Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
The reason why the GTX280 and the 9800GX2 performance figures vary so wildly is solely down to the game/benchmark being run. The GX2 is basically SLI on a card and as such falls foul of games that do not run well in multi-GPU mode. Some games will give you almost twice the performance for the second GPU, others give you next to nothing. Multi-GPU configs (whether 2 separate cards or 2 GPUs on a card) are only ever useful if the games you play take proper advantage of them. Regards Jason -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Steve Tomporowski Sent: 13 July 2008 11:45 To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Interesting, sigh. Seems to be the typical arguments for ATI: It's faster when it decides to work. Once I bought an ATI TV card because it was cheap. The software caused all sorts of problems, did not work like anybody would want it to, and, to top it off, 99% of all 3rd party TV software did not support it. Needless to say it's sitting in a bag in the drawer. And, no, they never updated the software. I really don't have a prejudice when buying hardware, however, when it don't work, I don't feel the need to put any 'spin' on it. My time is valuable and a bargain is not a bargain (similarly 'best bang for the buck' is not) when you have to put gobs of time into it and still not have a lot of confidence it'll work. Back to the original question (slightly modified): Which is really faster the GTX280 or the 9800GX2? Depending on the benchmark, they seem to be all over the place. Of course, each site that does benchmarking uses different hardware, settings, software, etc. [CC]Personal[/CC] This message and any attachment are confidential and may be privileged or otherwise protected from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, please telephone or email the sender and delete this message and any attachment from your system. If you are not the intended recipient you must not copy this message or attachment or disclose the contents to any other person. Incoming and outgoing email communications may be monitored by Clifford Chance, as permitted by applicable law and regulations. For further information about Clifford Chance please see our website at http://www.cliffordchance.com or refer to any Clifford Chance office. Clifford Chance LLP is a limited liability partnership registered in England Wales under number OC323571. The firm's registered office and principal place of business is at 10 Upper Bank Street, London, E14 5JJ. For further details, including a list of members and their professional qualifications, see our website at www.cliffordchance.com. The firm uses the word 'partner' to refer to a member of Clifford Chance LLP or an employee or consultant with equivalent standing and qualifications. The firm is regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. The Authority's rules can be accessed by clicking on the following link: http://www.sra.org.uk/code-of-conduct.page
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Good information, hadn't thought of that. I'll have to look at the architecture of the GTX280 and see what it is. Since you mentioned the GX2 as SLI, probably the GTX280 is not? Got to look and see. Of course I'll also be watching to see if ATI will really solve their problems with the 4870 Steve On 7/14/08, [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The reason why the GTX280 and the 9800GX2 performance figures vary so wildly is solely down to the game/benchmark being run. The GX2 is basically SLI on a card and as such falls foul of games that do not run well in multi-GPU mode. Some games will give you almost twice the performance for the second GPU, others give you next to nothing. Multi-GPU configs (whether 2 separate cards or 2 GPUs on a card) are only ever useful if the games you play take proper advantage of them. Regards Jason -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Steve Tomporowski Sent: 13 July 2008 11:45 To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Interesting, sigh. Seems to be the typical arguments for ATI: It's faster when it decides to work. Once I bought an ATI TV card because it was cheap. The software caused all sorts of problems, did not work like anybody would want it to, and, to top it off, 99% of all 3rd party TV software did not support it. Needless to say it's sitting in a bag in the drawer. And, no, they never updated the software. I really don't have a prejudice when buying hardware, however, when it don't work, I don't feel the need to put any 'spin' on it. My time is valuable and a bargain is not a bargain (similarly 'best bang for the buck' is not) when you have to put gobs of time into it and still not have a lot of confidence it'll work. Back to the original question (slightly modified): Which is really faster the GTX280 or the 9800GX2? Depending on the benchmark, they seem to be all over the place. Of course, each site that does benchmarking uses different hardware, settings, software, etc. [CC]Personal[/CC] This message and any attachment are confidential and may be privileged or otherwise protected from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, please telephone or email the sender and delete this message and any attachment from your system. If you are not the intended recipient you must not copy this message or attachment or disclose the contents to any other person. Incoming and outgoing email communications may be monitored by Clifford Chance, as permitted by applicable law and regulations. For further information about Clifford Chance please see our website at http://www.cliffordchance.com or refer to any Clifford Chance office. Clifford Chance LLP is a limited liability partnership registered in England Wales under number OC323571. The firm's registered office and principal place of business is at 10 Upper Bank Street, London, E14 5JJ. For further details, including a list of members and their professional qualifications, see our website at www.cliffordchance.com. The firm uses the word 'partner' to refer to a member of Clifford Chance LLP or an employee or consultant with equivalent standing and qualifications. The firm is regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority. The Authority's rules can be accessed by clicking on the following link: http://www.sra.org.uk/code-of-conduct.page
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Interesting, sigh. Seems to be the typical arguments for ATI: It's faster when it decides to work. Once I bought an ATI TV card because it was cheap. The software caused all sorts of problems, did not work like anybody would want it to, and, to top it off, 99% of all 3rd party TV software did not support it. Needless to say it's sitting in a bag in the drawer. And, no, they never updated the software. I really don't have a prejudice when buying hardware, however, when it don't work, I don't feel the need to put any 'spin' on it. My time is valuable and a bargain is not a bargain (similarly 'best bang for the buck' is not) when you have to put gobs of time into it and still not have a lot of confidence it'll work. Back to the original question (slightly modified): Which is really faster the GTX280 or the 9800GX2? Depending on the benchmark, they seem to be all over the place. Of course, each site that does benchmarking uses different hardware, settings, software, etc. On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 11:26 PM, maccrawj [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I know I am over posting but IT'S NOT JUST THE HD4XXX BUT ALSO THE HD2XXX HD3XXX THAT HAVE THIS *BIOS* ISSUE. Brian Weeden wrote: SNIP I have heard that ATI's drivers are still spotty. There actually is as problem with the HD 4870/4850 where the driver won't properly spin up the fan and the card gets really hot. SNIP
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
At 07:45 AM 13/07/2008, Steve Tomporowski wrote: Interesting, sigh. Seems to be the typical arguments for ATI: It's faster when it decides to work. I've been dealing with ATI for about two years now with no driver problems. Very happy with them (and I was a big anti-ATI guy just a few years back.) T
[H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex as the drivers have evolved, so benchmarks seem to vary from month to month. Anything definitive out there? ThanksSteve
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex as the drivers have evolved, so benchmarks seem to vary from month to month. Anything definitive out there? ThanksSteve _ Making the world a better place one message at a time. http://www.imtalkathon.com/?source=EML_WLH_Talkathon_BetterPlace
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Absolutely agree - why bother with Nvidia? Sure, they have the single fastest card overall but that same card is on average only a bit faster than something $250 cheaper (and in some cases slower). To quote Anand: A pair of Radeon HD 4850s can come close to the performance of a GeForce GTX 280, and a pair of Radeon HD 4870s are faster across the board - not to mention that they should be $50 less than the GTX 280 and will work on motherboards with Intel-chipsets. Quite possibly more important than the fact that AMD's multi-GPU strategy has potential is the fact that it may not even be necessary for the majority of gamers - a single Radeon HD 4850 or Radeon HD 4870 is easily enough to run anything out today. His review: http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 And another roundup that reaches the same conclusions: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/07/11/summer-2008-graphics-performance-roundup/1 Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Hayes Elkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex as the drivers have evolved, so benchmarks seem to vary from month to month. Anything definitive out there? ThanksSteve _ Making the world a better place one message at a time. http://www.imtalkathon.com/?source=EML_WLH_Talkathon_BetterPlace
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
some of us just DO NOT like ATI video cards. Everyone I ever messed with gave me grief, nVidia never has. FWIW Well every plug in, just built a system with built in ATI and it gave me no problem. chipset was AMD/ATI. fp At 06:35 AM 7/11/2008, Brian Weeden Poked the stick with: Absolutely agree - why bother with Nvidia? Sure, they have the single fastest card overall but that same card is on average only a bit faster than something $250 cheaper (and in some cases slower). To quote Anand: A pair of Radeon HD 4850s can come close to the performance of a GeForce GTX 280, and a pair of Radeon HD 4870s are faster across the board - not to mention that they should be $50 less than the GTX 280 and will work on motherboards with Intel-chipsets. Quite possibly more important than the fact that AMD's multi-GPU strategy has potential is the fact that it may not even be necessary for the majority of gamers - a single Radeon HD 4850 or Radeon HD 4870 is easily enough to run anything out today. His review: http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 And another roundup that reaches the same conclusions: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/07/11/summer-2008-graphics-performance-roundup/1 Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Hayes Elkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex as the drivers have evolved, so benchmarks seem to vary from month to month. Anything definitive out there? ThanksSteve _ Making the world a better place one message at a time. http://www.imtalkathon.com/?source=EML_WLH_Talkathon_BetterPlace -- Tallyho ! ]:8) Taglines below ! -- The speed of the leader determines the rate of the pack.
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Is AMD/ATI's driver support finally gotten mature enough? That is what always burned me in the past. The drivers were always crap right out of the box and updates were few and far between. And the review sites would never tell you stuff like visible skyboxes, etc. Of course now, with the 8800GT, Nvidia dropped the ball with people waiting over a year for driver corrections with respect to the Unreal Tournament series. And, of course, I expect to get a chorus of 'I've never had a problem with an ATI card'. My experience has been ATI = trouble, except if its a cheap 2d card you do nothing with. Steve On 7/11/08, FORC5 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: some of us just DO NOT like ATI video cards. Everyone I ever messed with gave me grief, nVidia never has. FWIW Well every plug in, just built a system with built in ATI and it gave me no problem. chipset was AMD/ATI. fp At 06:35 AM 7/11/2008, Brian Weeden Poked the stick with: Absolutely agree - why bother with Nvidia? Sure, they have the single fastest card overall but that same card is on average only a bit faster than something $250 cheaper (and in some cases slower). To quote Anand: A pair of Radeon HD 4850s can come close to the performance of a GeForce GTX 280, and a pair of Radeon HD 4870s are faster across the board - not to mention that they should be $50 less than the GTX 280 and will work on motherboards with Intel-chipsets. Quite possibly more important than the fact that AMD's multi-GPU strategy has potential is the fact that it may not even be necessary for the majority of gamers - a single Radeon HD 4850 or Radeon HD 4870 is easily enough to run anything out today. His review: http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 And another roundup that reaches the same conclusions: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/07/11/summer-2008-graphics-performance-roundup/1 Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Hayes Elkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex as the drivers have evolved, so benchmarks seem to vary from month to month. Anything definitive out there? ThanksSteve _ Making the world a better place one message at a time. http://www.imtalkathon.com/?source=EML_WLH_Talkathon_BetterPlace -- Tallyho ! ]:8) Taglines below ! -- The speed of the leader determines the rate of the pack.
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
I've had problems and good experiences with both manufacturers :) I have heard that ATI's drivers are still spotty. There actually is as problem with the HD 4870/4850 where the driver won't properly spin up the fan and the card gets really hot. But there is a fix out there. I think I would rather have good hardware with possible driver issues than bad hardware - because while in the former there is always the chance for a patch, the latter means you're screwed. As example, it seems to be massive problems with Nvidia G84 and G86 chipsets, possibly ALL of them (every recent Nvidia card under the 8800 part number: http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/07/09/nvidia-g84-g86-bad Nvidia is keeping mum on exactly what the problem is and how many chips it has affected but there is definitely something to the story - their stock took a massive hit this week as they announced they were taking a $200 million Q2 charge to replace all the faulty chips: http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=2172 --- Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 10:44 AM, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Is AMD/ATI's driver support finally gotten mature enough? That is what always burned me in the past. The drivers were always crap right out of the box and updates were few and far between. And the review sites would never tell you stuff like visible skyboxes, etc. Of course now, with the 8800GT, Nvidia dropped the ball with people waiting over a year for driver corrections with respect to the Unreal Tournament series. And, of course, I expect to get a chorus of 'I've never had a problem with an ATI card'. My experience has been ATI = trouble, except if its a cheap 2d card you do nothing with. Steve On 7/11/08, FORC5 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: some of us just DO NOT like ATI video cards. Everyone I ever messed with gave me grief, nVidia never has. FWIW Well every plug in, just built a system with built in ATI and it gave me no problem. chipset was AMD/ATI. fp At 06:35 AM 7/11/2008, Brian Weeden Poked the stick with: Absolutely agree - why bother with Nvidia? Sure, they have the single fastest card overall but that same card is on average only a bit faster than something $250 cheaper (and in some cases slower). To quote Anand: A pair of Radeon HD 4850s can come close to the performance of a GeForce GTX 280, and a pair of Radeon HD 4870s are faster across the board - not to mention that they should be $50 less than the GTX 280 and will work on motherboards with Intel-chipsets. Quite possibly more important than the fact that AMD's multi-GPU strategy has potential is the fact that it may not even be necessary for the majority of gamers - a single Radeon HD 4850 or Radeon HD 4870 is easily enough to run anything out today. His review: http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 And another roundup that reaches the same conclusions: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/07/11/summer-2008-graphics-performance-roundup/1 Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Hayes Elkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex as the drivers have evolved, so benchmarks seem to vary from month to month. Anything definitive out there? ThanksSteve _ Making the world a better place one message at a time. http://www.imtalkathon.com/?source=EML_WLH_Talkathon_BetterPlace -- Tallyho ! ]:8) Taglines below ! -- The speed of the leader determines the rate of the pack.
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Searched the forums for a bit on 4870 and came up with quite a number of messages about crashing with most of the conclusions being 'driver problems' and 'wait a few weeks for xxx drivers.' Now, of course I'll have to search on Nvidia problems and see if those are less than 104,000 hits. Steve On 7/11/08, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Is AMD/ATI's driver support finally gotten mature enough? That is what always burned me in the past. The drivers were always crap right out of the box and updates were few and far between. And the review sites would never tell you stuff like visible skyboxes, etc. Of course now, with the 8800GT, Nvidia dropped the ball with people waiting over a year for driver corrections with respect to the Unreal Tournament series. And, of course, I expect to get a chorus of 'I've never had a problem with an ATI card'. My experience has been ATI = trouble, except if its a cheap 2d card you do nothing with. Steve On 7/11/08, FORC5 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: some of us just DO NOT like ATI video cards. Everyone I ever messed with gave me grief, nVidia never has. FWIW Well every plug in, just built a system with built in ATI and it gave me no problem. chipset was AMD/ATI. fp At 06:35 AM 7/11/2008, Brian Weeden Poked the stick with: Absolutely agree - why bother with Nvidia? Sure, they have the single fastest card overall but that same card is on average only a bit faster than something $250 cheaper (and in some cases slower). To quote Anand: A pair of Radeon HD 4850s can come close to the performance of a GeForce GTX 280, and a pair of Radeon HD 4870s are faster across the board - not to mention that they should be $50 less than the GTX 280 and will work on motherboards with Intel-chipsets. Quite possibly more important than the fact that AMD's multi-GPU strategy has potential is the fact that it may not even be necessary for the majority of gamers - a single Radeon HD 4850 or Radeon HD 4870 is easily enough to run anything out today. His review: http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 And another roundup that reaches the same conclusions: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/07/11/summer-2008-graphics-performance-roundup/1 Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Hayes Elkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex as the drivers have evolved, so benchmarks seem to vary from month to month. Anything definitive out there? ThanksSteve _ Making the world a better place one message at a time. http://www.imtalkathon.com/?source=EML_WLH_Talkathon_BetterPlace -- Tallyho ! ]:8) Taglines below ! -- The speed of the leader determines the rate of the pack.
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
From what I can tell the crashing is all about the fan issue I mentioned which is causing the overheating and crashing. And yes, it is a faulty driver. There are hacks to fix it while waiting for the next Catalyst driver update on 15 July: http://nwgat.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/ati-radeon-hd-4870-4850-fanfix/ http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=4272339#post4272339 http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?p=2751569#post2751569 --- Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 10:57 AM, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Searched the forums for a bit on 4870 and came up with quite a number of messages about crashing with most of the conclusions being 'driver problems' and 'wait a few weeks for xxx drivers.' Now, of course I'll have to search on Nvidia problems and see if those are less than 104,000 hits. Steve On 7/11/08, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Is AMD/ATI's driver support finally gotten mature enough? That is what always burned me in the past. The drivers were always crap right out of the box and updates were few and far between. And the review sites would never tell you stuff like visible skyboxes, etc. Of course now, with the 8800GT, Nvidia dropped the ball with people waiting over a year for driver corrections with respect to the Unreal Tournament series. And, of course, I expect to get a chorus of 'I've never had a problem with an ATI card'. My experience has been ATI = trouble, except if its a cheap 2d card you do nothing with. Steve On 7/11/08, FORC5 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: some of us just DO NOT like ATI video cards. Everyone I ever messed with gave me grief, nVidia never has. FWIW Well every plug in, just built a system with built in ATI and it gave me no problem. chipset was AMD/ATI. fp At 06:35 AM 7/11/2008, Brian Weeden Poked the stick with: Absolutely agree - why bother with Nvidia? Sure, they have the single fastest card overall but that same card is on average only a bit faster than something $250 cheaper (and in some cases slower). To quote Anand: A pair of Radeon HD 4850s can come close to the performance of a GeForce GTX 280, and a pair of Radeon HD 4870s are faster across the board - not to mention that they should be $50 less than the GTX 280 and will work on motherboards with Intel-chipsets. Quite possibly more important than the fact that AMD's multi-GPU strategy has potential is the fact that it may not even be necessary for the majority of gamers - a single Radeon HD 4850 or Radeon HD 4870 is easily enough to run anything out today. His review: http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 And another roundup that reaches the same conclusions: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/07/11/summer-2008-graphics-performance-roundup/1 Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Hayes Elkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex as the drivers have evolved, so benchmarks seem to vary from month to month. Anything definitive out there? ThanksSteve _ Making the world a better place one message at a time. http://www.imtalkathon.com/?source=EML_WLH_Talkathon_BetterPlace -- Tallyho ! ]:8) Taglines below ! -- The speed of the leader determines the rate of the pack.
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
For what possible reason would DRIVER based control of fan speeds vs temps make sense? This should be implemented at the firmware level, period. Perhaps driver override, but only within pre-defined allowable temperature windows. I know both manufacturers have had issues with this particular issue. It just baffles me that they'd implement fan control in SOFTWARE. Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 10:04 AM To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? From what I can tell the crashing is all about the fan issue I mentioned which is causing the overheating and crashing. And yes, it is a faulty driver. There are hacks to fix it while waiting for the next Catalyst driver update on 15 July: http://nwgat.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/ati-radeon-hd-4870-4850-fanfix/ http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=4272339#post4272339 http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?p=2751569#post2751569 ---
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
A lot of fan control stuff does it at a driver level. Speedfan, one of the most popular, does that. And just about every overclocking tool I have seen works through the drivers. But you would think a firmware backup or failsafe would be nice. --- Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 3:56 PM, Greg Sevart [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: For what possible reason would DRIVER based control of fan speeds vs temps make sense? This should be implemented at the firmware level, period. Perhaps driver override, but only within pre-defined allowable temperature windows. I know both manufacturers have had issues with this particular issue. It just baffles me that they'd implement fan control in SOFTWARE. Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 10:04 AM To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? From what I can tell the crashing is all about the fan issue I mentioned which is causing the overheating and crashing. And yes, it is a faulty driver. There are hacks to fix it while waiting for the next Catalyst driver update on 15 July: http://nwgat.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/ati-radeon-hd-4870-4850-fanfix/ http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=4272339#post4272339 http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?p=2751569#post2751569 ---
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
I could understand a SW failsafe, but I agree with Greg on this one. They knew these toys needed cooling and cooling control. That control should have been p/o their FW at the chip level. If the driver's can back this up, fine. I am now scared to upgrade to these Thoroughbred Video cards until this long time cooling business gets fixed. Hell, what do I know? Best, Duncan At 16:00 07/11/2008 -0400, you wrote: A lot of fan control stuff does it at a driver level. Speedfan, one of the most popular, does that. And just about every overclocking tool I have seen works through the drivers. But you would think a firmware backup or failsafe would be nice. --- Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 3:56 PM, Greg Sevart [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: For what possible reason would DRIVER based control of fan speeds vs temps make sense? This should be implemented at the firmware level, period. Perhaps driver override, but only within pre-defined allowable temperature windows. I know both manufacturers have had issues with this particular issue. It just baffles me that they'd implement fan control in SOFTWARE. Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 10:04 AM To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? From what I can tell the crashing is all about the fan issue I mentioned which is causing the overheating and crashing. And yes, it is a faulty driver. There are hacks to fix it while waiting for the next Catalyst driver update on 15 July: http://nwgat.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/ati-radeon-hd-4870-4850-fanfix/ http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=4272339#post4272339 http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?p=2751569#post2751569 ---
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Two different things, though. You're talking about the ability to control fans via software. I don't have any issue with that. However, the card's built-in thermal management should not be DEPENDENT upon software for control, and should revoke software control if temp levels exceed some pre-defined value. Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 3:00 PM To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? A lot of fan control stuff does it at a driver level. Speedfan, one of the most popular, does that. And just about every overclocking tool I have seen works through the drivers. But you would think a firmware backup or failsafe would be nice. --- Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 3:56 PM, Greg Sevart [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: For what possible reason would DRIVER based control of fan speeds vs temps make sense? This should be implemented at the firmware level, period. Perhaps driver override, but only within pre-defined allowable temperature windows. I know both manufacturers have had issues with this particular issue. It just baffles me that they'd implement fan control in SOFTWARE. Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Brian Weeden Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 10:04 AM To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? From what I can tell the crashing is all about the fan issue I mentioned which is causing the overheating and crashing. And yes, it is a faulty driver. There are hacks to fix it while waiting for the next Catalyst driver update on 15 July: http://nwgat.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/ati-radeon-hd-4870-4850- fanfix/ http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=4272339#post4272339 http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?p=2751569#post2751569 ---
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Which particular P/N boards are the G84/G86 used in? I do have a 8800GT and an 8800GTS here, but no problems so far. My experience with Nvidia has mostly been, install card, load drivers, run. Next version drivers make it go faster. My experience with ATI has been, install card, load drivers, doesn't work, download new drivers, it sort-of works, don't worry fixed in next driver version, months later, new driver version, something different broken or same stuff not fixed, runs slower, oh, that'll be fixed in next driver version, rinse and repeat. But that's just my experience. The 8800GT/Unreal Tournament problem has really irritated me as the problem is supposed to be fixed in the 177 version. Currently a 177 version is released for every operating system EXCEPT XP. And that's been like that for a month now. So I'm in the market for a new video card, want something fast that'll work. Seems like a pipedream Steve On 7/11/08, Brian Weeden [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: From what I can tell the crashing is all about the fan issue I mentioned which is causing the overheating and crashing. And yes, it is a faulty driver. There are hacks to fix it while waiting for the next Catalyst driver update on 15 July: http://nwgat.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/ati-radeon-hd-4870-4850-fanfix/ http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=4272339#post4272339 http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?p=2751569#post2751569 --- Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 10:57 AM, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Searched the forums for a bit on 4870 and came up with quite a number of messages about crashing with most of the conclusions being 'driver problems' and 'wait a few weeks for xxx drivers.' Now, of course I'll have to search on Nvidia problems and see if those are less than 104,000 hits. Steve On 7/11/08, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Is AMD/ATI's driver support finally gotten mature enough? That is what always burned me in the past. The drivers were always crap right out of the box and updates were few and far between. And the review sites would never tell you stuff like visible skyboxes, etc. Of course now, with the 8800GT, Nvidia dropped the ball with people waiting over a year for driver corrections with respect to the Unreal Tournament series. And, of course, I expect to get a chorus of 'I've never had a problem with an ATI card'. My experience has been ATI = trouble, except if its a cheap 2d card you do nothing with. Steve On 7/11/08, FORC5 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: some of us just DO NOT like ATI video cards. Everyone I ever messed with gave me grief, nVidia never has. FWIW Well every plug in, just built a system with built in ATI and it gave me no problem. chipset was AMD/ATI. fp At 06:35 AM 7/11/2008, Brian Weeden Poked the stick with: Absolutely agree - why bother with Nvidia? Sure, they have the single fastest card overall but that same card is on average only a bit faster than something $250 cheaper (and in some cases slower). To quote Anand: A pair of Radeon HD 4850s can come close to the performance of a GeForce GTX 280, and a pair of Radeon HD 4870s are faster across the board - not to mention that they should be $50 less than the GTX 280 and will work on motherboards with Intel-chipsets. Quite possibly more important than the fact that AMD's multi-GPU strategy has potential is the fact that it may not even be necessary for the majority of gamers - a single Radeon HD 4850 or Radeon HD 4870 is easily enough to run anything out today. His review: http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 And another roundup that reaches the same conclusions: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/07/11/summer-2008-graphics-performance-roundup/1 Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Hayes Elkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's beginning to get rather confusing...which Nvidia chipset/card is the fastest...for gaming? You've got the 9800GX2 versions and the GTX 280 which run about the same price. The hardware on the GTX series seems to have more of everything, yet, the GX2 seems to be faster in certain cases. Then this is made more complex
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
From what I have read all nVidia products with a 84xx or 86xx model number, both mobile and desktop. But I could be wrong. Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 5:13 PM, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Which particular P/N boards are the G84/G86 used in? I do have a 8800GT and an 8800GTS here, but no problems so far. My experience with Nvidia has mostly been, install card, load drivers, run. Next version drivers make it go faster. My experience with ATI has been, install card, load drivers, doesn't work, download new drivers, it sort-of works, don't worry fixed in next driver version, months later, new driver version, something different broken or same stuff not fixed, runs slower, oh, that'll be fixed in next driver version, rinse and repeat. But that's just my experience. The 8800GT/Unreal Tournament problem has really irritated me as the problem is supposed to be fixed in the 177 version. Currently a 177 version is released for every operating system EXCEPT XP. And that's been like that for a month now. So I'm in the market for a new video card, want something fast that'll work. Seems like a pipedream Steve On 7/11/08, Brian Weeden [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: From what I can tell the crashing is all about the fan issue I mentioned which is causing the overheating and crashing. And yes, it is a faulty driver. There are hacks to fix it while waiting for the next Catalyst driver update on 15 July: http://nwgat.wordpress.com/2008/06/30/ati-radeon-hd-4870-4850-fanfix/ http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?p=4272339#post4272339 http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread.php?p=2751569#post2751569 --- Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 10:57 AM, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Searched the forums for a bit on 4870 and came up with quite a number of messages about crashing with most of the conclusions being 'driver problems' and 'wait a few weeks for xxx drivers.' Now, of course I'll have to search on Nvidia problems and see if those are less than 104,000 hits. Steve On 7/11/08, Steve Tomporowski [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Is AMD/ATI's driver support finally gotten mature enough? That is what always burned me in the past. The drivers were always crap right out of the box and updates were few and far between. And the review sites would never tell you stuff like visible skyboxes, etc. Of course now, with the 8800GT, Nvidia dropped the ball with people waiting over a year for driver corrections with respect to the Unreal Tournament series. And, of course, I expect to get a chorus of 'I've never had a problem with an ATI card'. My experience has been ATI = trouble, except if its a cheap 2d card you do nothing with. Steve On 7/11/08, FORC5 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: some of us just DO NOT like ATI video cards. Everyone I ever messed with gave me grief, nVidia never has. FWIW Well every plug in, just built a system with built in ATI and it gave me no problem. chipset was AMD/ATI. fp At 06:35 AM 7/11/2008, Brian Weeden Poked the stick with: Absolutely agree - why bother with Nvidia? Sure, they have the single fastest card overall but that same card is on average only a bit faster than something $250 cheaper (and in some cases slower). To quote Anand: A pair of Radeon HD 4850s can come close to the performance of a GeForce GTX 280, and a pair of Radeon HD 4870s are faster across the board - not to mention that they should be $50 less than the GTX 280 and will work on motherboards with Intel-chipsets. Quite possibly more important than the fact that AMD's multi-GPU strategy has potential is the fact that it may not even be necessary for the majority of gamers - a single Radeon HD 4850 or Radeon HD 4870 is easily enough to run anything out today. His review: http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 And another roundup that reaches the same conclusions: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/07/11/summer-2008-graphics-performance-roundup/1 Brian On Fri, Jul 11, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Hayes Elkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And add to mix the 8800 Ultra, which still has higher theoretical specs in certain areas (it is still the fastest card period for Flight Simulator X and few other older games). All in all, the GTX280's have the most upside. Frankly for the price, the Radeon 4870 mops the floor with everybody. Is 5fps worth $300 more in Crysis? Date: Fri, 11 Jul 2008 07:54:38 -0400 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Been searching the web on this, but it's
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
8800GT is G92 8800GTS is G80 if it is a 320/640MB card, G92 if it is 512MB. Greg -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:hardware- [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Steve Tomporowski Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 4:14 PM To: hardware@hardwaregroup.com Subject: Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card??? Which particular P/N boards are the G84/G86 used in? I do have a 8800GT and an 8800GTS here, but no problems so far.
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
Well true as the ATI issues are there's 2 reasons to use them over Nvidia: 1. HD3870X2 or newer beats all but the most expensive Nvidia cards maybe all with new HD4xxx series. 2. CrossfireX works on Intel Nvidia chipsets, SLI only works on Nvidia because they make it so. Reasons not to use ATI: 1. Drivers suck, great, suck, rinse repeat 2. Fan (as in not work w/o manual control) and PowerPlay (as in card drops out of 3d or lowers clock rate) bugs on all but a few makes/models of HD, BIOS updates supposedly forthcoming. 3. VPU Recover AKA driver loops where card stops responding seem to be more frequent without cause or solution. With all the issues I've had, I would not switch to Nvidia give #2 then #1 of reasons to use ATI.
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
As it is supposed to do, it's a design flaw fixed on BBA models but few non-BBA's with notable exception to the Asus VisionTek HD3870X2's with quad-DVI ports. Biggest danger of the fan bug is that the fan is only ramped out AFTER you boot an OS initiate software control leaving a card like the HD3870X2 idling @ 60C+ until then. Greg Sevart wrote: Two different things, though. You're talking about the ability to control fans via software. I don't have any issue with that. However, the card's built-in thermal management should not be DEPENDENT upon software for control, and should revoke software control if temp levels exceed some pre-defined value. Greg
Re: [H] Fastest Nvidia Card???
I know I am over posting but IT'S NOT JUST THE HD4XXX BUT ALSO THE HD2XXX HD3XXX THAT HAVE THIS *BIOS* ISSUE. Brian Weeden wrote: SNIP I have heard that ATI's drivers are still spotty. There actually is as problem with the HD 4870/4850 where the driver won't properly spin up the fan and the card gets really hot. SNIP
