ATi or nVidia, time to place your final bets.

Who's going to be top dog next generation? Final bets.


  • Total voters
    273
I'm not voting until two months after the cards are available & they have been analysed in minute detail.

Call me Mr cautious.
 
Too close to call. To me, it depends not only on how fast and how good the image quality is, but also how intrusive the card is. For example, if I have to use a Dustbuster-like cooler on an R420 SuperMegaUltra or whatever, that's right out. If I have to use a Dustbuster 2 on NV40, nuhuh, please drive through.

(Why isn't PowerVR on the poll? ;) )
 
The Baron said:
Too close to call. To me, it depends not only on how fast and how good the image quality is, but also how intrusive the card is. For example, if I have to use a Dustbuster-like cooler on an R420 SuperMegaUltra or whatever, that's right out. If I have to use a Dustbuster 2 on NV40, nuhuh, please drive through.

I agree. I'd buy a slightly slower card if it had other advantages like low heat/noise or better IQ. For instance I deliberatly chose a quiet hard drive because although it benches a couple of milliseconds slower than the fastest drives, it benches massively quieter than the fastest drives. The slight speed loss is more than offset by the huge drop in noise.

If the rumoured high power requirements of NV40 are correct (which could be a problem in itself for many people), that has to translate to a lot of heat output, which in turn could translate to a noisy cooling solution, either on the card itself or additional case cooling. This could be a big deal for a lot of potential purchasers.
 
The Baron said:
(Why isn't PowerVR on the poll? ;) )


Tim "Will Work For Series 5 Rumors" Murray

Work has paid off?

Besides, it is. with a strange shade of yellow. Ask Dave.
 
vb said:
The Baron said:
(Why isn't PowerVR on the poll? ;) )


Tim "Will Work For Series 5 Rumors" Murray

Work has paid off?

Besides, it is. with a strange shade of yellow. Ask Dave.
Work hasn't paid off. At all. That's the problem. :( I just want a third competitor...
 
On the face of it, probably NV40. On a level playing field with both drivers being 'honest'? Probably R420.

So... draw. Let's go home.
 
I was going to say Nv40 until I read this...

aaronspink said:
A little fuel for the fire though... Has anyone thought of the possibility of the R420 having multiple clock domains? If they are reusing pretty much intact the architecture of the R300 for the pipelines, then that means they would have had on the order of 18 months to do custom circuit work. What if the pixel pipes are double pumped? That would certainly be extreme in my opinion, the limitation on pixel output to memory is 12 pixels per cycle.

Imagine an 8 pipe R420 running at 500-600 Mhz able to run its pixel pipes at 1000-1200 Mhz with a 12 pixel output per cycle. Should easily be able to get 2-3x the performance of R360. It would also explain the rumors of 700-800 Mhz GDDR3 for it as well.

Aaron Spink
speaking for myself
 
PatrickL said:
Nvidia already won.

The hype campaign i mean.

That poll made one month ago would have been like 90 % in ati favor. And now with zero reliable info but a lot of carefully leaked PR hints made, result is 50/50.

I find that funny :devilish:

This poll HAS been held before, and I think you'll find the results hold up your theory... it was the same thought I had :)
 
Hum...

The ATI R420 is a Marlborough product, which conceive the R200 (Radeon 8500).

I think the NV40 can beat the R420 but...

The NV40 was conceive when NVIDIA dominated the market (and when NVIDIA sleep deeply).

Maybe on the paper, the NV40 will be the best.

However in the reality (games and benchs), maybe the R420 have the best architecture...
 
vote for NV40
R420 don't support SM3.0, so it can't be "top dog next generation", it will be top dog of current generation
 
Maybe Ati's stride still carries a lot of momentum. Few years ago nvidia was the obvious choice for most developers and gamers.
Nvidia failed to catch up with ati, first with the fx5800 and later the fx5900 a year after the 9700pro, which is still a great card.
Finally it even caught on with the majority of gamers that Ati isn't 'bad drivers' or 'incompatible' but a good choice, even if they still favour nvidia. That's why I'm willing to guess we're finally going to see a fair contest between ati and nvidia, so my vote is for Ati.
 
I'll expect it to be so tight tie, that lot's of "if-this-feature-is-needed-in-the-future" -flamewars will arise.

So, basically... ATI is faster when doing SM 2.0, and nVidia a bit faster doing SM 3.0 stuff. the speed of AA and AF is too hard to guess. (just too many ifs on possible new AA/AF implementations.)

and the end?
it really does not matter which one is better... both will have enough power and features to make you survive on launch of next generation. during that generation, you most likely see what these cores really can do, but who really cares about it then? it's all about the next-next generation. (think about what else you could have done with 1.5 x $400 if you would use GFX card 2.5 years between the updgrades instead of the regular year. And don't give me that crap about only minority boughts High End card every year. just look a round here and try to estimate how much that minority actually causes cash flow. 40 000 ppl buying $400 card makes a huge cash flow, even if it would be just minority.)

(there has been 2 racing games that really have showed the power of GF DDR... first one was BugBear's Rally Trophy (released 3 years after the card.) and second one was Race Driver (released 4 years after the card.) by CuteMast... umh, sorry CodeMasters.)

sorry, had to make a small rant. it has been 1.5 years since I saw my bank account pass over 1000 Euros...
 
Nappe1 said:
sorry, had to make a small rant. it has been 1.5 years since I saw my bank account pass over 1000 Euros...
Not a bad reason. I mean, my rants are spurred by something like this:

"Hm, Tim, you're not wearing pants."
"Good point, Tim, you're right."
"How about a rant?"
"Good plan! Thanks, you crazy leprechaun!"

Anyway, you're right--the cards will be pretty comparable. The devil will be in the details, though, and that's probably how one will be declared a winner.
 
how about power/heat in next gen cards?

i think i won't be buying anything that requires buying new high end PSU to run. things like heat/noise might become much more important if both cards are pretty much close in performance..
 
The Baron said:
Nappe1 said:
sorry, had to make a small rant. it has been 1.5 years since I saw my bank account pass over 1000 Euros...
Not a bad reason. I mean, my rants are spurred by something like this:

"Hm, Tim, you're not wearing pants."
"Good point, Tim, you're right."
"How about a rant?"
"Good plan! Thanks, you crazy leprechaun!"

Anyway, you're right--the cards will be pretty comparable. The devil will be in the details, though, and that's probably how one will be declared a winner.

British pants or America pants? :)

BTW, love the signature ;)
 
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