[Achillion]

Read through the entire thread and I think everything has been covered. That never stopped me in the past from mouthing off my own uneducated opinion though so here ya go:

- Both brands have problems (hell, nVidia had a massive recall on laptop motherboards in the US about a year ago and 2007 nVidia based MacBooks have been dying all over the place).
- ATI VGAs are usually (at least whenever I've gone shopping) cheaper at the midrange, while things even out the higher you go. For hardware I usually consult bit-tech.net (they have a monthly buyer's guide of price-ranged systems which is very well thought out) and Tom's Hardware (benchmark charts and monthly "Best VGA for the money" articles; the latter tells you which VGA will give you the best performance in each price range, which is great when you're on a budget).

Something I haven't seen mentioned (though I might have missed it) is the manufacturer of the actual card. Some dismiss it entirely but there have been benchmarks were different makes of the same chipset show different performance. Trying to save a bit of money on a cheaper brand usually backfires when the quality of the cooler and connectors is sub-par.
For nVidia, I prefer Asus, MSI and XFX, though that's simply experience and personal trust in certain companies.
I have less experience with ATI, though from what I understand Saphire is supposed to be the leading manufacturer (please correct me here if I'm wrong) and the brands mentioned above do a good job on ATIs as well.

I very recently bought this and it's great at staying cool under load.

[Kosh]

The only factor that levels the playing field is that the competition is having the exact same problems and can't really deliver a stable product most of the time.

From last year but very relevant to that point

Acer is a POS. Don't worry so much about AMD A-series though: the IGP is a lot cooler than a dedicated card. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_Fusion#.22Llano.22_.2832nm.29_2

Here's the funny thing though, NVidia doesn't even have a product like Fusion, nor does it seem to have any plans to produce one.

[Nuke]

i remember way back when i put a voodoo card into my ancient 120mhz pentium rig and it turned a soso computer into a gaming rocket. we went from sub par software 3d to epic hardware 3d overnight. seriously, install retail freespace 1 and run it in software. then play it with hardware 3d, its like day and night. i cant think before or since ive ever felt a product really had a major impact in performace. every videocard (or cpu for that matter) ive bought since then has only felt like a marginal increase in performance than what came before. we are kinda spoiled. for some reason i think my 2 year old video card that still gets a good framerate in most games with the settings full up is just not good enough to use in my next computer.

[Achillion]

Funny you should mention Voodoo. I was just reading this earlier: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/picturestory/25-graphics-radeon-geforce.html

[Nuke]

Funny you should mention Voodoo. I was just reading this earlier: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/picturestory/25-graphics-radeon-geforce.html

i read through that article earlier. of course i got disappointed that they didnt mention the voodoo 3 which was one badass beast of a card. if i remember correctly nvidia didnt steal the show till the voodoo 4/5 era, where both products turned out to be major flops. the voodoo 3 was still a major contender in its day.

[Mikes]

Both brands have and always had their ups and downs. Nvidia appeared to be more willing to make hot and noisy cards in order to get every tiny bit of performance, while ati has a much more balanced approach. (Both brands dual gpu cards are noise and heat monsters tho )

I really liked the old 8800gts cards a few years back. But after that I went Ati all the way without looking back, as the new Nvidia generation was just idiotic as far as heat and noise goes. And who knows what the next gen cards will be like.

My advice: Don t be a fanboy. Buy whichever card suits your purpose best.
(I.e. I can understand people who build dedicated gaming PCs with the "fastest" card available and simply do not care about noise, heat or the electricity bill. Puting that same card into a multipurpose computer and having to deal with all that noise and energy consumption while its running the whole day would be rather stupid however.)

P.S.: As far as drivers go there is hardly a difference in my eyes, I have plenty of horror stories for both brands, but never had an issue that could not be fixed (usually by installing a different/better/older driver)

P.P.S: Been running an Intel Hexcore on a highend Gigabyte Mainboard with a Sapphire 5870 VaporX for the last year and its without question the best setup I ever owned. Rock stable, solid performance, whisper quiet.

P.P.P.S:  Anyone experiencing random crashes is doing something seriously wrong.

[Bob-san]

That list had a few cards missing. Notably...

Voodoo3 (awesome, era-defining card)
GeForce 7600 GT (excellent mid-range card: a hell of a good performer)
GeForce 8800 GTX (best performance you could buy and not surpassed for a very long time)
GeForce 8800 GT (cost-effective performance and the core of 9800's and GTS 250's)
Radeon HD 5850 (again, very cost-effective performance)

[Achillion]

It's not missing 8800 GTX (Picture 16).
OMG YOU ARE SO WRONG. HOW COULD YOU MAKE SUCH A TERRIBLE MISTAKE?!?!!

...


Just thought I'd point it out.

[Kosh]

Radeon 9700 should be on that list, not quite era defining but it was when Nvidia made its first big mistake.

[QuantumDelta]

You mean the 9800, right? :I

[Nemesis6]

I'm considering buying an MSI 570GTX Twin Frozr III -- The 480gtx' I have now is just intolerable, noise-wise.

Also, avoid ATI cards if you don't like artifacts and stuff in games; they seem to specialize in that.

[QuantumDelta]

I'm considering buying an MSI 570GTX Twin Frozr III -- The 480gtx' I have now is just intolerable, noise-wise.

Also, avoid ATI cards if you don't like artifacts and stuff in games; they seem to specialize in that.

Yea.................
No.

Just no.
If you're thinking about saying anything to further your illiterate opinion, just, no.

As many of the sensible people in this thread have already said, there is nothing wrong with either brand, that isn't really wrong with the other.

nV cards have been less reliable in my experience, but I realise that both A) They do for the most part make excellent cards, and B) it's only really their budget or mid-range cards that tend to come out ****ty.
ATi drivers have had problems in my experience, (mostly, to be fair, in the past), but I realise that both A) They drop in occasional dodgey versions, and for the most part they can go years without introducing problems and B) their hardware is more often than not better than nVs.

So it's entirely swings and roundabouts.

[Nemesis6]

I'm considering buying an MSI 570GTX Twin Frozr III -- The 480gtx' I have now is just intolerable, noise-wise.

Also, avoid ATI cards if you don't like artifacts and stuff in games; they seem to specialize in that.

Yea.................
No.

Just no.
If you're thinking about saying anything to further your illiterate opinion, just, no.

How about shove it up your ass and I elaborate anyway? Oblivion on ATI's 4870HD; z-buffer problems, showing particles through geometry that should be blocking the view, and producing artifacts when looking at the sky. Problems with shadow rendering, with shadows showing up as jagged in games like BF2 or Call of Duty 4, Assassins Creed, etc. Oh no, I didn't do what you said. That's sad, huh.

[Ghostavo]

I never had problems with my HD4890 (which is basically the same card as yours but with higher clock speeds) on any of those games.

Sucks to be you then....

[TwentyPercentCooler]

Can't we all just agree that the current market is a total crapshoot and get along? 

[Nuke]

My advice: Don t be a fanboy. Buy whichever card suits your purpose best.

^ this. i use nvidia out of familiarity with the drivers and naming conventions. im sort of a lazy fool in that reguard, go with whats worked in the past and dont try anything new. though i dont exclude the possibility of ati having a better product at the time im shopping for a new video card. last 2 laptops i bought had ati chipsets, simply on the grounds that the mobile nvidia gpu at the time used shared memory while the mobile ati gpu used dedicated memory. had the roles been reversed id have bought nvidia gpus.

[Kosh]

You mean the 9800, right? :I

Which was a slightly tweaked version of the 9700. The reason being that the 9700 thoroughly trounced the best GeForce 4 at the time, and nvidia's response was the hot, noisy and underperforming GeForce "Dust Buster" FX 5800.

Now fast forward 9 years and following several other high profile screw ups with Fermi last year, the 2011 sales picture looks like this:



Source


But it all started with the Radeon 9700......

[QuantumDelta]

I am saddened by intel's market growth, I also hope nV don't drop off too much, since competition is part of the reason the market has progressed as fast as it has :I

[Achillion]

I am saddened by intel's market growth, I also hope nV don't drop off too much, since competition is part of the reason the market has progressed as fast as it has :I

Why is Intel's market share (or growth) a problem? It's a different market if you ask me. The non-gaming, family internet-browsing or office computers (which are far more than gaming computers) have no need for nVidia or ATI VGAs. Even the cheapest nVidia/ATI VGA is probably overkill for that and most on-board Intel chips are more than fit for the task, especially the latest ones. I'm expecting to see that share grow much further as more people start realising how cheap a casual-use PC can get.

[QuantumDelta]

It means the PC gaming market isn't expanding as fast as the glorified pocket calculator market