Widescreen Gaming Forum

I guess we're seeing a YMMV situation. I like ATi too. I'm definitely not a fanboy. Daggone that crap gets me ill. I'm just like you there. In fact, it's why I don't post on alot of OC'ing forums anymore. They just won't cut that crap out, and everytime something starts getting into the inner workings then people start calling everybody fanboi's and then it's a war again. It gets so old. It's seriously childish. I'm running an nVidia Card, but have an ATi chip in my monitor. hehe No issues with that at all.

I liked that statement about the turbine cooler. That reminds me back about a years or so ago my freind and I fired up one of the X1600XT cards and went :shock: WOW, that's loud. We were laughing. Those were just about a wash with the 7800's.

I had that nv4disp.dll on one set of drivers one time. i do have to come clean about that. I don't think my particular system and setup liked those drivers. I was mostly running WHQL drivers at that time though as I was benching alot. On the gaming end I would reload different drivers that were optimized for gaming though, but would put back the WHQL's as the benches won't be ranked unless you follow the rules at the ORB. Obviously they can't let people go hacking on drivers becasue that could bypass the benchmarking program and you could dial in about any score you wanted. hehe

There isn't a thing wrong with an ATi. If you're planning on a Intel rig an Asus board with an Intel chipset should fully support crossfire. At least last time I checked it had full support. PSU's if you need dual PCI-e's you can use an adapater/splitter from a molex. I don't know if it's power you are concerned with or the connectors or what. If you have 520 watts, power shouldn't be an issue if you have at least 30 amps on the 12v rail, and that's assuming mild to medium OC'ing. Lots of good choices there.

The 939 boards are probably coming to the end of their life cycle. Everything AMD is AM2. There is also Conroe, and those things run extremely well too. If you are planning on Vista and wanting to future proof, those might be options, although that is more money. There is lots of good stuff out there. The best part right now for people looking for a full upgrade (mobo, CPU, ram, and video) is that RAM is dirt cheap right now.

PM me and let me know what you've got in mind and I can ask around and talk with my freinds. I've got alot of freinds that do some pretty extreme stuff. They really keep up with the very latest. I've got 3 freinds close by that run ATi and two others that run nVidia, and know guys that run AMD and Intel or both. I've messed a little with many different systems.

Off topic a bit:

Do you guys think its even worth while to install vista on a P4 2.4ghz w/ 512 megs of ram and onboard video? I'm working my way through the download of vista ultimate now and don't want that crap on my gaming rig, but am very curious about it.

I have a laptop that goes to school with me every day, but sees no duties other then word processing and web browsing, so I figured I'd play with vista on there... see what its about. Before I bother starting from scratch on it, I'm wondering, does it even make sense to check it out w/o the Aero effects?

ahh! crap, just realize I may have to get the 32bit version for that kit.

I guess we're seeing a YMMV situation.

As with so much in computing. ;) Hey, I've seen the same spec PC's next to each other and one had driver issues the other didn't. (Although that turned out to be the way Windows assigns IRQs etc when it installs... :lol:)

I liked that statement about the turbine cooler. That reminds me back about a years or so ago my friend and I fired up one of the X1600XT cards and went :shock: WOW, that's loud. We were laughing. Those were just about a wash with the 7800's.

I was thinking more back to the X800XTPE (honestly, what's with all the letters?!) X1800XT and X1900XTX type cards. The X1950XTX (thank God!) has a much better and quieter cooler on it. As far as I knew, the X1600 wasn't a dual slot?

The 939 boards are probably coming to the end of their life cycle. Everything AMD is AM2. There is also Conroe, and those things run extremely well too. If you are planning on Vista and wanting to future proof, those might be options, although that is more money. There is lots of good stuff out there. The best part right now for people looking for a full upgrade (mobo, CPU, ram, and video) is that RAM is dirt cheap right now.

I know 939 is effectively dead. But the fact remains that I have a 939 Opteron chip that I don't want to waste (despite it being a bad stepping and therefore overclocking badly - I was quite proud of getting a 30% OC on it using air cooling given how badly most of them seemed to do...) and a graphics card and RAM that I also don't want to waste, as I quite like them. ;) I can still find the A8N32-SLI Deluxe (the board I use at the moment) online, but CrossFire 939 boards are either MIA or hideously expensive. :(

PM me and let me know what you've got in mind and I can ask around and talk with my friends. I've got a lot of friends that do some pretty extreme stuff. They really keep up with the very latest. I've got 3 friends close by that run ATi and two others that run nVidia, and know guys that run AMD and Intel or both. I've messed a little with many different systems.

Cool.

Off topic a bit:

Do you guys think its even worth while to install vista on a P4 2.4ghz w/ 512 megs of ram and onboard video? I'm working my way through the download of vista ultimate now and don't want that crap on my gaming rig, but am very curious about it.

I have a laptop that goes to school with me every day, but sees no duties other then word processing and web browsing, so I figured I'd play with vista on there... see what its about. Before I bother starting from scratch on it, I'm wondering, does it even make sense to check it out w/o the Aero effects?

ahh! crap, just realize I may have to get the 32bit version for that kit.

The whole attraction of Vista for me was Aero. Without that, it's like a slightly-more-secure-but-more-annoying Windows XP. :)