g card opinions please

[ibmike]

as in tittle i would like peoples opinions of this graphics card

128MB ATI Radeon 9200 VIVO (sapphire version)

cheers

[MrFlibble]

As the owner of a 128mb Connect3d Radeon 9200 I'd say it's an excellent value for money card. I don't know if it would please the hardcore gaming elite, but it certainly pleases me. Excellent image quality, runs most games perfectly well at high resolution, and totally silent being fanless. All without breaking the bank

[SilentDeath]

the 8500 is supost to be technicly better iirc

[pmk24]

the 9200 is a great card and one of the better ones of the range of budget cards that is on offer, its not the most powerfull of cards but will do nicely for a tv pc or more internet and work then 200fps headshot action card but it still can pack a punch at games really easy

if your budget is low i would look out for a bargin 4200ti or 2nd hand one because they are still really good cards, great value for money and will take the latest games etc at good speed

[Austin]

Yeah it's decent enough but way slower than the old Rad8500LE let alone the full 8500. You kick the ass of GF4MX, can match the GF3TI200 in 3D perf but the FX5200 is a better budget buy and not because of useless DX9. I would suggest paying a tiny bit more for a GF4TI4200 though as that is streets ahead of these entry level cards and can match the Rad9600PRO & FX5600ultra until you use DX9 or enable high AA+AF. Seriously consider the FX5200 or the way better GF4TI4200 (even 64MB version).

[Popa Bear]

Try and beat this price u will struggle getting a rad 9200 for less

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...duct_uid=46514

1 question though was this the card lots of people was having problems with ages ago?

[Austin]

Well you can find GF-FX5200 and Rad9200 for around £50 but they are way inferior even armed with 256MB than a 64MB 4200. It is worth paying a little extra for a 128MB 4200 (£75 Dabs IIRC) but if on an extremely tight budget the 4200 is an ace card!

[chrisf6969]

ti4200 is the best budget card and you dont need the 128MB b/c you cant run games at 1600x1200 with AA anyway which is the only thing that really needs more than 64Mb.

[Austin]

Originally posted by chrisf6969
ti4200 is the best budget card and you dont need the 128MB b/c you cant run games at 1600x1200 with AA anyway which is the only thing that really needs more than 64Mb.

Not true at all. The original (non 8X) versions showed this the best. The 4200 64MB used 13% faster clocked RAM but yet only had a 1-2% perf lead, about a third of what it should have. So with the 128MB card you actually received a boost even when games didn't use more than 64MB, Rad8500 also showed this speed increase simply by having the RAM while GF3 for example didn't.

When it comes to more than 64MB being needed the perf hit is huge, enough to knock a 4200 64MB o/c'ed to 300/600 down to STOCK (250/444) 4200 128MB levels. You certainly don't need 1600x1200 nor AA and/or AF to show gains from 128MB nor in order to use more than 64MB. Seriously, the 4200 64MB were good cards but as I said back at the 4200 launch the 128MB are a wiser option and well worth the extra £10ish they demanded.

Nowadays you don't need to compromise as the 4200-8X 128MB should use the same faster RAM clocks as the original 4200 64MB did. Anyway, a quick search around should show you, here's what I have to hand...

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1643

http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/...ti4200-03.html (uses a 4200 128MB clocked to 4200 64MB speeds)

http://www.techreport.com/etc/2002q3...m/index.x?pg=3 (all cards using the same clocks to isolate 64MBvs128MB alone)

[chrisf6969]

Good reply with supporting evidence. But the only things that showed a performance difference like I said were too demanding for the card anyway. Like Codecreatures (a DEMO) the difference between 24 and 16fps is a lot, but both are not playable for a game, unless you like slideshows. All of the other pages with more mainstream games show less of a difference especially at high fps.

The point I was trying to make is the only things that really use the 128Mbs like higher resolutions(+AA) or very large texture/poly counts (at medium to high res.) are too much for the card to handle anyway.

Once the GF4 starts to have to handle over 64MB in buffer it slows to below 30fps most often very far below. Granted if there's not a big price difference get the 128MB, more ram is always better, but it only helps in situations that are already too slow for most people's game play.

[ibmike]

well i have now ordered a connect 3d 9600 128 mb
so this shall hopefully play all my games and the new max payne when it comes out