Video card decision

[Yoda9864]

I'm going to be upgrading my video card withint 1-2 months and I'm not sure whether to get ATI or nVidia. I've researched them high and low, looked at comarisons and benchmarks, and I'm still not sure which way to go.

I'll either be getting an ATI 9800 or 9800pro, or an nVidia FX 5900 or 5950. Or something comparable.

I've heard many people say that ATI's driver issues are still pretty prevalent in many games. My brother is having troubles with drivers right now with his 9600. I'm a bit nervous on that regard. But there is no doubting the power behind the 9800 series.

I've been a loyal nVidia customer for quite a while now. Started with the GeForce 2 GTS-V and am now at a GeForce 4 Ti4200. I have yet to have one driver issue in my 4/5 years of gaming.

I know the FX's had a rough start (bulky, loud, not powerful enough). But I really think that nVidia pulled it together and made the 5900/5950 competitive cards, beating out the 9800 series in serveral benchmarks.

Right now, I'm gridlocked as to which to buy. I geuss I still have over a month to decide before I upgrade, but I hate being undecided.

What do you guys think? Lean toward ATI or nVidia. Or should I wait till a week before the upgrade to see how the field is?

The hardware that will supplement by video card is a 2500+ Barton, an 8xAGP ready mobo, and 768mb DDR-2700 (hopefully up to 1.2gb before I upgrade my video).

[Ace195]

looked at comarisons and benchmarks Not to be nitpicky or anything yoda but you mis-spelled comparisions.. Anyways from what I've seen of the ATI video cards and myself running a Nvidia, I would choose ATI in a heart beat. But when you get ati I would spend the extra money and get the XT so I wouldn't have to upgrade for a long time... Upgrading is a b*tch... But ATI all the way thats what my laptop runs it runs a 9600 pro and it works wonderful even compared to my Nvidia card :)

[Jonbo298]

Get an Asus 9800pro. A weee bit expensive, but it has the same cooling at the XT version (if you feel like flashing the bios to XT speeds). Or if you want. You can save abuot $75-$100 and get a 9800pro (other then Asus obviously:p) and be set for awhile. I love Ati and will probably never go Nvidia.

[Null]

i prefer Nvidia, i love thier drivers MUCH better then ATI's.

ATI's current set of cards are better then the current nvidia's.

But im wiating to see what the Nvidia's NV40 chip will do, that comes out soon. they claim its VERY high powered compared to current cards. and ATI's new brands are father off then nvidias.

it flip flops back and forth between them. Nvidia had the better cards, now ATI does, no doubt Nvidia will have them again sometime then back to ATI. All in all it doesnt truely matter becuase the power of each is so high it doesnt matter which you choose you wont notice a diff.

i do like nvidia drivers much better tho.

[Happydude]

ATI for me :)

[Ace195]

Oh I agree completly with the whole driver thing.. ATI doesn't have very good drivers.. I love my ti4400 It runs better then the 9200 up to the 9500 and it's much older but, I'm looking more for speed then anything else ATM.. So I'll stickwith my Nvidia in my desktop andmy ATI in my laptop

[Jason1]

Id say it depends on if you plan on playing HL2. If you do, ATI is an absolute no brainer because its been designed for ATI from the ground up, and runs better on them.

[Null]

Id say it depends on if you plan on playing HL2. If you do, ATI is an absolute no brainer because its been designed for ATI from the ground up, and runs better on them.


actually ATI just kinda sponsers it the way nvidia does Unreal Tournament.

its being designed for both. ATI just talks about it more.

but right now it does run better on ATI cards. thats basically driver issues tho

[Canyarion]

Me dunno bout this stuff so me shaddup. :)

[Yoda9864]

At first I wanted to upgrade for Half-Life 2, but now in all reality, it won't be coming out until September the last I checked. But now I'm just upgrading because my card is too old. Now it's more for Doom 3 :D

And yeah, like Null said, ATi is just kinda a sponsor. It's not like the game is built solely around it.

I don't know, I can't seem to get over the driver issue. I know it's not that big of deal, but I just can't put it aside for some reason.

Thanks for all the input guys. +rep to all

[thatmariolover]

Uh.. If you're looking at the best nVidia card, you should look at the best ATI card (9800 XT).

I personally would always say ATI, but that's just me.

[Hero2]

the driver issue isnt that bad I have a 9800 in mine and everytime i figure out that its having some issue with a game they have an update for the drivers so its not that big of a deal id say go for what you can get the better deal with without compromising quaility and such. or just get ATI

[Jason1]

I did have driver issues awhile back that at first I didnt think were actually driver issues. Then someone at a forum told me to download this one omega driver that was released like early last year. Amazingly, no problems whatsoever since then. And no drops in framereate either, at least from what I can tell. But yea I'll admit ATI's catalyst drivers do have some issues.

[Yoda9864]

Hmmmm. I think that nVidia is releasing their NV40 cards in like late march/early April. Damn, I think I'll have to wait until they release them so that the prices of the existing cards go down.

Or maybe I'll get one of hte NV40s, lol. Supposedly, the NV40s are like 3x faster than the faster FX. I don't know about that, but I geuss we'll see.

Anybody know when ATi is releasing their new line of cards?

[thatmariolover]

Anybody know when ATi is releasing their new line of cards?

Yeah, the R420 is supposed to go into volume production this March (so a release sometime in April is likely) and the R500 is supposed to be released Quarter 4 this year.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/3/34607.html

[Seth]

I say wait. The XT has been out for a while now. Even if you don't get the NV40 or the new ATI then the current chips will be cheaper.