Which Video Card?

[Moss]

I'm sure this has been covered before, but I am just looking for a little advice, or suggestions before I make my purchase, which will be later this week.

I'm looking at either the

Msi Geforce4 Ti 4200 64mb 8x Agp W tv out $229 CND
or
Ati 9000 Pro 128 Mb $223 CND

I know that the 4200 overclock well, but which one would outperfrom the other with no overclocking? which one has better driver support?

These 2 are my price range, I would love to get the 9500 pro, but its just more than I'm willing to pay for a video card. So any advice, info, or exp with either card would be appreciated

Thanks

 

[cmdrdredd]

the Radeon is WAAAAYYY slower than the Ti4200 for gaming. It does however have a huge advantage in 2D clarity.

if you can get it...the 8500 is much faster than the Radeon 9000 but still slower than Ti4200. However ATI's 2D is second to only Matrox IMO

 

[Moss]

is the Difference in Clarity that huge??

I just seen a 8500LE 64mb card for 145..thats a pretty big savings.

If the difference in Clarity is that huge, then I may go for the 8500...simply because I am not a Huge gamer, but that could be because of my 8mb onbard video currently LOL...but I do want to get a card that can play all current games decently.

 

[mrzed]

You can get an 8500le 64Mb for just over $100 (can) at ncix.com. Not the best memory in those cards, but they would still be at least equal to a 9000 pro

Even that $223 for a 9000 pro sounds out of line to me. I would expect around $160-170 for a half decent deal.

If the price was the same, I would definitely suggest the 4200, but it should not be the same.

 

[Moss]

Originally posted by: mrzed
You can get an 8500le 64Mb for just over $100 (can) at ncix.com. Not the best memory in those cards, but they would still be at least equal to a 9000 pro

Even that $223 for a 9000 pro sounds out of line to me. I would expect around $160-170 for a half decent deal.

You are only looking at OEM cards, and I was listing prices for Retail cards. The Site lists the Retail Cards for pretty much what I have listed.

Still unsure. I think personally Image Quality rates higher for me than speed, and If a 8500 is as fast as the 9000, then I guess I can save some cash. Would there be a benefit to getting the 8500LE 128 over the 64 MB card?

 

[mroptimistic]

probably not for what your using it for, if your not a hardcore gamer you probably wont use the 128. the extra 64mb of ram on the 128 model are used for storing graphics information in graphics heavy games such as jk2 where a 128 card performs much better then 64mb. But since you dont game a lot, you should save money and go with 64. As it is the 64mb should do you fine for current games, as long as you dont require max detail and max settings in every game you play.

 

[Moss]

OK well now I have another question which of these 2 would you get?

ATI Radeon 8500 128MB Video Card w/TV-OUT, OEM 150.00
ATI Radeon 8500LE 64MB Video Card, Retail 145.00

I looked through some reviews and the 8500 seems to outperform the 8500LE, and It would have 128MB Ram too. But what would be the main difference between OEM and Retail? The bundled software?? Core and Ram Speeds?? I was looking for the 8500 128mb Retail card, hard to find, and when I did they wanted like 260-280 is that the going price for that card??

 

[Mem]

is the Difference in Clarity that huge??

To be honest probaby not,it depends on the card brand/model etc and what res you use,I had the chance to compare my humble GF2 Ti (Leadtek) to an ATi card (hooked up a friends PC to my monitor) and couldn`t see any difference,in general the GF4 cards are pretty good up to 1600x1200 res ,Leadtek and Gainward are probably the best on image quality GF4 wise,I should say the GF4 cards have improved on image quality over the older GF3/2 models etc.

In the end image quality is down to your eyes and only you can really decide how good or bad it really is.

.

 

[AnAndAustin]

There's a lot of old info being pushed around on '2D' image quality. Matrox are tops although the hugely overpriced Parhelia is a bit comical. ATI have always beeen very close to Matrox while nVidia ...

GF2 & GF3 suck for 2D IQ but some brands were better than others, GF4 are MUCH improved and very consitent, they're well up to ATI standards and only really fall behind when you begin using 1600x1200 type res with high refresh rates on a good monitor. A lot does come down to personal pref, reqs and how susceptible you are but a GF4TI4200 shoudl easily give you a great looking picture.

Rad9000 is VERY slow, effectively GF2TI or Rad7500 speed but it does have DX8 hw. Rad9000PRO is faster BUT still slower than the Rad8500LE which in turn is a bit slower than the full Rad8500. The 8500 series varies alot though so you do need to check clock speeds as they vary by oem/retail and manu. The 9000 series much like the GF4 are MUCH more consitent. The Rad8500 series and GF4TI series all gain a speed boost by having 128MB gfx RAM regardless of whether a prog needs the extra RAM, so a Rad8500LE-128MB @ 230/230 is a better buy than a Rad8500-64MB @ 250/250, speeds would be VERY close but the hit when a prog does need more than 64MB gfx RAM is BIG. Here's some links ...

1 Tech-Report Rad9000PRO and a load of other cards
2 Firing Squad Rad9000PRO and a load of other cards
3 AnAndTech 4200 roundup
4 Tech-Report 4200 roundup
5 PCstats Albatron P Turbo
6 Tech-Report look at 64MB vs 128MB (all cards set to 250/500 to isolate RAM size only)
7 TomsHW on nVidia's GF4-8X cards[/quote]