This card is nothing short of AWESOME!!!. The speed and image quality is INCREDIBLE!!. I have been an Nvidia user for a long time and was hesitant about buying this card. Nevertheless, I am very surprised at the speed this thing possesses. My 3DMark went from 8000 to 12249!!. I would recommend it to anyone that is looking to upgrade......

Do you want to buy me one?

lol

i just got one in my new dell (see NEW WORK COMP)


UT2003 - all effects to MAX and res @ 1600 x 1200 - did not even dent it - where as i got my VAIO - with a g4 4600m ultra - 1600 x 1200 - man, major lag - but likely cause of the pc133 memory

Try running the new Catalyst 2.5 drivers if you aren't already. Supposed to have some 9700 improvements in them.

Is DirectX 9 out yet or they are still using the 8.1a. I don't think it is available for download yet. it is supposed to improve the image quality and stability of the card even more.

I like to get my hands on the thimg and see how Mafia looks like on it. Call me oldie, but I love the game.

DirectX 8.2 is available, for Windows 2000. I don't recall where on Microsoft's site it was, but it was a large download (20+MB) for the entire directplay update.

Well... Microsoft will release DX9 right after FG FX is released, because MS and Nvidia are working closely and they will do anything to ruin ATI's business!!! i guess.
DX9 was supposed to be released a long time ago. At least with Radeon 9700.

I think I read that DirectX9 will actually be released before the end of the year, FYI.

ehhh no. ATI got scared and released their card WAY before schedule. DX9 is on the same schedule it's always been at.

I'm running the DX9 RC1 and B0 drivers from ATI.

THey run faster then the DX8.1 versions, and seems to be relatively bug free.

There were rumors that ATI R 9700 will crash in some games if you are using DX8.1. I think Mafia was one of thoes games. They never said it is not playable though.

Just wanted to let you know: DirectX9 is out, see http://www.microsoft.com/directx/ and ATI released their Catalyst set of drivers at http://mirror.ati.com/products/pc/catalyst/index.html.

If you look in my profile you will see my 3dmark, i aint saying anything bad about the card but i aint impressed with that score for a 9700 radeon on your system. RAM and processor give next nothing for 3dmarks, especially with a radeon being so much higher clock rates than the Ti4600 (mine is at stock speeds) i would of expected much higher than what i have

If you look in my profile you will see my 3dmark, i aint saying anything bad but i aint impressed with that score for a 9700 radeon on your system. RAM and processor give next nothing for 3dmarks, especially with a radeon being so much higher clock rates than the Ti4600 (mine is at stock speeds) i would of expected much higher than what i have.[/quote]



How do you figure that a Radeon 9700 is clocked "so much higher than the Ti4600"?. Here are the numbers:

Radeon 9700 Pro:

GPU clock- 325Mhz
Memory clock- 620 Mhz


GeForce Ti4600:

GPU clock- 300Mhz
Memory clock- 650Mhz

25Mhz is not "so much higher in my book". The memory is clocked 30 Mhz higher on your Ti4600 also. It's not the clock speed of the GPU or the memory that make this card stand out....it's the technology behind it. For example.....How does a AMD XP 2000+ outperform a Pentium 4 2GHZ?....Is it the clock speed?. Certainly not with the XP 2000 being clocked at 1.667Ghz. It's the underlying technology. Happy Holidays everyone!!....

Any ideas why the Radeon 9700 is more expensive than the 4600 then, everyones system that has this card outruns my system, 3dmark scores for frame rates and quality. Obviously you arent getting what you should from this card. You also said 25mhz isnt much higher, but it is still higher and this card has better technology and has 8pipe lines rather than 4 on the GF4. I am getting 600 points more which is a lot more. If i clock my CPU back to 2.53 i still get 12712 points.

You also said that an xp 2000+ outperforms a 2ghz P4, does this mean you are suggesting that the GF4 outperforms the Radeon, in this case everyone should save there money and go for the faster Gf4

Any ideas why the Radeon 9700 is more expensive than the 4600 then, everyones system that has this card outruns my system, 3dmark scores for frame rates and quality. Obviously you arent getting what you should from this card. You also said 25mhz isnt much higher, but it is still higher and this card has better technology and has 8pipe lines rather than 4 on the GF4. I am getting 600 points more which is a lot more. If i clock my CPU back to 2.53 i still get 12712 points.

You also said that an xp 2000+ outperforms a 2ghz P4, does this mean you are suggesting that the GF4 outperforms the Radeon, in this case everyone should save there money and go for the faster Gf4[/quote]


"Any ideas why the Radeon 9700 is more expensive than the 4600 then"

1. It is more expensive because it is cutting edge technology. Why not spend $100 more(basing this on Circuit City prices) and get a Radeon with better technology and DX9 support?. This card will be good for a good while simply because of the DX9 support.

"Obviously you arent getting what you should from this card."

2. What should I be getting?. I am running no tweaks on this system at all. Everything is at the defaults. I tried a GF4 for a while, and it didn't come anywhere near the speed or quality of the Radeon. I am not dissin' Nvidia....I have been a loyal user of many Nvidia cards for several years now. But, like I said above, my decision to go with a Radeon was based on performance, longevity, and negligible price difference.

"If i clock my CPU back to 2.53 i still get 12712 points."

3. My original score was using a P4 2.26 Ghz. I now have a 2.53 that I got a few days ago. My benchmark has now gone to 13,429 3Dmarks with DX9 installed plus the Catalyst 3.0 drivers.



"You also said that an xp 2000+ outperforms a 2ghz P4, does this mean you are suggesting that the GF4 outperforms the Radeon, in this case everyone should save there money and go for the faster Gf4"



4. An XP 2000+ DOES outperform a P4 2Ghz. No, that is not what I am suggesting. If the Radeon and the GF4 were run at the same core and memory speeds the Radeon would still win because of the technology advancements....just as the XP2000+ whips the Pentium 4 2Ghz. Just go to http://www6.tomshardware.com/graphic/20020819/radeon9700-13.html
and compare the results for yourself. Also, read this conclusion on the comparison of the GF4 and the Radeon 9700 Pro at http://www6.tomshardware.com/graphic/20020819/radeon9700-28.html

I do agree with you though that MY 3DMark scores should be higher than they are. I dont know, maybe I just have a piece of $hit computer.....lol. At any rate, I am happy with the Radeon. Have a good Christmas.

You keep saying how much better the Radeon is, and i agree, but like i said you have very low points for such a card. I use no tweaks apart from upping my cpu and that gives me a small amount of points. I find it hard to belive that you went from 2.26 up to 2.53 and got that much of an improvement in points, even with dx9 and new drivers. Anyway all i was suggesting at first was for you to look at your system because you had a low score for that system.

I was gonna go for this card myself until i saw its problems with some games, like displaying bad textures in UT2003 and also a mate of mine bought an 8500 radeon and he doesnt like it, so i stayed away. Maybe they have changed but i need proof before i jump the boat. I jumped over to my P4 because the Intel chips are so much cheaper now than they were and i thought i would give them a go, but the radeon still seems to have problems and at nearly 50% extra cost of the GF4 Ti4600 i didnt think it was worth it

I know my 3Dmarks should be higher. I dont know why it isn't.... . I have a decent motherboard and am running XP Home. Maybe its like I said above......I just have a piece of $hit!!.


P.S..........typo below...

3. My original score was using a P4 2.26 Ghz. I now have a 2.53 that I got a few days ago. My benchmark has now gone to 13,429 3Dmarks with DX9 installed plus the Catalyst 3.0 drivers.


Should have been 12,429

I wasnt dissing your system as you have pritty much the same system as i have, but you should be getting better scores. I would look into it, you should be over 13,000 really.

Why in the world do you care? I tell you a radeon 9000 did a better job than a GF4 TI 4200 on nature scene when i compared the two. (Not in terms of frame rate, but in tems of colour and visuals). If i were in movie business and i cared a lot about visuals i would go with ATI cards.
(It is my personal opinion and i think that is just being fare)

Has any Radeon owners ever notice that on every piece of ATI manufactured card, there is a felt pen marking on each of those on board aluminum SMT caps; and ever woner why it is so?

Doesnt ever exhibits the same on Nvidia cards

Maybe the PC2100 is holding you back, Prehaps a fresh install of windows, it could be anything. Also I wouldn't use 3dmark to describe a computer as crap.

I recently upgraded my Celeron 633 to a XP 1700+. Both systems are/were using a GeForce2 MX200 card. I gained about 400 3dmarks when I used the XP. But in the real world my games feel so much faster and in general everything is better.

Don't base your computer on a 3DMark score.

P.S. I've also heard rumors that 3Dmark is more optmised for nVidia hardware.

The 9700 has double the memory bandwidth that the TI 4600 has - THAT is where it gets alot of speed! the TI has like 10.4gb/sec, the ati has about 19 gb per /sec i think it is.


and as for the higher scores - your cpu and memory have ALOT to do with it, don't think your gpu is taking all the heat for 3dmark - also, 3d mark is not a real world test, so don't hink tcause u don't got a higher score that your system is not better.

i got both a ti 4600 and a ati 9700 - i should run some tests of my own.

But of couse the obvious - the 9700 is newer so it is faster, and when the fx comes out, it will be faster, and then when ATi pops out it's new card, it will be faster and so on, and so on etc etc.

if your getting low scores with your radeon 9700 and havent formatted and reinstalled windows i recommend you do so.

when i upgraded from a gf4 to my 9700 my score was only 1300 ish, after a reformat and reinstall i am breaking past 16,600. it makes a big difference.

Well, when you install any new hardware - for me it is a rule to reformat, to get ride of old useless drivers.

I format often anyways, i just put .net rc2 on my vaio with my g4 4600.

but anyways - don't go buy 3dmark - i have also heard the rumours of its prefernce for Nvidia cards. Also, as i said your CPU and memory AND hard drive speed are affected - if you got a slow 5400 rpm HD - then that is gonna limit how fast the data can be read anbd sent to the rest of your system. Don't think JUSt cause u got a new video card your scores will fly through the roof. - unless u got from like a TNT 2 32mb card to a g4 4600 ultra like i did, from liek 6000 on 3d makr to about 10,000 - darn pc133!

Look at cold hard numbers - actual specs /' tech details for each card. - and toms hardware - his reviews are okay, - but his wording is crap and his comparisions are usually a joke and recycled with new product names.



i got ut2003 - full details, max res - 1600 x 1200 - not ONE issue with this game - problems like that can be related to MANY other issues - so to just right out blame a video card to me is not very smart, just an easy way out. And why does your mate not like his 8500 - i got a 7500 in my moms comp - my friend has the 64mb 8500 - no issues, and he plays more games and watches more movies then i do!