[Eagle_Driver]

As long as ATI continues to release REALLY buggy driver software for its newest graphics cards, I won't be buying that company's newest pieces of crap anytime soon!

 

[ai0tron]

It was written that XBOX technology was based on the GeForce and was in fact the replacement or later generation of the GeForce.

 

[SumB]

Quote:

And those somewhat negative reviews of the 7500? That's because the drivers available for the 7500 are almost as crappy as those available for the 8500 - and much less mature than the latest drivers available for the original Radeon (aka Radeon 7200)/Radeon VE (aka Radeon 7000).

You just shot your credibility to **** with that statement.

The entire Radeon line uses the same unified driver, which is very mature at this time BTW.

It's not like you give a ****, you're just interested in distorting the truth in order for you to justify your purchase.

I would like a list of these so called non-functional features if you will, so I can confirm them for myself.

 

[MacDEF]

Quote:

The entire Radeon line uses the same unified driver, which is very mature at this time BTW.

I don't know who's right in this discussion, but keep in mind that "unified" drivers often contain *different* drivers for different hardward (i.e. multiple drivers inside a "universal" driver(s) ). So it is possible that the drivers for the 7500 and 8500 are different.

That said, again, I have no idea who's right...

 

[mcbiff]

Anandtech just put up a review of the Radeon 8500, looks like another great card/crap drivers deal from Ati. Damn it, when will someone challenge nVidia?

Link: http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1544&p=1

 

[Eagle_Driver]

SumB, sorry that I confused you about the Radeon line. What I REALLY meant to say is that the latest released unified drivers for the Radeon line don't properly support the new features that the Radeon 7500 and 8500 have to offer. And those new features will have to be enabled in order for the new Radeons to perform at their best - without proper driver support for those added features specific to the 7500 and 8500, the new Radeons perform craptacularly sluggish in many applications.

 

[SumB]

Eagle_Driver the 7500 is the same old Radeon on a smaller pcb with faster ram and the core bumped up as high as it can handle. These so called new features are pure fantasy.

The only thing not working on the 8500's side of the coin is SmoothVision. ATI chose not to implement it yet. Better to omit
something for the time being than introduce it broken. It's not like Nvidia ever had a problem with FSAA...

And I would question the integrity of Nvidia sponsored sites like Anandtech.

Why didn't Anand also test the card in Win9x and on an Athlon platform? This is the platform most gamers are using after all. Why are his numbers always lower than everyone else?

And what applications run sluggish on the Radeon? I haven't come across one yet. Please enlighten me.

 

[Eagle_Driver]

SumB, Tom's Hardware also tested the Radeon 8500 and 7500 cards with the same 2.0GHz Intel Pentium 4 processor and RDRAM - the only difference is that Tom's used Windows Me as its OS, versus Windows 2000 Professional SP2 that AnandTech used. Both Radeons performed well under WinMe in a majority of tests - but strangely both fell behind the NVidia competition in a couple of them. Which means that ATI still has driver problems (bugs?) to iron out.

In other words, I don't recommend buying any of the Radeon 7500 or 8500 cards for now. If you need the "fastest" consumer-level graphics cards now, you'd do better to wait until Christmas. The GF3-based cards seem like a good choice, but after seeing the Radeon 7500/8500's potential performance expectations, I can now say that the GF3 Ti-series boards are somewhat overpriced.

 

[ai0tron]

Any self-respecting human being doesnt use Windows ME. What a piece of crap... I have seen it devastate so many computers.

 

[Eagle_Driver]

The games that I currently play won't run at all on Windows 2000!

In fact, they won't even install on computers based on that OS, according to the game publishers!

 

[Deuce_Bigalow]

Well heres the awesome system I'm using:

Bought in Dec. 1996
Dell XPS P166S
166mhz
64mb ram
2.1gb Western Digital upgraded to 8.5 (added a 6.4)
15" Sony trinitron monitor
2mb ****ty video card
512 cache (something like that)

recent upgrades:Natural keyboard (awesome)
Microsoft optical mouse (awesome)
Ricoh 6x cd-rw drive (2 years ago, still awesome)

I just can't wait til next summer when my parents get a new computer and I get this one for myself! I need this antique for college.

I know it sucks but it really works as good as it did when it was new, and it's faster than my friends Compaq 166mhz that's similar to it.

 

[coolvij]

Deuce: Upgrade the RAM and processor.......and it'll be fine......

 

[Eagle_Driver]

Well here's the so-called "awesome" system I'm using:

Built in Feb. 2001
AsusTek P3B-F motherboard
700MHz Intel Pentium III processor (100MHz FSB)
256MB SDRAM
40.9GB Maxtor DiamondMax Plus ATA/100 7200RPM HD, model 54098H8
17" .27dp monitor
32mb GeForce 256 DDR video card
256K L2 cache (something like that)
250W PSU (REALLY noisy)
8x/40x Toshiba DVD/CD-ROM drive
4/4/24x HP 8250i CD-RW drive (2 years old, CRAP)
Microsoft Internet Keyboard (good, but I want an "ergonomic" keyboard with Internet hot keys)
Microsoft Intellimouse (good, but I want an "optical" mouse with a center scroll wheel)

recent upgradesromise/Maxtor Ultra ATA/100 card (nice, since my HD access times are sluggish)
64MB DDR ATI Radeon video card (awesome!)
300W Antec PP-303X PSU (AMD-recommended for Athlons up to 900MHz or Durons up to 950MHz - and MUCH quieter than the original 250W PSU)
TDK 24/10/40X CD-RW drive (will replace the crappy HP 4X unit soon)

Anyway, since Roxio Easy CD Creator 4.05 doesn't support any drives that high of a speed, then what should I do? Use the Nero Burning ROM 5.5/InCD package that comes with the TDK drive, or buy Roxio Easy CD Creator 5 Platinum?

 

[Eagle_Driver]

Uh, I forgot to mention that my old HP CD-Writer Plus often made coasters in the two years that I have owned it - and buffer underruns often occured (even though I defragged the HD and disabled all of the startup items except for Systray), which locked up my computer! I had to hard-reboot the PC when that happened!!!

 

[Eagle_Driver]

Quote:

Originally posted by Eagle_Driver Well here's the so-called "awesome" system I'm using: Built in Feb. 2001 AsusTek P3B-F motherboard 700MHz Intel Pentium III processor (100MHz FSB) 256MB SDRAM 40.9GB Maxtor DiamondMax Plus ATA/100 7200RPM HD, model 54098H8 17" .27dp monitor 32mb GeForce 256 DDR video card 256K L2 cache (something like that) 250W PSU (REALLY noisy) 8x/40x Toshiba DVD/CD-ROM drive 4/4/24x HP 8250i CD-RW drive (2 years old, CRAP) Microsoft Internet Keyboard (good, but I want an "ergonomic" keyboard with Internet hot keys) Microsoft Intellimouse (good, but I want an "optical" mouse with a center scroll wheel) recent upgradesromise/Maxtor Ultra ATA/100 card (nice, since my HD access times are sluggish) 64MB DDR ATI Radeon video card (awesome!) 300W Antec PP-303X PSU (AMD-recommended for Athlons up to 900MHz or Durons up to 950MHz - and MUCH quieter than the original 250W PSU) TDK 24/10/40X CD-RW drive (will replace the crappy HP 4X unit soon) Anyway, since Roxio Easy CD Creator 4.05 doesn't support any drives that high of a speed, then what should I do? Use the Nero Burning ROM 5.5/InCD package that comes with the TDK drive, or buy Roxio Easy CD Creator 5 Platinum?

This is an update on that above referenced system:

It now consists of these components (new replacement components are in red:

AMD Athlon XP 1600+ (1.4GHz) CPU with Coolermaster fan/heatsink
EliteGroup Computer Systems K7S5A motherboard with DDR and SDRAM support (but both types of RAM shouldn't be used together)
256MB DDR266/PC2100 DDR SDRAM
40GB Maxtor (formerly Quantum) D740X Ultra ATA/133 7200rpm hard drive, model 6L040J2
17" (15.8" vis) .27dp monitor
ATI Radeon 8500 64MB DDR graphics card (retail boxed) with DVI output (not the *slightly* slower Radeon 8500LE)
384K total available processor cache (versus 256K on my old PIII-700)
8x/40x Toshiba DVD-ROM drive
24/10/40X TDK CD-RW drive
300W Antec PP-303X (ATX 2.03 version) PSU
Microsoft Internet Keyboard
Microsoft Intellimouse

And I forgot to tell you, that old PIII-700 had a Crap Blaster Live? Value sound card with only analog outputs; my "new" system has a Turtle Beach Santa Cruz sound card. Furthermore, that old PIII-700 ran Windows Me (Millenium Edition - or was it Winblows Microshafted Edition?); my "new" Athlon XP-based system now runs Windows XP Professional.