Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Nuke on November 16, 2006, 06:01:06 pm
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now that i have $1100 complements of the alaskan oil industry. im looking to buy a very high end geforce card. i had originally planned to buy a gf7950gx2. but now as im browsing newegg i find theyre out of them, as is pretty much everyone else, except ewiz. they got one for like $512. the geforce 8800s are replacing them.
now im looking at the new 8800gtx which costs $150 bucks more. it has a small bug though, the position of the power connector sucks, id have to saw holes in my case to get it to fit, but it would fit. doable, but inconvenient. also the added costs cut into budget for other things, like groceries and rent. im sure i could wing it though. now the 8800 gtx looks like it has better specs, fil rate on this card is much higher 36.2g vs 24g (i think in pixels/sec). the 7950gtx has more memory, but its about 10 gb/s slower. it also looks like the new model is a single gpu card, instead of dual like my original choice. then it comes down to dx10 support. id hate to get the new one only to find out its full of bugs. or get the old one to find out it wont run at all.
so im curious as to which way to throw my money, i got a day befre my deposit clears, and that long to review my choices. any ideas?
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I'd get the new one.
just to stay on the cutting edge.
because when that starts getting outdated, you can get a second one and SLI, which would probably be cheaper than getting a new card.
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Im waiting. I waaaaant an 8800gtx, but there will be better, cheaper, less power hungry in the future...
/me hates his intel x3000
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now that i have $1100 complements of the alaskan oil industry. im looking to buy a very high end geforce card. i
:wtf: :wtf:
Motherfu**cker! What is this, Libya or something? I thought the US was against socialist handouts. I am firmly opposed to such measures, unless of course they cut me in on the deal.
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I was looking at a 8800GTS... it's about the same size at the 7950GX2... powerhungry... and has better performance!
I'll prolly wait over the GeForce 8x00 boom until the 8600 or something comes out... I prefer midrange to highend... and when NewEgg or TigerDirect stocks them... they'll be alot less expensive!
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If the 8600 is anything like the 7600 was to the 7800, it will be low end, not midrange.
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I Wish I had the money to build my system to uber specs. :/
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I'd get the new one.
just to stay on the cutting edge.
because when that starts getting outdated, you can get a second one and SLI, which would probably be cheaper than getting a new card.
thats the main reason i want a geforce, cause this summer, when i start building a new machine, i may buy a second one, funds permitting. im gonna have a look at the 8800gts. might go with that one with plans to do a second some time down the line. it doesnt apear to have piss poor power connector placement, and is comparable to my previous choice. dont like not having a gig of ram, i like really big textures. then again i may likely splurge on the big one. for me,waiting is not an option, as if i dont buy me something, my moneys gonna get spent on other things.
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I'd get the new one.
just to stay on the cutting edge.
because when that starts getting outdated, you can get a second one and SLI, which would probably be cheaper than getting a new card.
thats the main reason i want a geforce, cause this summer, when i start building a new machine, i may buy a second one, funds permitting. im gonna have a look at the 8800gts. might go with that one with plans to do a second some time down the line. it doesnt apear to have piss poor power connector placement, and is comparable to my previous choice. dont like not having a gig of ram, i like really big textures. then again i may likely splurge on the big one. for me,waiting is not an option, as if i dont buy me something, my moneys gonna get spent on other things.
I'd aim for the 8800 GTS instead of the GTX. The GTX seems to be a bit of an overpowered beast while the GTS is nearly perfect in its balance between power requirements, the physical size of the card, and performance. Its still blazing fast...and I mean blazing fast according to the benchmarks.
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having gone over toms hardware guide im definately aiming for the 8800gts over the 7950gtx. mainly for the dx10 support. as i expect to get at least 3 or 4 years out of this thing. kazan has convinced me to take a look at ati cards. il look, but unless i see something spectacular, il just stick with nvidia (as im most comfortable with nvidia drivers). another factor that just popped into my head, my monitor sucks, and probibly couldnt reach such a high refresh. i think it capps at 75 or 80 hz. but it will be nice to actually get tu use aa though :D
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Those thinking of getting one of the new geforces should really wait until january for ATI R600 to be reviewed. It has the potential to leave 8800's in the dust, but only time will tell.
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Those thinking of getting one of the new geforces should really wait until january for ATI R600 to be reviewed. It has the potential to leave 8800's in the dust, but only time will tell.
True that...or at least wait for the two to start jockeying for best pricing/performance against each other. Thats when the real deals start to show up!
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my money will be gone by january :D
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I'm holding out on buying a new rig until Q1-Q2 next year because I'm waiting how R600 competes and also waiting for R600 and G80 prices to drop into more sensible level. Shelling out 500-700€ just for a video card is simply put stupid IMHO. Not only that but I'm also waiting for Intel's Bearlake and AMD's Barcelona chipsets which will be supporting the companies next-generation quad-cores, even if I will buy dual-core at the time. And will also support PCI Express 2.0.
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I posted my thoughts on it in here (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,43230.0.html). Basically, wait for the games. It's a pity that we have this amazing card available but there is hardly anything to take advantage of it.
now im looking at the new 8800gtx which costs $150 bucks more. it has a small bug though, the position of the power connector sucks, id have to saw holes in my case to get it to fit, but it would fit. doable, but inconvenient. also the added costs cut into budget for other things, like groceries and rent. im sure i could wing it though. now the 8800 gtx looks like it has better specs, fil rate on this card is much higher 36.2g vs 24g (i think in pixels/sec). the 7950gtx has more memory, but its about 10 gb/s slower. it also looks like the new model is a single gpu card, instead of dual like my original choice. then it comes down to dx10 support. id hate to get the new one only to find out its full of bugs. or get the old one to find out it wont run at all.
The amount of memory is lower due to the way SLI works. The 8800GTX crushes the 7950GX2 across the board in any case.
Do you have a small case? Chances are that a bigger problem will be the 10.8" card length, which overhangs ATX motherboards and is too big for a lot of midtowers. A number of people are getting a new case for this card because it won't fit in their existing one.
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I posted my thoughts on it in here (http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php/topic,43230.0.html). Basically, wait for the games. It's a pity that we have this amazing card available but there is hardly anything to take advantage of it.
now im looking at the new 8800gtx which costs $150 bucks more. it has a small bug though, the position of the power connector sucks, id have to saw holes in my case to get it to fit, but it would fit. doable, but inconvenient. also the added costs cut into budget for other things, like groceries and rent. im sure i could wing it though. now the 8800 gtx looks like it has better specs, fil rate on this card is much higher 36.2g vs 24g (i think in pixels/sec). the 7950gtx has more memory, but its about 10 gb/s slower. it also looks like the new model is a single gpu card, instead of dual like my original choice. then it comes down to dx10 support. id hate to get the new one only to find out its full of bugs. or get the old one to find out it wont run at all.
The amount of memory is lower due to the way SLI works. The 8800GTX crushes the 7950GX2 across the board in any case.
Do you have a small case? Chances are that a bigger problem will be the 10.8" card length, which overhangs ATX motherboards and is too big for a lot of midtowers. A number of people are getting a new case for this card because it won't fit in their existing one.
so far it looks like im going with the gts model. ive measured my case thuroughly, while my formfactor is a little bit non-standard, it is amazingly effietient. it has a good 12 inches of video card space, so long as the card isnt exceptionally tall. the 8800 cant fit without some minor modification due to the placement of the power connectors. the fan on that thing apears to be a blower, so thats better news on the cooling side of things, but il probibly drop a few bucks on some bay fans just incase.
I'm holding out on buying a new rig until Q1-Q2 next year because I'm waiting how R600 competes and also waiting for R600 and G80 prices to drop into more sensible level. Shelling out 500-700€ just for a video card is simply put stupid IMHO. Not only that but I'm also waiting for Intel's Bearlake and AMD's Barcelona chipsets which will be supporting the companies next-generation quad-cores, even if I will buy dual-core at the time. And will also support PCI Express 2.0.
i wouldnt call it stupid. ive just never owned such a high end card, and here i got an oppritunity to. seems everytime i wait for a cheaper deal i end up not getting the performance i expect..
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Pfeh. My machine is over a year old and wasn't even cutting edge then, but it'll stand up to anything thrown at it for at least another year.
Of course, the next upgrade will involve mobo, CPU, graphics card, and memory, or newer kit will bottleneck at the memory. It's the fastest DDR there is, which is still slower than any DDR2.
Case space? Muhahahahahaa...
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now that i have $1100 complements of the alaskan oil industry. im looking to buy a very high end geforce card. i
:wtf: :wtf:
Motherfu**cker! What is this, Libya or something? I thought the US was against socialist handouts. I am firmly opposed to such measures, unless of course they cut me in on the deal.
Its alaska, they have to pay people to live there.
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Meh... I have a 6800 GS and I'm as happy as hell.
No game I can't play or have problems with yet :D
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Pfeh. My machine is over a year old and wasn't even cutting edge then, but it'll stand up to anything thrown at it for at least another year.
Of course, the next upgrade will involve mobo, CPU, graphics card, and memory, or newer kit will bottleneck at the memory. It's the fastest DDR there is, which is still slower than any DDR2.
Case space? Muhahahahahaa...
Check out the motherboard reviews Anandtech did with the ASRock 775Dual-VSTA board; specifically, this one: http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2810
DDR2 isn't much faster at all.
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I'm still holding out for the 8600... i like the combo between price and preformance that was delivered in previous gen GeForce x600's. As of now, anything is a big upgrade over my crappy FX5200 on APG 4.0.
My crappy PC...
Intel Celeron 2.0ghz (the 128K L2 cache isn't recognized) on Socket 478
Intel D845PESV (DDR DIMM 1 is burnt out due to three problems... 1) RAM that was unstable at high temperatures (didn't exceed any temperature max), 2) crappy design on Intel's part... the APG slot was placed to high, putting pressure on DIMM 1 that could damage it... (as I found out and then read up on), 3) the RAM burnt out about 6 months after it was upgraded in the middle of summer; I was still watching the thermal sensors, turning off when it started to overheat a little bit. No throttling alerted me, and the RAM burnt out after I shut down smoothly. I turned it back on and the uncle (who built the PC and was repairing it) tried to convince me that the RAM burnt out because I let it overheat.)
512MB DDR RAM, PC2100, on DDR DIMM 0. (I originally started with 256MB, upgrade to 1024MB, and then DIMM 1 burnt out leaving me with a damaged stick and a good 512MB stick)
PNY nVidia GeForce FX 5200, 128MB on APG 2.0
Western Digital? E-IDE Hard Drive, 80GB, 8MB Cache, 7200RPM
Well that's about it... the PC sucks because it's damaged. It's still running after four years 8 months... after 3 complete OS reinstalls in the first 3 years. It's fine since... I guess...
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Check out the motherboard reviews Anandtech did with the ASRock 775Dual-VSTA board; specifically, this one: http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2810
DDR2 isn't much faster at all.
I've seen evidence and heard arguments for both side of the argument.
Personally I doubt there'll be a huge improvement until DDR3 arrives.
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So, nuke, how is it?
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Use the money to get one 8800GTX, a good and big case, a bunch of fans, good power connector cords, and even more ram. Plus LED lights (neon optional).
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So, nuke, how is it?
its in the mail, i doubt il get it till friday.
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I never understood what was so cool about LED lights and all....
If you want your fans to last a lifetime, grab Panasonic Panaflo fans. I've been using mine since 2001 and none of them have died. Just an interesting side note.
That, and getting a GTX right now would be silly. I mean, man, if that's the card you have your heart set on, wait six months and you'll be able to get it at half the cost. GTS would have more than enough power to do anything you can throw at it untill vista comes along and some big developer releases the next big DirectX10 game (prob. Valve, or Monolith)
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Personally I doubt there'll be a huge improvement until DDR3 arrives.
When's that supposed to happen?
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That, and getting a GTX right now would be silly.
Actually, getting the GTS is sillier. Its performance boost over the Radeon X1900XTX cards isn't ginormous (and is even beaten by them in certain specific tests), and yet the cost is the same. The GTX merely adds $100 to that already-high $500 price (list; it's selling for closer to $650-690 currently), and yet has a tremendous %25 performance boost over the GTS.
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Well, the difference is bigger than that, but it's still worth it as far as I can see. The GTS does overclock well and you can usually get it to perform at about the level of a stock GTX, but the GTX can be pushed almost as far up too.
By the way, if you're getting one right now, Dell SB currently has a very nice deal on these cards, with 15% automatically taken off the standard price. If you have signed up for their mailing list, you will have another 10% coupon code on top of that (can also be gotten for a few dollars off ebay), so the prices in the end come out to about $530 for the GTX and $380 for the GTS. Although they will probably become heavily backordered soon once the word starts to get out, like the last such deal a few months ago.
As I said earlier though, there is hardly anything to play on these cards. :p
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Still think I'll get a 7950 GT and enjoy the increasingly lower price points with the next gen coming onto the market.
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Yeah, I can't wait to see prices drop (hopefully like rocks).
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Yeah, I'm torn too. My venerable Radeon 9800 Pro burnt out a couple of days ago - fan stopped working and I was out all day, so the thing overheated but the computer never shut off. I'm running off my brother's old 9500 Pro now, but itching to upgrade. Problem is, the best price for an 8800 GTX is $900 USD here (including VAT, but still...). It makes paying a mere $600 for one seem like a dream.
Anyway, I think I'll force myself to wait for 2 things: One, ATI's DX10 cards. And two, DX10 cards that cost about half the price of the 8800 GTX.
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Im not sure what to do. I want to keep DX10 because I run vista, but I dont want to spend that much money at all... and Im getting close to needing a video card, as the integrated thing is only good enough to run vista aero.
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Yeah, I'm torn too. My venerable Radeon 9800 Pro burnt out a couple of days ago - fan stopped working and I was out all day, so the thing overheated but the computer never shut off. I'm running off my brother's old 9500 Pro now, but itching to upgrade. Problem is, the best price for an 8800 GTX is $900 USD here (including VAT, but still...). It makes paying a mere $600 for one seem like a dream.
Anyway, I think I'll force myself to wait for 2 things: One, ATI's DX10 cards. And two, DX10 cards that cost about half the price of the 8800 GTX.
If the rumors are anything to go by...G80 based chips in the mid and low end markets are due early in 2007.
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Actually, I just realized something. I'd been mentally looking at the 2000 shekel (http://www.google.com/search?q=2000+ILS+in+USD) (price in Israel - it actually meant ~$300-$350 US-priced cards) price range for a GFX card upgrade for many months now. Back when I first started looking into things, the best card for that kind of money was the GeForce 7900 GT. When the X1900 XT came out, it took the 7900 GT's spot handily.
But now, looking at NewEgg.com, I can get an 8800 GTS for $460, which is 2000 shekels! The only problem is, NewEgg doesn't ship inter-freakin-nationally! :hopping:
Who wants to drop-ship a VGA card overseas for me? ;)
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I'd ship it if you let me test it out a little first! ;}
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I'd ship it if you let me test it out a little first! ;}
Heh.... hehehe.... :drevil: I'm so very tempted to take you up on that offer... ;)
Actually, I just discovered that Frys.com ships internationally. They want to charge $45 to ship the dinky little 8800 GTX to my front door. Humph!
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Look on ebay. If you have some patience, you may be able to get it cheaper there. That's where my current card came from (brand new) and it was a good $100 less than the going retail price at the time.
If you want your fans to last a lifetime, grab Panasonic Panaflo fans. I've been using mine since 2001 and none of them have died. Just an interesting side note.
Those aren't that great anymore, basically ever since they moved their factories to China in 2004. I have some older ones that work very well and a newer one that is obnoxiously loud.
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I think I've decided on an x1950pro. They're coming down in price, and one can be had for under 200.00... (well. at or about 200.00)
Anyone any opinions?
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X1950 Pro offers the best price/performance ratio at the moment. The only downside is that it is a DX9 card, but given the situation it is a better buy than any high-end DX9-card. IMHO of course.
Still, it is entirely possible we will be seeing mid-range DX10 cards sometime next march.
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Well, the way I see it, I wont be using it to its full potential as it is for a long while, I imagine. FS2, perhaps some fps titles here and there, and 3dmax will be the predominant uses for it... I dont think I need to worry about DX10 for quite some time...
I think I'll still give it a month or so before I go for it... see how prices, and new technology go.
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If you can afford it, an X1900 XT 256 is WAY faster than the X1950 Pro, although it doesn't use the fancy-schmancy new CrossFire implementation that the X1950 Pro does.
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It's 100.00 more. Thats more than any individual part of my rig. And I only have one PCI-e slot so crossfire is out of the question.
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Ah.
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results are in
system specs (if you didnt know)
athlon 64 3500+
2gb pc3200 ddr (4x 512's all in dual channel mode)
geforce 8800gts
3dmark 2001 (all defaults except using 1280*124*32): 22700
3d mark 2006 (defaults): 5499
quake 4, settings maxed: 60 fps (capped by monitor refresh, need to figure out how to get it up to 75 hz in quake). otherwise smooth as silk.
tenebre quake, start map (ineffieteint as hell too, with that bloom effect or whatever which used to render my rig a slide show), held at 60 fps.
fsopen 7.8 + nukemod + all mediavps:
scannin crates with ragnarok, valhalla, rummrunner, dante calld in, and alpha flying a phoenix, a chimera, a shagrath and a satyr + tc crates and vasudan support ship, no combat:
ogl, 16 anistrophic, trilinear, 1280*1024*32: 105-120 fps
d3d8, 2 aa samples, 1280*1024*32: 63-118 fps
scannin crates, alpha 1 in phoenix only + support and crates, dante vs dante:
ogl, 16 anistrophic, trilinear, 1280*1024*32: 6.2-7.9 fps
d3d8, 2 aa samples, 1280*1024*32: 8.5-55 fps
all in all im pretty happy. need to tweak some stuff, like quake 4, to take advantage of more features. freespace runs on it pretty well up till you start seeing effects, at which point, no matter what you got in your machiine your screwed. nukemod at this point is a brutal torture test, without any lod-ing on the hi poly models (yet). quake 4 is the most graphic intense thing i got, and it cant be slowed. though i need to get it to use the monitor's maximum 75 hz. my last 3d mark 2k1 test scored between 6k and 8k, so with 22.7k id say i like.
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Looks good, but man, you need to increase those settings bigtime. :p Bump up the resolution by a couple notches or try the 8xQ or 16xQ CSAA modes. Unfortunately, it seems like they might have removed the combined AA modes that were on previous Nvidia cards.
freespace runs on it pretty well up till you start seeing effects, at which point, no matter what you got in your machiine your screwed.
Are you using one of the CVS builds with that particle bug? I have been sticking with the RC builds and they don't have this problem.
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dot 8. no doubt its really out of date. i checked the recent builds forum, but all i saw that were newer were a bunch of experimental features builds. really making us wait for rc8 they are. but im sure is partly my fault, ive been hooked on ragnacrack online and have been neglecting the scp boards.
as for upping settings, im at my monitor's native res, going any higher is really just a waste of rendering. yes i know its a dumb idea to buy a card that half my equipment bottlenecks the crap out of. but the general idea is to have a card that i wont have to upgrade for quite some time. besides in a few months i plan to start building a computer that can keep up with it.
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Nuke, all you need to do to remove the 60hz cap on games is to take off "wait for screen refresh" in the game options / video card control panel.
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Nuke, all you need to do to remove the 60hz cap on games is to take off "wait for screen refresh" in the game options / video card control panel.
Taking off refresh rate syncing quite likely results in visible tearing in some games (if not all) even if you gain a few frames per second. If the refresh rate setting in display options don't have effect in games, you probably need to use the settings found in video card driver control panel.
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Of course it results in tearing, but for benchmarking purposes, that doesn't matter. And, with these cards, it's likely to gain a bit more than just a few frames per second. A few dozen, perhaps. ;)
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i usually keep vsync off. i found out how to get my refresh up in doom 3 engine games, unfortunately it supposedly forces a framecap of 60 anyway. the video card wants to go faster but the game wont let it.
freespace doesnt have a setting for refresh, and the drivers dont let you tweak in-game refresh rates. im sure theres a way around it. my monitor can do 75 fps, the video card can keep up, just a mater of getting them to do it.
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If you're getting 60FPS and you know there's headroom, then turn on the fancy 16xQ Super Sampling Transparent Anti-aliasing.
Turning off v sync to get more FPS is a pretty poor trade off when you have a fast enough video card. (It's understandable for people who can't get enough FPS of course).
BTW, at any resolution 1600x1200 and below, an A64 3500+ will be the bottleneck apparently for the G80s O_O
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dot 8. no doubt its really out of date. i checked the recent builds forum, but all i saw that were newer were a bunch of experimental features builds. really making us wait for rc8 they are. but im sure is partly my fault, ive been hooked on ragnacrack online and have been neglecting the scp boards.
That one actually should work okay. I never used it (went from 7 to 7dot9) but the particle bug is supposed to be only present in the CVS builds. It might be worth trying 7dot9 (the latest one) anyway. I've been using that and have not run into the problem.
as for upping settings, im at my monitor's native res, going any higher is really just a waste of rendering. yes i know its a dumb idea to buy a card that half my equipment bottlenecks the crap out of. but the general idea is to have a card that i wont have to upgrade for quite some time. besides in a few months i plan to start building a computer that can keep up with it.
You should look into upgrading your monitor in that case. :p (which I've always maintained is the most important part of a computer) Although I suppose on the flip side, you won't have to worry about framerate dips for quite some time. The rest of your stuff is pretty much fine.
i usually keep vsync off. i found out how to get my refresh up in doom 3 engine games, unfortunately it supposedly forces a framecap of 60 anyway. the video card wants to go faster but the game wont let it.
freespace doesnt have a setting for refresh, and the drivers dont let you tweak in-game refresh rates. im sure theres a way around it. my monitor can do 75 fps, the video card can keep up, just a mater of getting them to do it.
Yeah, the Doom 3 engine has some annoying issues with that. I don't remember exactly how to remove the framecap (and the stuttering it causes), but it can be done with some combination of the console parameters com_fixedtic and com_precisetic.
As for FS2, just add a dword registry flag called OGL_RefreshRate and set it so that the decimal value is 75.
If you're getting 60FPS and you know there's headroom, then turn on the fancy 16xQ Super Sampling Transparent Anti-aliasing.
16xQ has no SS component. It's purely MS. I've seen a few complaints about this, as Nvidia seems to have entirely removed the various combined and pure SS modes and replaced them with these Q modes. The Q modes offer much better performance but don't look as good on textures.
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That one actually should work okay. I never used it (went from 7 to 7dot9) but the particle bug is supposed to be only present in the CVS builds. It might be worth trying 7dot9 (the latest one) anyway. I've been using that and have not run into the problem.
didnt know there was a newer build. found it, now i get better performance in the dante vs dante test in this build. still some initial slowdown during the guns blazing jump in, but once the warp mesh goes away i see framerates from 60-110. huge performance boost there.
You should look into upgrading your monitor in that case. :p (which I've always maintained is the most important part of a computer) Although I suppose on the flip side, you won't have to worry about framerate dips for quite some time. The rest of your stuff is pretty much fine.
dont think il be getting a better monitor any time soon. a second monitor is something i want though.
Yeah, the Doom 3 engine has some annoying issues with that. I don't remember exactly how to remove the framecap (and the stuttering it causes), but it can be done with some combination of the console parameters com_fixedtic and com_precisetic.
As for FS2, just add a dword registry flag called OGL_RefreshRate and set it so that the decimal value is 75.
il try the doom 3 tweak here in a bit. i set the fs2 tweak and it seems to be working. my monitor has alot of ghosting at 60hz and much much less at 75. it looks alot smoother than it did as well. thanks for the tips.
16xQ has no SS component. It's purely MS. I've seen a few complaints about this, as Nvidia seems to have entirely removed the various combined and pure SS modes and replaced them with these Q modes. The Q modes offer much better performance but don't look as good on textures.
im using as much aa as the games will let me, its really nice to actually be able to use it for a change. sence ive never had a card with suffietient performance to actually use aa, its not too big of a deal that they took out some modes. any aa is better than none.
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16xQ has no SS component. It's purely MS. I've seen a few complaints about this, as Nvidia seems to have entirely removed the various combined and pure SS modes and replaced them with these Q modes. The Q modes offer much better performance but don't look as good on textures.
If I meant 8xMSAA+2xSSAA then I'd say 16xS. However, I said 16xQ Super Sampling Transparent AA. The super sampling refers to the transparency part (known as adaptive AA for ATI). This feature is enough to bring the GTX to its knees for some modern games with a lot of alpha textures.
You have to set this in the control panel btw. It's not enough to set it ingame.
Incidentally, because TSSAA is still in the G80, that leads me to believe that the super sampling modes are still there but just hidden by the driver. Nonetheless, the 16xQ is actually very good (as opposed to plain 16x CSAA which can deteoriate down to 8xQ depending on the scene). And it performs better than a theoretical 8xS on the G80 would.
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i got supersampling enabled. its something i tweaked after i installed the card.
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What is this Q and what does it mean? :wtf:
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Also, while we're on the subject... Which is a better buy?
SAPPHIRE 100186L Radeon X1950XT 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Video Card - Retail (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16814102067) $269.99
or
DIAMOND X1950PRO512PCIE GDDR3 VIVO Video Card - Retail (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16814103022) $259.99
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didnt know there was a newer build. found it, now i get better performance in the dante vs dante test in this build. still some initial slowdown during the guns blazing jump in, but once the warp mesh goes away i see framerates from 60-110. huge performance boost there.
That sounds a lot better. I also get a strange slowdown when certain types of weapons fire for the first time in a mission (a prolonged framerate drop rather than the stutter you might expect), but it doesn't occur after that.
If I meant 8xMSAA+2xSSAA then I'd say 16xS. However, I said 16xQ Super Sampling Transparent AA. The super sampling refers to the transparency part (known as adaptive AA for ATI). This feature is enough to bring the GTX to its knees for some modern games with a lot of alpha textures.
Never mind, I misunderstood what you were saying there.
Some people are saying that 8xS and 16xS (it actually consists of 4x MS and 2x2 SS) both look better than 16xQ with transparency SS due to their effect on non-transparent textures. I suppose the two SLI AA modes are still available with multiple cards, but those are inferior to the xS modes from what I've seen.
What is this Q and what does it mean?
Presumably quality. :p Some of the new AA modes on the 8800 cards are labeled with a Q and use extra color depth information over the non-Q versions. They look slightly better, although the difference is supposed to be very small.
Also, while we're on the subject... Which is a better buy?
SAPPHIRE 100186L Radeon X1950XT 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Video Card - Retail $269.99
or
DIAMOND X1950PRO512PCIE GDDR3 VIVO Video Card - Retail $259.99
The first one, easily. Although that Pro is far too expensive; those are normally around $200.
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Well... I just bought the HIS X1950XT >..>;; Reeeealy nervous now.
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Well... I just bought the HIS X1950XT >..>;; Reeeealy nervous now.
X1950XT? I don't know of any such card... there's X1900XT's and X1950 Pro's, but I don't know of any X1950XT's. From the product picture, it's not the X1950 Pro (which has a newer cooler), so it's probably the X1900XT - which is a great card. :)
EDIT: Unless that's what they're calling the 256Mb version of the original X1900XT's, which had 512Mb. I haven't seen any announcements to that effect, tho... strange.
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http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814161047
Its clocked higher, memory wise, than the x1900xt, it seems, but is indeed 256Mb.
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Well, as far as I have heard, ATI hasn't released a X1950XT card yet, so it could just be a rebranding by retailers or something. Whatever, it's not important, just curious.
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Either way it should be much better than my x3000 :p
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X3000? That's a card?? :wtf:
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Da. It is, and its not horrible, but its not great. Got 5632 on 3dMark01, and has HTL and HDR support. Is DX10, and has a unified architecture. (http://www.intel.com/products/chipsets/g965/)
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...Is DX10...
Somehow I doubt that... :p
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...Is DX10...
Somehow I doubt that... :p
Hmm, original releases I read had stated that, but it seems now that it is no longer true. Well, then no loss in upgrading to the x1950xt :D
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Wait, wait... it's an integrated chip??? Dude!
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I went microATX this time. Its not easy to find a mATX Board with out integrated graphics :/
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The X1950XT was launched silently a few weeks ago. It's basically a 256MB X1900XT with faster memory.
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/me grumbles about ****ty driver support for Vista Beta. :hopping:
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the U.S. military industrial complex is looking at using the GPU's for processing\problem solving a la CUDA
it was on mae pennet a little bit ago