]

Ok time for me to lay some flame bait

ATI drivers are buggy, and yes im saying that from experience not just because im an Nvidia "Fan Boy"

Everyone is giving nvidia crap now becase the FX series of cards was weak to say the least. Well, what about the last 4-5 years where they have churned out pretty much absolute gold in terms of gaming performance and stability and compatibility with the drivers?

The point im trying to make is everyone is switching sides now because a fluke happended where ATI made some decent cards at the same time Nvidia goofed up.

I'll wait for the next gen of cards before I make a final decision to leave my "Nvidia Rules" standpoint.

My choice for a good ~150 card would the the Nvidia GF 4 Ti 4400 or the 4600 if you can find one for a good price. Dont worry about the 8X agp crap, it makes absolutely NO difference in perfomance

[cisco2]

I'm not as much of a gamer as I used to be, but I still am a gamer. I bought the ATI 9700 pro earlier this year when I rebuilt. I rarely go out on a limb like that and buy something new and high end. I usually stick to hardware a notch or two back from cutting edge that has been tried and tested. I went with ATI because I read great reviews from multiple sources. I was upgrading from a GEForce3 video card and even though I've never had the highest impression of ATI, I was pleased to see that someone was offering some real competition for NVidia.

I have been very happy. I haven't had any driver issues or problems. Then again, not being as much of a gamer as I used to be I haven't been running a wide variety of games. I downloaded the latest drivers when I initially built my new PC and installed the card. Since then I have had no trouble so I haven't messed with it.

I can't contrast my experience VS. any current NVidia products but I can say the the 9700pro has been great to me. A couple tech friends I used to work with bought new Dell PCs about the same time as I was building mine. They both went with the 9700pro as well. I haven't heard either one of them mention anything problematic. One of them lives his life on his PC, he's always trying out the newest games. While we haven't talked video cards much, I'm pretty sure he still runs the 9700pro. He pulls down some pretty good coin, he would have replaced it by now if it was causing him any grief or not performing well.

Whether or not there are any "buggy" problems with 9700pro drivers, I haven't personally experienced any.

[BOHICA]

Ok, not so much wind this time, lol. But I was thinking about your question from a less emotional stance, lol, (I am passionate about machine performance and getting the best performance for the money.) So, maybe this will help:

Budget. If I break the queston down along the lines of how much money can be spent on the video card, the answer to the question is somewhat simpler. I would go this route, based on the the budget:

$60- 220: NVIDIA

Above $220 starts to tread into the current top-end debate between Radeon vs geForce FX. Until the Radeon 9700 Pro/Ultras were available, NVIDIA had the same or slightly lower performance, but also had a slight edge in price/performance, plus all the other positives in the NVIDIA court. There are other aesthetic reasons to steer clear of the early FX cards, like that honking 2-slot jet-engine loud cooling system, yowza! What were they thinking! A great middle-high-end value right now is the gf4 Ti4200 and Ti4600 cards with 128, 256 is better, and the "Ultra" series is the best (faster ram and core clocks). In my opinion, the ATI vs NVIDIA debate is around the uber card at the very top of the heap, and then only in regards to the DX9 performance. ATI Radeon 9800 Ultra > NVIDIA gf FX 5900 Ultra 256 in that eschelon.

I own a Radeon 9700 Ultra and the gf4 Ti 4600 256 and in DX8 games, the NVIDIA has an edge, mainly from the drivers I think. Both cards are running in XP systems, and the Ti 4600 is also in a 98SE (swap HD) system for old-games, like HL or CS, lol. The ONLY issue I have had with the Radeon have been driver related and power supply releated, and the "don't fix it if it isn't broken" mantra is doubly true with the Radeon drivers, meaning if you aren't having problems with what you are doing with the system, you don't need to update the drivers. The Radeon has an extra power connector to pull juice from the power supply, and via the AGP slot on the mobo, this really helps with overall stability.

Make sure you have a very well ventiliated system, and an excellent power supply. This is really important on gaming rigs.

Use the budget acid test, that should make deciding which way to go a little easier, lol.

BoH

[BOHICA]

Ok time for me to lay some flame bait

ATI drivers are buggy, and yes im saying that from experience not just because im an Nvidia "Fan Boy"

Everyone is giving nvidia crap now becase the FX series of cards was weak to say the least. Well, what about the last 4-5 years where they have churned out pretty much absolute gold in terms of gaming performance and stability and compatibility with the drivers?

The point im trying to make is everyone is switching sides now because a fluke happended where ATI made some decent cards at the same time Nvidia goofed up.

I'll wait for the next gen of cards before I make a final decision to leave my "Nvidia Rules" standpoint.

My choice for a good ~150 card would the the Nvidia GF 4 Ti 4400 or the 4600 if you can find one for a good price. Dont worry about the 8X agp crap, it makes absolutely NO difference in perfomance

I'm also somewhat in the thrall of NVIDIA for the same reasons as you are, and you are correct, the FX series of cards is just weak. They laid an egg on that product line. I think what happened is NVIDIA got comfortable on the throne, and was gloating about kicking ATI in the jimmie with a driver update with the first radeons and their gf3 series cards. That was hilarious. Then they nerfed themselves by getting content, probably figuring they could keep squashing ATI very simply with driver updates, and manufacturing capacity. Well, that is what happens in the competitive biz world when you get lazy, you get juked. Competition like this is GOOD for the consumer, it will keep the goliath on its toes! I have no doubt that NVIDIA will survive this current egg laying episode, they have critical mass and a good chunk of the OEM market, where the real money is. They also have enourmous resources, and some very, very clever engineers. The fab-plants just need to catch up to them! I too will likely wait awhile before I update the Ti4600... it will be interesting to see what happens to say the least!

Cheers!

[TripleRLtd]

All well and good,
and I love the editorials:
Bo, you ought to write for a gaming mag.
You must be a member of ALL those video card forums I've checked out, right?
Anyway,
good stuff so far, but I AM disappointed by the lack of replies.
May the powers that be keep this post on the front page so it becomes useful.
I am truly surprised by the lack of response.
I still haven't learned anything I didn't know already!
COME ON ATI users:
give me YOUR XP.
Good, Bad, Yes, or No?

PS:
The power and cooling are going to be taken care of:
Just like his lack of RAM, it goes without saying.
I need info on best video cards for gaming, nothing else.
thanks

[Poseidon]

Best card for under $150? - GeForce4 Ti 4200 would be my vote.

[Radical Dreamer]

All well and good,
and I love the editorials:
Bo, you ought to write for a gaming mag.
You must be a member of ALL those video card forums I've checked out, right?
Anyway,
good stuff so far, but I AM disappointed by the lack of replies.
May the powers that be keep this post on the front page so it becomes useful.
I am truly surprised by the lack of response.
I still haven't learned anything I didn't know already!
COME ON ATI users:
give me YOUR XP.
Good, Bad, Yes, or No?

PS:
The power and cooling are going to be taken care of:
Just like his lack of RAM, it goes without saying.
I need info on best video cards for gaming, nothing else.
thanks

You must realise that most people dont want to get into debates about what is better ATI or nVidia just like they dont want to get into debates about intel and amd, they usually end up in name calling and people just saying this product is better pretty much because i say so

[Takeda]

I'm a hardcore gamer and I've had Windrivers as my homepage in IE for the past 3 years.

hmm, I recently upgraded from a GeForce 2 MX400 to an ATI All-In-Wonder Radeon 9800 Pro. Thus far, I haven't noticed any problems whatsoever. And I've tried well over 200 popular games. Though, the one problem that I encountered was that it was incompatible with my motherboard (Abit KT7A-Raid), so I upgraded to the MSI K7N2 Delta and it's been running like a dream ever since. So if you can get past the main hardware compatibility issues (there are quite a few motherboards that don't work with the radeon 9x00), there shouldn't be any problems whatsoever.

Though, if you want a for sure workable card, I'd recommend either a high end NVIDIA GeForce FX 5900 Ultra or an NVIDIA GeForce 4 TI4600, because everything between those two cards sucks badly. =\

[Rô©kHøµñÐ]

Having owned bot Nvidia and ATI cards I personally will stick with nvidia. IMHO They have better driver support in both Windows and Linux.

With the ATI i had I had a few games that would just BSD the entire system after a few hours of play. And it was always the same error: IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL . I still find that BSD on newer DELL's at work with ATI cards even under XP. For that reason alone is why i stick with nvidia cards.

I have freinds that swear by ATI cards and it might be good for them but i try not to make the same mistake twice.

[Tacit_k]

Well I have to kick my 2 cents in here.

First off I was an Nvidia fan for some time then the boards got more expensive and the performance did not seem to match the $ figures. I now have a radeon 9700 pro and it sure as hell is quieter than the "dust buster" vacuum that Nvidia has to offer, if I wanted the top of the line I could get the quieter 5900 ultra from Nvidia but the ATI 9800 is quieter and out performs the damn thing anyhow.

I had trouble with DVDs back in the first gen radeon but now it is a different story. And Unlike Nvidia, ATI has yet to have a driver problem that resulted in a board overheat that desoldered the GPU from the board. (A problem discovered some time last year)

Now even Microsoft is dumping Nvidia for ATI in the X-BOX II.

Now for the meat and potatos, either board will do well for the gamer if the top of the line is used. Right now it looks like the Nvidia boards will not do well under DX9 with HL2 even though code optimizations were writen for the Nvidia. The fact that even second tier ATI boards seem to stomp all over Nvidia with regards to res and frame rates under HL2. I guess what I am saying is if you want to be sure about DX9 and your video card then ATI is the only choice at this time. If you are willing to wait and see then Nvidia just may pull off a driver update for their current line up then you may have an option. ANd if Nvidia can work some magic they just may have some real performers in the next line up but don't think ATI didn't learn from the past. I suspect that the choice to make the latest card an extension of the 9800 rather than call it the 9900 would mean they have a trick or two left in this generation of cards and they also have something to go well beyond that for the next gen. Personally my money is on ATI for at least the next 18 months. I am sure we'll all know the score by the end of October when we see what is in store for the Christmas buying season.

If Nvidia wants my money they will have to drop some weight Drop some price and learn to be silent.

[Radical Dreamer]

Well I have to kick my 2 cents in here.

First off I was an Nvidia fan for some time then the boards got more expensive and the performance did not seem to match the $ figures. I now have a radeon 9700 pro and it sure as hell is quieter than the "dust buster" vacuum that Nvidia has to offer, if I wanted the top of the line I could get the quieter 5900 ultra from Nvidia but the ATI 9800 is quieter and out performs the damn thing anyhow.

I had trouble with DVDs back in the first gen radeon but now it is a different story. And Unlike Nvidia, ATI has yet to have a driver problem that resulted in a board overheat that desoldered the GPU from the board. (A problem discovered some time last year)

Now even Microsoft is dumping Nvidia for ATI in the X-BOX II.

Now for the meat and potatos, either board will do well for the gamer if the top of the line is used. Right now it looks like the Nvidia boards will not do well under DX9 with HL2 even though code optimizations were writen for the Nvidia. The fact that even second tier ATI boards seem to stomp all over Nvidia with regards to res and frame rates under HL2. I guess what I am saying is if you want to be sure about DX9 and your video card then ATI is the only choice at this time. If you are willing to wait and see then Nvidia just may pull off a driver update for their current line up then you may have an option. ANd if Nvidia can work some magic they just may have some real performers in the next line up but don't think ATI didn't learn from the past. I suspect that the choice to make the latest card an extension of the 9800 rather than call it the 9900 would mean they have a trick or two left in this generation of cards and they also have something to go well beyond that for the next gen. Personally my money is on ATI for at least the next 18 months. I am sure we'll all know the score by the end of October when we see what is in store for the Christmas buying season.

If Nvidia wants my money they will have to drop some weight Drop some price and learn to be silent.

Sorry to have to bust your balls, but nVidia dropped the loud fan sometime back.
As for M$ dropping nVidia for ATI....well I seem to remember a price dispute between them not too long back. M$ had agreed on a certain price for the chips and then started bitching because nVidia didnt lower the price.