Thinking about abandoning ATI

Discussion in 'Videocards - NVIDIA GeForce' started by chrispton22, Nov 7, 2008.

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  1. chrispton22

    chrispton22 Member

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    EVGA GTX295
    I have been through a 4850, 2 4850's in Crossfire, 2 4870's and now I'm using a single Sapphire 4870. I have had problems continuously with all of the boards, nothing huge but I frequently crash, see artifacts, etc. I'm also not a big fan of downloading a new Catalyst every week followed by a hotfix.

    My question for you Nvidia owners is..are you satisfied? I am strongly considering buying a GTX 280 not as much for performance but peace of mind.

    Games I'm having sporadic problems with:

    Fallout 3 : Crashes, image corruption
    Far Cry 2 : Frame rate fluctuation
    World in Conflict : Artifacts, not so much anymore though
    Crysis : Runs the best probably, still get artifacts tho

    No i'm not OC'ing the Radeon either.

    Thanks I'd like some recommendations.
     
  2. inklimited

    inklimited Ancient Guru

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    First off: "Noooooooooooooo! Don't leave!"

    Now the joking is out of the way. You went through 6 cards, all of which were dud? Either you shouldn't walk outside next electrical storm, or the real problem lies with the rest of your gear.
     
  3. LookyKai

    LookyKai Member Guru

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    resolution you are using?

    what's your mobo, memory ram? OS? catalyst version, Direct3D version, Driver Package version, etc

    i think the driver is corrupted, if your using vista, here's my method to clean install newest driver
    for vista
    start > control panel > Ati Catalyst Manager > Change > Uninstall All Ati Software > Express > Finish > Remove Ati Catalyst Manager > reboot, finish reboot > run driver sweeper > Clean ATI Display > restart, finish restart > install the latest driver using express setup > reboot > done!

    total reboots: 3

    oh, i forgot.. i satisfied with my GTX280 @ 1680x1050 res, with crysis series overall very high/enthusiast, it's just happy :)
     
    Last edited: Nov 7, 2008
  4. D3lta

    D3lta Active Member

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    My feeling about my HD4870,


    FarCry 2: Waiting new driver for more stable fps - no sporadic problem
    WIC - No artifacts - runs good - no sporadic problem
    Crysis and WarHead - No Artifacts - runs good - no sporadic problem
    Fallout 3: soon

    Best Regards
     

  5. F1refly

    F1refly Ancient Guru

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    your making a good descision sir.
    welcome to the side of truth
     
  6. UnrealGaming

    UnrealGaming Ancient Guru

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    Yes I'm satisfied with Nvidia. I have had no problems with any of the Nvidia cards, ever, nor the driver issues ( when using the right driver, and there is always atlist 1 excellent working driver for Nvidia ) . While that was no case with ATI cards I owned. To be more accurate with 3850 and 4850. Older ATI cards worked as good as Nvidia cards. The problems with 3850, 4850 were : driver stopped responding, weird freezes, crashes... mostly all the problems got fixed through newer driver revisions. But comparing that to ZERO problems with Nvidia cards or drivers I must say that at the moment I really recommend Nvidia. And most friends, some of them are even computer specialists or computer builders I oftenly consult with, agree with this. Atm Nvidia card with forceware 178.15 properly installed is definitely the choice for the win. ( Yes, not all Nvidia drivers are good, but there is always a driver the will work almost perfectly with your card ). And also single GPU card solutions is always much better. If you consider more then one GPU I recommend SLI with 2 single GPU cards rather then GX2.
     
    Last edited: Nov 8, 2008
  7. drivetheory

    drivetheory New Member

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    chrispton22, your problems are, based on my experience, potentially:

    overheating Video Card (causes image corruption)
    overheating RAM (causes file corruption when files move in & out of memory)
    corrupt driver installation (causes image corruption & crashes)
    corrupt DirectX files (causes image corruption & crashes)

    Check your thermal sensor readings and make sure your environment and GPU temperatures are within reasonable levels while gaming. IF they aren't then add/replace system fans, use some 3rd party software to increase fan speeds & thermal response times.

    LookyKai mentioned a good clean driver install procedure, except I'd add a few steps as common precautionary measures:

    1) run "chckdsk c: /f" to check HDD & download and run memtest86+ to check your RAM. Files don't become corrupt for no reason so if corruption is to blame find the reason for corruption and your problem is solved.

    2)Clean TEMP folder before new driver install.
    click start > click run > type: cmd > click ok >type: rd %temp% /q /s > press enter

    IF that command completes with no response messages:
    type: md %temp%
    this recreates your temp folder

    2) delete the "C:\ATI" folder before new driver install.


    I was a die hard ATI supporter for 10+ years (never seen an integrated nVidia graphics unit in a server motherboard until recently as well)
    recently after having 3 bad experiences with ATI manufactured & ATI GPU based cards i've switched to using a BFG GTX 280 OC on my own personal computer and it runs smooth as silk...
     
    Last edited: Nov 8, 2008
  8. mixalis9

    mixalis9 Guest

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    am nvidia fan.. never have any problem with vga cards from gforce2 gforce4 nvidia 6600 nvidia 7600 to 9800gtx ;p
     
  9. PineMangoes

    PineMangoes Master Guru

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    If you had problems with six different cards, it seems like the cards itself are not at fault. While it is possible that one or even two cards are faulty, six cards is a statistical unlikelihood. Some questions:

    1) Have you been using the same motherboard with every card? If so, tried updating the bios?

    2) Same for ram, psu and cpu.

    I'd recommend testing every component by itself before spending more money. Use memtest for the memory first, then Orthos and SuperPI 32M for the cpu, and lastly a multimeter to read out the voltlines on your PSU @ load.

    As for the software part, try reinstalling windows. Use different drivers for every software component if possible (sometimes even something as unrelated as WiFi can cause trouble).
     
  10. HouseTRG

    HouseTRG Member

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    I bought a 9700 Pro for Half Life 2. Then x800 GTO and X1950 Pro.

    Im back with nVidia after having GeForce 2,3 and 5500.

    nVidia seem like the all round strong company with strong drivers and hardware.

    Ati X1950 Pro: GRID nice quality image especially where im looking at the screen. The middle point where the apexs are.

    9800 GT dosnt seem to have, at the same res, the quality at this point in the image. I noticed jaggy edges more in the mid distance in GRID with the 9800 GT.

    Battlefield 2: X1950 Pro: Geomerty is absolutetly appauling. I thought it was a game thing. Its shifts it shape all the time. For years iv been playing like this.

    BF2 with 9800 GT geometry is completetly still and dosnt shape shift at all.

    But i did buy the 9800 GT for its lower power consumption than the 4830 (30 watt less), and slightly slower performance, GRID (10fps lower) every other game 3-8 fps lower.
    So far im happy.
     
    Last edited: Nov 8, 2008

  11. chrispton22

    chrispton22 Member

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    I'm on Catalyst 8.10, I've used 8.8 and 8.9

    The GPU temp will go from 40-60 C, the fan is a complete abomination

    I will definitely try the clean driver reinstall

    Specs :

    Asus P5Q Pro
    E8500 @ 4.17 GHz (I still had the video card problems running at factory speed)
    8GB Corsair DDR2 800Mhz
    650W Antec PSU (New)

    Thanks for the input everyone
     
  12. NeoElNino

    NeoElNino Master Guru

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    brother! the best way to determine if its a MOBO problem or VGA is to go get urself an Nvidia GTX280 and try it out.. if ur crashing issues continue then id suggest u get rid of da motherboard! if ur problems are gone then voila ! ATI was the hic.
    but still take ur time and troubleshoot.. could be defective memory stick.. motherboard etc...
    Aslo have u tried reinstalling the OS? it could fix da problem too who knows.
     
  13. sykozis

    sykozis Ancient Guru

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    It's amazing...I'm running a DMM HD4850 and haven't had a single problem...driver or otherwise. I've run my card at stock clocks and with a mild OC and haven't seen any of the problems that others have complained about. As for his issues with 6 different cards.....hate to break it to every, but statistically....that's impossible. As for nVidia...if they were so great, I'd still have my 9600GT...which was never as stable as my 4850 at any point....if fact, the closest it ever got to stable in 6 months was the 175.19 driver which only delayed it's irritating "black screen of death". From the problems he's describing...I'd loadup the bootable memtest86+ and see how many failures it registers for the memory. Faulty ram will cause artifacts...not just the video card. Seeing as he claims to have had 6 faulty cards....I can just about guarrantee it's either the motherboard, ram, harddrive or processor....all of which can and will cause the exact problems he's describing and are more like than 6 (statistically impossible) faulty graphics cards. BTW....acceptable failure rate for any product is less than 1% and most companies will issue notices if the failure rate reaches 5%. The same person receiving 6 faulty products from the same line would put the failure rate (statistically) around about 40%...which would qualify in the US for a class-action lawsuit based on product failure rate. That would put ATI in the same position as nVidia is with their G84/G86 failures that they denied for a year...all while knowing the GPU's were faulty from day 1. People need to stop immediately blaming video cards for problems that can be related to other components without actually testing other components FIRST. Makes you look a little more intelligent that way. I'd even question whether or not the PSU has a high enough output for the system. I run a 750watt PSU on a system that probably draws less power...and I'm VERY close to the max amperage output. Wouldn't be surprised to find that he is exceeding the amperage output and thus damaged those 6 cards.
     
  14. Exige245

    Exige245 Master Guru

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    Fail


    Success
     
  15. Doug

    Doug Guest

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    If you had the same problems with each card then it's more than likely it's a different component causing the problem. 6 dead cards in a row isn't happening :/
     

  16. chrispton22

    chrispton22 Member

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    I think you guys are misunderstanding me

    The cards weren't faulty

    It's just a ridiculous amount of troubleshooting to fix problems. I had a 9800 back in the day and had problems just like this. NVIDIA the way it's meant to be played..they may be on to something.

    I don't care how fast the 4870's or 50's are for the money or the 4870x2. I still wish I would've gone with a solid Nvidia card.
     
  17. NobleKnight51

    NobleKnight51 Master Guru

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    If you want to see if its an ATI thing, get a cheap Nvidia card for testing (8800GT for example). If you find out you still have problems with video, then its not the video cards fault, its something else. This way you wouldnt have blown all your money on a mistake.

    Personally, my Geforce 4 MX440 sucked, my 6800nu was freaking amazing (although I killed the beast), my 7600GS was ok, and my 8800GT is just what I need for todays games.
     
    Last edited: Nov 8, 2008
  18. Saabjock

    Saabjock Master Guru

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    The Nvidia experience...for me anyway, has been a really good one, so was ATI. I had the AIW, ATI 7000, ATI 9700Pro, then the 9800Pro, all of which were great cards which served me well, with no problems. ATI was a nice company and seemed to be able to provide customer support for their products. The marriage to ATI bred some issues...notably in the customer support area. The once great support just seemed to 'go out the window'. I took a break from ATI and went to Nvidia with the 6800Ultra, followed by 7800 SLI, 8800GTS-640 followed by 8800GTS-512. I took another look at ATI for the HD4870 a few weeks ago... It's now up for sale. Once again, great hardware...but with "stupid" driver oversight. ATI seems to have a 'knack' for releasing drivers which do not address simple fixes...I'm not talking about complex issues....everyone has those from time to time....I'm speaking to things like the current heat debacle. The gaming community has known for months that at around 35% fan speed...(which is not noisy in the least)...you can drop the GPU temp to around 49-52 degrees), yet instead of adding a few lines of code to fix it at the driver level. We are about four driver releases in, and still 'dicking' around with fan profiles to keep it from idling at 77-79 degrees celsius. How stupid is that? Heat is always the enemy of modern electronics, despite report that the RAM can handle that much heat. The card is not just made of RAM. What about the capacitors and other circuit components? Yesterday I went back to a BFG260 O/C. Overall ATI seems to make decent hardware, but their drivers are horrible. Nvidia seem to have a team dedicated to driver optimisation. They're also more compliant in terms of working with end users to maximize performance (as it relates to their hardware). The driver support at Nvidia seems more advance in it's pace to confront general gaming issues in a timely fashion. I hope ATI will eventually do the same for their drivers, the hardware really need good driver support if it is to mature.
     
    Last edited: Nov 9, 2008
  19. macdaddy

    macdaddy Guest

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    You says 6 cards all have problems. Its time to do some trouble shooting and check the whole of your setup. Both sides Nvidia and Ati will encounter some problems for certain games and setups. So the is no definite answers as some will get problems for certain games and some don't. Having the knowledge to trouble shoot is the key.
     
  20. sykozis

    sykozis Ancient Guru

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    Sounds to me more like you simply bought the cards to have a reason to bitch about ATI. I've used both ATI and nVidia cards...and have had my share of problems with them. I've had faulty cards from both "camps". Radeon 9600XT that was DOA...and a GeForce FX5600XT (funny how nVidia has disavowed all knowledge of that card) with a faulty GPU. It always amazes me that people can have the problems they do...and immediately blame the manufacturers instead of actually taking the time to figure out exactly what's wrong. Aside from faulty cards, I've never had an issue with products from either manufacturer. Most problems are related to 2 things...improper configuration or faulty Windows installation. When I got my 4850 I had a problem getting it to run at full speed....simple solution, reinstall Windows. The problem wasn't related to the card or the driver...it was simply damage system files. nVidia has a history of lying to consumers....seen the lawsuits nVidia is currently facing? Why praise a company that can't tell their customers the truth? None of us have perfectly configured systems...but at least some of us have learned to work through the flaws and fix problems before we blame manufacturers for our own screwups.
     
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