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Game Forum / Action Games / Half Life / April 2008Valve + nVidia = LOVE
I have a 7600GT in my PC. I was thinking about buying a more powerful card for it, something like ATI 3870 or nVidia 8800GT. I identified the cards of each manufacturer which were suitable for my purpose (short length), and the reasons why I want this or the other card. (Though, comparing these cards was like comparing apples with oranges... each card had prominent qualities in different areas... and moreover, I was not able to find out facts about the cards.) One day I wanted HD3870, and the other day I realised this had to be 8800GT. Well, yesterday I started the TF2. First, a Steam initiation window appeared... and a part of it was the banner "nVidia -- the way it was meant to be played". Well, th efate is sending me a signal: nVidia it is. Even the maker of my most favorite games, Valve, left the sponsorship of ATI/Radeon, and crawled under nVidia. Yes, 8800GT it is. I planned my trip down to the local discount shop where I would pick up the card. Though, in the evening of the same day, a thought occured to me. I asked myself, what games I am playing, or about to buy which require a larger card performance ? In order to play the Source engine-powered games (the only games I care about), the 7600GT card is totally adequate. I can play with every image quality setting max out. I have two games installed on my computer which I fell would benefit from a more powerful card: Oblivion and Silent Hunter 4 (in the latter game, I installed the mod with the hi-res textures of the water which require higher performance). But I am a very occasional player of these games. I decided that I would buy a 8800GT only when I am faced with an interesting game which requires a performance higher than can be provided by 7600GT. That will be the only thing which will truly motivate me to go out there and buy 8800GT. It may take another half a year, at least. The 8800GT will get cheaper by then (30-40% cheaper), the new, improved versions may appear, or a new card will appear altogether. Still holding on... >I decided that I would buy a 8800GT only when I am faced with an >interesting game which requires a performance higher than can be [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > >Still holding on... well, you now have the 9600GT to consider. And it might just fit your Smart-car- sized case...... John Lewis >>I decided that I would buy a 8800GT only when I am faced with an >>interesting game which requires a performance higher than can be [quoted text clipped - 8 lines] >well, you now have the 9600GT to consider. And it might just fit your >Smart-car- sized case...... I'm kind of torn at the moment. I have two 1950XT cards and am looking to upgrade. Been waiting for the 9 series Nvidias and they release something that, although cheaper than one of my cards when I bought it and indeed faster, is not what I was hoping for. I'm going to avoid a 2 card solution for the forseable future as I didn't find many games that it made a difference on to be honest. Maybe this is just an ATI thing as they seemed to go out of their way to stop you choosing which games you wanted it to work with, forcing you to do the renaming trick on the .EXE. I've heard the Nividia drivers give you a little more scope. I guess what I'm waiting for is the 8800 Ultra equivalent in the 9 series. >>>I decided that I would buy a 8800GT only when I am faced with an >>>interesting game which requires a performance higher than can be [quoted text clipped - 19 lines] >you a little more scope. I guess what I'm waiting for is the 8800 Ultra >equivalent in the 9 series. You may have to wait a long time. It seems as if the 9xxx series is the G9x chip-sets in various clothing. The true next-gen GPU family from nVidia should have arrived some time in the second half of this year. It that give any of the new series a 9xxx nomenclature there will be REAL confusion in the customer base.... John Lewis > I have a 7600GT in my PC. I was thinking about buying a more powerful > card for it, something like ATI 3870 or nVidia 8800GT. I identified [quoted text clipped - 33 lines] > > Still holding on... in another post of yours (which I can't find now thanks to OE) you indicated you were mostly happy with your 7600GT (which was a budget card when it came out) which is why I suggested the 9600GT instead of the 8800GT. The only game where you'll see a benefit from the 8800GT is Crysis - and one game aint worth spending £140 on. I play Oblivion on a 3850 at 1280x960 High Settings and its fine > > I have a 7600GT in my PC. I was thinking about buying a more powerful > > card for it, something like ATI 3870 or nVidia 8800GT. I identified [quoted text clipped - 43 lines] > > I play Oblivion on a 3850 at 1280x960 High Settings and its fine- The idea of my post was that Valve went from under the sposorship of ATI and to nVidia. I made that conclusion when I saw the nVidia banner in the Steam window when it was automatically upgrading Steam. However, if I go to TF2 video settings window, it still touts Radeon as the card "the game is best played with". The idea of my post was that Valve went from under the sposorship of ATI and to nVidia. I made that conclusion when I saw the nVidia banner in the Steam window when it was automatically upgrading Steam. However, if I go to TF2 video settings window, it still touts Radeon as the card "the game is best played with". It's called advertising. So what if a game company says "best played with X card" It's just hype and means nothing. It just means the card company paid for the ad. JLC > I play Oblivion on a 3850 at 1280x960 High Settings and its fine No it's not sleepy!!! > Well, yesterday I started the TF2. First, a Steam initiation window > appeared... and a part of it was the banner "nVidia -- the way it was > meant to be played". Well, th efate is sending me a signal: nVidia it > is. I don't think that's anything to do with Steam, probably something which your nVidia drivers do when you switch into a hardware-accelerated graphics mode, i have an ATI card, and I don't see that logo appear anywhere when I start up source games. Still, an nvidia card is probably the best choice at the moment.  SignatureBen Cottrell "Speedy thing goes in, speedy thing comes out" "Ben Cottrell" <bench@bench333.screaming.net> wrote > Beladi Nasrallah wrote: >> Well, yesterday I started the TF2. First, a Steam initiation window >> appeared... and a part of it was the banner "nVidia -- [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > graphics mode, i have an ATI card, and I don't see that logo appear > anywhere when I start up source games. You may be right about that. I don't remember ever seeing that banner before I bought a card. Now that I have an 8800 GT OC, it appears all the time. BTW, I don't know if its worth considering, but my HL2 game never crashed once while using on-board graphics. Now with a vid card, the games look absolutely awesome, but the occasional lock-up and crash is annoying. I've read the Steam forums and fixes, but they either don't work, or don't seem to apply. Maybe a fix or new drivers down the road will help? Overall I'm sure happier with the card, EP1 was not really playable without one. The bit in the core was like playing in the fog without a video card. >> Well, yesterday I started the TF2. First, a Steam initiation window >> appeared... and a part of it was the banner "nVidia -- the way it was [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > graphics mode, i have an ATI card, and I don't see that logo appear > anywhere when I start up source games. Yeah, thats what I found too.. moved from nVidia to ATi and suddenly all the "Way It's Meant To Be Played" videos mysteriously disappeared from my games... Civilian_Target > I have a 7600GT in my PC. I was thinking about buying a more powerful > card for it, something like ATI 3870 or nVidia 8800GT. I identified [quoted text clipped - 33 lines] > > Still holding on... Go out and get Crysis and Call of Duty 4.. that will put the hurt on your old video card and make your system scream for an upgrade. :-) SignatureJethro[AGHL] aka Phat_Jethro Reply Email: jethro86 (at) gmail (dot) com I just bought a $54 Asus mobo with onboard Nvidia GeForce 6150 graphics. It's using 512mb of my system RAM. Not great graphics, but this board has PCI Express so I will upgrade soon. But hell, my previous system had circa 2003 onboard 32mb video, so this is like night and day. I went with this mobo because it had Nvidia graphics. It's just less scary going with Nvidia than ATI or the other graphics vendors. ----== Posted via Pronews.Com - Unlimited-Unrestricted-Secure Usenet News==---- http://www.pronews.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! >100,000 Newsgroups ---= - Total Privacy via Encryption =--- >I have a 7600GT in my PC. I was thinking about buying a more powerful > card for it, something like ATI 3870 or nVidia 8800GT. I identified [quoted text clipped - 33 lines] > > Still holding on... I just bought an 8800GTX, will arrive Monday. Why'd I get it? Well, got a 24" widwscreen HD LCD 1920x1200 monitor now. I still play Far Cry, HL, HL2, Doom3, Quake4, Morrowind, Oblivion and several Tombraider games. Sometimes. More, I do a lot of photography and 3D stuff now. Also, the one 8800GTX is quite a bit faster than both my current 7800GTX256 meg cards in SLI. And, I don't have to give up my dual monitor configuration to use the 8800GTX power. Also, it's under $400 now. This same one last year was $697.00 But the biggest reason I got it....is cause I wanted it :) McG. > I just bought an 8800GTX, will arrive Monday. ... > More, I do a lot of photography and 3D stuff now. If you are a photographer, you'd appreciate a better visaul appearance of the images (both 2D and 3D) with an ATI card. I heard that the nVidia 8XXX series still had a worse image quality than ATI HD2XXX/ 3XXX cards... On Mar 29, 12:54 pm, "McG." <McGrandpa...@NOThotmail.com> wrote: > I just bought an 8800GTX, will arrive Monday. ... > More, I do a lot of photography and 3D stuff now. If you are a photographer, you'd appreciate a better visaul appearance of the images (both 2D and 3D) with an ATI card. I heard that the nVidia 8XXX series still had a worse image quality than ATI HD2XXX/ 3XXX cards... (chuckles!) sorry, I still own both ATi and nVidia cards. And I've seen first hand what both series are capable of. I've no idea where they get the "info" that either one produces worse IQ than the other. I haven't seen that, and I use the wide gamut. And I do have monitors that display the wide gamut. At this time; the 8800GTX is still a great card. I'm not going to drop $700 for a new ATi card plus have to get a new motherboard to use it. McG. > I just bought an 8800GTX, will arrive Monday. Why'd I get it? Well, got a > 24" widwscreen HD LCD 1920x1200 monitor now. I still play Far Cry, HL, HL2, [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > But the biggest reason I got it....is cause I wanted it :) > McG. Hey, good to see you McG. Been a while. You've just reminded me to resubscribe to the PSP group. I was in two-minds recently (Xmas) about the GTX. It was still slaughtering the competition even after several new cards had been released and was dropping down to a great price. Went for the GTS 512MB in the end and that's been great for my normal rez of 1680x1050 but I'm still amazed how well the GTX has stood up to the competition for so long. I guess it goes to show the lack of competition from ATI... unfortunately. >> I just bought an 8800GTX, will arrive Monday. Why'd I get it? Well, >> got a 24" widwscreen HD LCD 1920x1200 monitor now. I still play Far Cry, [quoted text clipped - 16 lines] > still amazed how well the GTX has stood up to the competition for so long. > I guess it goes to show the lack of competition from ATI... unfortunately. Good to see you too Shawk! I been playing with 3D stuff a lot lately, plus using the camera gear. A nearly two year old conversation in both camps, the ATI and nVidia hardware ng's, about ATI card killers from nVidia and nVidia card killers from ATI. I think it's pretty damn obvious what the real outcome was. ATI got smeared. AMD picked up the smelly roadkill and started cookin it. They've come up with some good stuff under AMD, but not good enough for the prices. I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 slot. Means new mobo and cpu. There is a lot the 8800 can do folks don't talk about a lot. They just play games tho :) Anyways, I'll find out tomorrow if my very first BFG card is as good as all the talk has been for over a year. Besides, I still play HL and HL2 a lot. McG. > I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the 9xxxGX2 > is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 slot. OK I'm dumb, what's a PCI E2 slot? I didn't know it took a new type of PCI-E slot. JLC >> I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the >> 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 >> slot. > > OK I'm dumb, what's a PCI E2 slot? I didn't know it took a new type of > PCI-E slot. JLC The PCI Express slot in my K8-N-SLI mono is a PCIe 1.0 slot, and in the newer mobos they are PCIe 2.0. The new 9xxx card requires the 2.0 slot. That's all I know about it so far. Here's some quickies from Gigabytes mobo site: http://www.giga-byte.com/Products/Motherboard/Products_Overview.aspx?ProductID=2 694&ProductName=GA-MA790FX-DS5 PCI-E 2.0 Graphics Interface PCI-E 2.0 doubles the bus standard's bandwidth from 2.5 Gbit/s to 5 Gbit/s, meaning a x32 connector can transfer data at up to 16 GB/s in each direction. PCI-E 2.0 also features improvements to the point-to-point data transfer protocol and its software architecture. >>> I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the >>> 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] >The PCI Express slot in my K8-N-SLI mono is a PCIe 1.0 slot, and in the >newer mobos they are PCIe 2.0. The new 9xxx card requires the 2.0 slot. Actually that's not strictly true. My motherboard has no PCI-E2 slots. The specs. for PCI-E2 state that it is backwards compatible so it will work on older v1 boards. It works for me. I don't know if it is ever likely to max it out and I have some kind of bottleneck here but from what I have seen in Crysis, if there is a bottleneck I don't need to worry about it as it flies. >>>> I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the >>>> 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 [quoted text clipped - 13 lines] > Crysis, if there is a bottleneck I don't need to worry about it as it > flies. That's what I thought. It's seems to be another marking ploy to get gamers to shell out money on new MB's. Thanks for the info, I'm so green I think I'm gonna need to puke! Oh well the price on that monster of yours will come down to my price range some day. On a side note have you heard about the new Nvidia MB's that have onboard graphics that run with your card? The idea is to save power and heat build up by having the main graphic card shut down when not running games and just use the onboard chip for 2D. Read about it on Gamespot. JLC >>>>> I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the >>>>> 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 [quoted text clipped - 22 lines] >up by having the main graphic card shut down when not running games and just >use the onboard chip for 2D. Read about it on Gamespot. JLC Yeah, I was reading about those yesterday. The plan for Nvidia now appears to be no more discrete chipsets, instead including an onboard VGA solution allowing what you describe. The idea is to save power by not using the plugin accelerator when it is not needed. As one forum member stated though, if you can afford the high end cards, why would you be worrying about power consumption!? :-) > if you > can afford the high end cards, why would you be worrying about power > consumption!? :-) Because you heart the environment? (Or because it's just a thing they put on the laptop chips and has filtered though to desktop...) Civilian_Target >>>> I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the >>>> 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 [quoted text clipped - 13 lines] > Crysis, if there is a bottleneck I don't need to worry about it as it > flies. I've read some more on the specs for PCIe2. Seems that v.2 can allow x16 bi-directionally, for their "total bandwidth" figure of x32. That fits the definition of 'full duplex', or simultaneous bi-direction. So in v1 it's 8+8 full duplex and v2 is 16+16 full duplex. Backward compatibility to v1 is maintained, so the 9xxx cards will work fine in the v1 slots. McG. >>>>> I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the >>>>> 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 [quoted text clipped - 20 lines] >is maintained, so the 9xxx cards will work fine in the v1 slots. >McG. Although possibly slower I guess. But then I've never been one to obsess over benchmarks. If it can play the games I want to play well I don't care if I'm losing a couple of FPS because I haven't overclocked. >>>>>> I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the >>>>>> 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 [quoted text clipped - 30 lines] > I'm > losing a couple of FPS because I haven't overclocked. What I like about using this particular vid card is it gives me more performance by itself than both 7800GTX cards in SLI. Means no messing up my dualview setup coming back from SLI too. McG. >>> I've had a hankering for the 8800GTX for a long time now. And the >>> 9xxxGX2 is still two or three hundred more plus it requires a PCI E2 [quoted text clipped - 14 lines] > direction. PCI-E 2.0 also features improvements to the point-to-point data > transfer protocol and its software architecture. Thanks for the info. JLC > I decided that I would buy a 8800GT only when I am faced with an > interesting game which requires a performance higher than can be > provided by 7600GT. Tried Bioshock yet? It might well be That Game. :) I got an 8800GT and am *loving* it. With BioShock, and with the Half-Life/TF2 games. 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