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ATI at the Top Graphics Chip Maker for 2004
dirutz writes "ATI is at the top according to market share, but nVidia is catching up. Hopefully this competition means lower prices and more goodies."
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Hopefully this competition means lower prices and more goodies.
And better open-source support?I used to be all for ATI, but the current selection of cards from Nvidia is IMO more impressive, especially cards like the 6600GT which are pretty awesome in the $200 price range.
I've owned various nVidia and ATI video cards. My current PC is using an ATI RADEON 9600XT from ASUS. Its a bit dated now, but a very nice card overall. My other PC has a nVidia GeForce4 MX400 made by Chaintech. That card is quite a bit more dated, and was kind of mediocre to begin with.
Anyways, the point I'm slowly coming to, is that, essentially, I don't really care if I own an ATI or nVidia card. High end cards are high end cards. I've had few problems with either; although, I find reliability of anything made by ASUS is best. Benchmarks aside, you get what you pay for. And most of the "discussion" over which is better in reference to ATI and nVidia is pure fanboyism.
Please mode insightful. ATI might have the better hardware (or not, nVidia latest offerings are catching up IIRC); but their driver suck. Specially outside Windows.
I'd love to buy a modern video card with OSS drivers - hell, i was planning to get a S3 Deltachrome when i though they might do that. But in the meantime, nVidia offers binary drivers for Windows/Linux/BSD that work flawlessly and never gave me an issue. I'm sold.
I question how long it will go. I see a few sinareo's:
1. The more advanced gaming gets, the more complex it gets. Eventually graphics cards will outdo what game developers can program for. Until programming techniques allow them to take advantage of features, that could cause a temporary stall in sales.
2. Heat? PC's tend to be getting smaller. Small is the trend right now, compared to "I need a mini tower" craze of the 90's. I think that heat barrier is going to become a big issue too. How do you cram that hot processor into a little box, with a quiet fan.... if even a fan? IMHO the thermal barrier is not somehting they can ignore.
3. Price. After 1,2. How do they keep the price affordable? Especailly with dedicated gaming units like the PS2 and Xbox... how do you keep PC gaming and encourage people to shell out cash. It seems more and more common for a game to be PS2 only, or Xbox only.... and no PC version. This removes the motivation to spend big bucks on GPU's.
IMHO this isn't going to last. It's a mini dotcom bubble.
It will burst, it will scale back, and some of it will survive. But I think the over-emphasis on Graphics Cards will be a trend of times past in the next few years.
Sidenote: And ironically I type this with an ATI ad right on the top of the page!)
And they told all this to an interviewee? RIGHT
-mkb
ATI is currently selling very few cards. Everyone knows the best value is in the 6600GT and 6800GT.
The x700 series, is just garbage.
The 9600 XT has the same performance for the same price, the 9800 pro is also the same price.
ATI has so little fab space they simply don't reflect market pressures.
This certainly sounds like ATI fanboy FUD to me. nVidia has shown that they're capable of producing a quality product (hence their growing market share). I don't see why they'd suddenly veer from a path that's proven effective.
It really doesn't matter one way or the other. The video card market is fast paced and volatile. If nVidia does produce garbage, the market will react accordingly, and drop them like a hot rock.
~D
This sig has been enciphered with a one-time pad. It could say almost anything.
However, given their stance on Linux drivers, my next purchase will be Nvidia.
Mine too.
Unfortunately, this means diddly-squat in the grand scheme of things. As long as ATI can convince Dell and the top few PC vendors that they have the best solution for Windows, then we lose.
More
Where is this founded?
:-) Well one is a 5200 :-( which is notably slower, even though it has double memory (256).
Here is a d/l for linux drivers, they have for about 20 of thier cards...
Are the drivers crap? Is this an urban myth? I loved my first ATI card with MPEG on board, and TV in... it was so nice! years ago now...
Then I had a matrox... damn thing, was a nice card but they supported my motherboard exactly 1 day (YES!! the next day they updated thier website!) after I ditched the card, after 13 months of unhappy marraige.
Now I just got two free nvidia 5700le's and they are nice enough
Doom3 on 5700le is definately playable on default settings.
me out.
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
Riiight. Except that Sony's about to plug x0 million NVidia GPUs into the PS3. I don't think flurried coding standards are going to be the end of NVidia, and especially not while it's Sony's bitch.
People like you are the reason that linux has a hard time being accepted as mainstream on the desktop. One zealot losing his temper right here could make a PC user reading this thread think "Damn, linux people are freaking weirdos", instead of reading people's ideas on why they release the drivers or not, and making their own decision.
So thanks, crazy man, for reaffirming the general public's thoughts that linux users are angry people who froth at the mouth at anything that isn't 100% open source, and type shit like M$ instead of MS/Microsoft.
If you'd just step away for a second and try to be open-minded(like open source, but use your brain), you can see why the companies do this. Sure, I don't agree with it either, but I'm not going to lose my temper over something that makes pretty colors show up on my monitor.
i use linux and windows oh god how can i have an opinion
And so, based on the accent of the interviewer and a statement that they hire many H-1Bs, you naturally concluded: "An army of H-1Bs are working on the simulator. The code itself has few comments because using American English is a hassle." Sorry, but you're making yourself less credible with every sentence you write.
ATI's graphics drivers suck. Would it be so hard guys to document your control registers so one of us out here could write a decent driver? Intel and AMD are wide open in this respect. Why aren't you?
an ill wind that blows no good