ATi or nVidia!?

[Ace]

I have always been a nVidia fan, but before Nvidia, I was into the expansion cards. "Power VR", which was ahead of its time...

[cyberneticimplant]

My experiance with PowerVR is opposite. I had a PowerVR Kyro based card and it blew big time. It used SDRAM while the competition, ATI and nVIDIA, used DDR. It didn't have transform and lighting so games looked a lot shittier than on nVIDIA and ATI. Performance wise it was excellent for a budget card since it could keep up with Geforce 2 MX, however the quality of the card was terrible.

The heatsink compound blew away by itself. The area under the heatsink was covered with white powder. The card overheated and I got artifacts in HL1 and Q2. I returned the card  and got a replacement but the same thing happened. They sent me a new fan, and I replaced the thermal compound with arctic silver, but the damage to the card was pernament. When I built my new computer I got a new video card.

When my Geforce Ti4200 died, I needed to use it as a 2D only card, but the stupid card wouldn't even fit in my AGP slot and I damaged my motherboard, and now I get artifacts no matter what card I use.

I think it is the worst purchase I ever made.

[X'tyfe]

amd shoulda bought out nvidia  then they would be on top

[UUD-40]

ATI? Nvidia?

Intel, yo! 

[X'tyfe]

nowai amd

[cyberneticimplant]

Yeah, Intel Extreme Intergrated Graphics.

[FirebirdTN]

How about....ummm....All 3????

Boy am I out of the hardware loop, just read the link on the previous page about ATI+AMD.  Damn.

Anyways, all my rigs in my house are dated, but when I built my kids rigs, I went with an ATI video card, coupled with an AMD processor on a Nvidia based chipset.  Hows that for a combo? LOL

Anyway, I have always been biased towards ATI, mainly because of their "All in Wonder" cards.  I Love features, but if I were to build a GAMING ONLY rig, I'd probably go with Nvidia.

I have an NV chipset in my lappy.

So, I guess I am biased towards ATI, but by no means brand loyal.

Used to be an Intel guy...Now when I buy, its AMD...I guess I buy whatever product offers the best product for my dollar.

-Alan

[cyberneticimplant]

Used to be an Intel guy...Now when I buy, its AMD...I guess I buy whatever product offers the best product for my dollar.

Thats what people should do, instead of becoming annoying AMD, Intel, ATI, or nVIDIA fanboys.

[Art]

I'm a fanboy of intel, nvidia, plextor, chevy, honda, guinness, crown, cannon, klein, wrangler, redwing, colt, browning, and orvis, just off the top of my head.
 

[X'tyfe]

i havent decided whether i like intel or amd better yet but i used to be an intel fanboy
but certinly im with nvidia all the way. d-link, creative labs, lexmark (only thing i hate is there printers dont work well in linux, which isnt that bad for me i guess ), plextor, logitech (ya i kinda hate them atm, but they still make the best stuff even though it sucks heh  )

[[BTF] Reflex]

Art,  Colt make anything usefull anymore?  sold rights to the m-14 and the .45 right?

[Art]

Looks like they still make a few variants of the 1911, m16/ar16, and single action armey revolvers.
http://www.coltsmfg.com/cmci/home.asp

[cyberneticimplant]

ATI has been really impressing me lately. They seem to be implementing new technology like GDDR4 RAM, and Pulse Width Modulation. The X1950XTX is the fastest card on the market right now and the X1900 series are faster than the NVIDIA 7900 series. For my next purchase I will definately consider ATI.

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/406/3/

The reason the PCB looks cleaner is because ATI was the first in the to use digital Pulse Width Modulation (PWM), a technology never seen before on high end desktop graphics cards. Digital controllers eliminate the dangers of overheating and exploding capacitors, giving users a safer and better monitored control over their video cards. By moving over to a digital PWM, ATI was able to save space on the PCB, but didn't shrink the size of the card as they wanted to stick with good low noise cooling solution.

ATI and NVIDIA have been using analog signals up to this point and it hasn't been a problem, but it's been proven in the labs that digital signals are the way of the future. One of the disadvantages of an analog circuit is that they tend to drift with time and they are difficult to tune. Analog circuits are also usually hot and are sensible to noise. A digital signal is easier to implement, requires a smaller circuit, can be fine tuned, is easily reproducible, dissipates less heat, is immune to noise and weights less meaning that it is the best way to dial a graphics card in. ATI uses an RoHS compliant Multi-Phase SMD Coupled Inductor (part #59PR9852) by Vitec Electronics Corporation to make sure the digital signals are in check and hopefully enthusiasts will end up getting clean power. 

Other than the move to digital PWM ATI has moved the heat sink fan power header to the top of the card and actually moved the additional +12V header down to the middle of the card. With that said the digital PWM is covered and we can move on to better things!

[uranus]

i just installed a PNY NVidia GeForce 6200 AGP (i know, a little on the wimpy side compared to what most folks use  ) , it runs Q2 & Q4 really good.

:::SiS integrated BLOWS!!:::

anyway, i'm running it on a pentium 4, 2.02Ghz, 768mb ram.  i should be honest here,  when i first start single player mode Q4, it's a little choppy at first, but clears up quickly. as for multiplayer mode, flawless,   same with Q2. of course Q2 runs 10x smoother! 

this is my second NVidia card, i'm sold!   

ltr!, uranus, aka: campista

[X'tyfe]

:::SiS integrated BLOWS!!:::

ummm, all integrated cards blow