Best Video card at this point of Vista developement

I am presently running vista ultimate on a amd Athlon 64 x2 with aNvidia
Geforce 7300 gs microsoft drivers as I had some troubles with Nvidia driver
installing and am going to wait till driver is out of bata before trying
again. Performance index is only 3.2 on business and gaming graphics same
machine using RC2 and Nvidia driver result was 3.4. I have the task of
upgrading serveral machines to Vista shortly and am tring to get a idea of
the best cards to use on slighly less powerful machines but must have dual
monitor support vga/dvi vga/vga or dvi/dvi. Not lookng for company loyalty
responces. Thanks
--
Trying to make sense of it all

What do you mean by "best"? For gaming? Dual displays?

I'm using an ATI X1800 GTO card, get 5.7 for business and gaming graphics.
Does alright but nothing exceptional. Has dual DVI, came with 2 VGA
adapters as well. I'm using it with a 20" WS LCD and a 19" CRT.

Clint

"joymac" <joymac@community.nospam> wrote in message
news:80AB43C2-4B5C-41DE-A8CE-E44131ADFB35@microsoft.com...
>I am presently running vista ultimate on a amd Athlon 64 x2 with aNvidia
> Geforce 7300 gs microsoft drivers as I had some troubles with Nvidia
> driver
> installing and am going to wait till driver is out of bata before trying
> again. Performance index is only 3.2 on business and gaming graphics same
> machine using RC2 and Nvidia driver result was 3.4. I have the task of
> upgrading serveral machines to Vista shortly and am tring to get a idea of
> the best cards to use on slighly less powerful machines but must have dual
> monitor support vga/dvi vga/vga or dvi/dvi. Not lookng for company loyalty
> responces. Thanks
> --
> Trying to make sense of it all

joymac wrote:
> I am presently running vista ultimate on a amd Athlon 64 x2 with
> aNvidia Geforce 7300 gs microsoft drivers as I had some troubles with
> Nvidia driver installing and am going to wait till driver is out of
> bata before trying again. Performance index is only 3.2 on business
> and gaming graphics same machine using RC2 and Nvidia driver result
> was 3.4. I have the task of upgrading serveral machines to Vista
> shortly and am tring to get a idea of the best cards to use on
> slighly less powerful machines but must have dual monitor support
> vga/dvi vga/vga or dvi/dvi. Not lookng for company loyalty responces.
> Thanks

To be honest any mid range card will do the trick - I think ones that
_don't_ offer dual monitor support of some kind are the exception these days
once you step out of budget territory.

I'd say that ATI have got slightly more mature drivers at the moment and for
a business type machine I'd look at the radeon x1300 and x1600 type cards,
to support dual monitors very nicely indeed and not use and abuse system
resources too much to support the video.

If you want gaming then the sky is the limit of course, but you probably
won't be entirely happy with a new purchase in this area at the moment.
ATI's more mature drivers suggest the x1900 series, but this isn't a DirectX
10 ready part. Only Nvidia are shipping those (8800 series) at the moment
and as you've discovered their drivers are not very good at all (I'm not
convinced that ATI's vista drivers are actually all they could possibly be
at the moment, but they're much more stable and mature than the Nvidia
ones).

Just my opinion of course and I hope it is of some use. I await what will no
doubt be large flame posts questioning my eyesight, parentage, ability to
operate a computer, etc. from fanboyz of both camps.
rob

Mainly for business Also should include that the cards I will be looking for
are AGP. This is going to be a recomended product so stability is importannt
as well if I can give a report that it has an index of ?? that much better
thanks for the info.

--
Trying to make sense of it all


"Clint" wrote:

> What do you mean by "best"? For gaming? Dual displays?
>
> I'm using an ATI X1800 GTO card, get 5.7 for business and gaming graphics.
> Does alright but nothing exceptional. Has dual DVI, came with 2 VGA
> adapters as well. I'm using it with a 20" WS LCD and a 19" CRT.
>
> Clint
>
> "joymac" <joymac@community.nospam> wrote in message
> news:80AB43C2-4B5C-41DE-A8CE-E44131ADFB35@microsoft.com...
> >I am presently running vista ultimate on a amd Athlon 64 x2 with aNvidia
> > Geforce 7300 gs microsoft drivers as I had some troubles with Nvidia
> > driver
> > installing and am going to wait till driver is out of bata before trying
> > again. Performance index is only 3.2 on business and gaming graphics same
> > machine using RC2 and Nvidia driver result was 3.4. I have the task of
> > upgrading serveral machines to Vista shortly and am tring to get a idea of
> > the best cards to use on slighly less powerful machines but must have dual
> > monitor support vga/dvi vga/vga or dvi/dvi. Not lookng for company loyalty
> > responces. Thanks
> > --
> > Trying to make sense of it all
>

Thanks for the information it gets expensive trying to purchace different
cards for testing as these will be in a business envirorment stability is
most inportant but much easier to recomend if it also has high scores.
--
Trying to make sense of it all


"Robert Moir" wrote:

> joymac wrote:
> > I am presently running vista ultimate on a amd Athlon 64 x2 with
> > aNvidia Geforce 7300 gs microsoft drivers as I had some troubles with
> > Nvidia driver installing and am going to wait till driver is out of
> > bata before trying again. Performance index is only 3.2 on business
> > and gaming graphics same machine using RC2 and Nvidia driver result
> > was 3.4. I have the task of upgrading serveral machines to Vista
> > shortly and am tring to get a idea of the best cards to use on
> > slighly less powerful machines but must have dual monitor support
> > vga/dvi vga/vga or dvi/dvi. Not lookng for company loyalty responces.
> > Thanks
>
> To be honest any mid range card will do the trick - I think ones that
> _don't_ offer dual monitor support of some kind are the exception these days
> once you step out of budget territory.
>
> I'd say that ATI have got slightly more mature drivers at the moment and for
> a business type machine I'd look at the radeon x1300 and x1600 type cards,
> to support dual monitors very nicely indeed and not use and abuse system
> resources too much to support the video.
>
> If you want gaming then the sky is the limit of course, but you probably
> won't be entirely happy with a new purchase in this area at the moment.
> ATI's more mature drivers suggest the x1900 series, but this isn't a DirectX
> 10 ready part. Only Nvidia are shipping those (8800 series) at the moment
> and as you've discovered their drivers are not very good at all (I'm not
> convinced that ATI's vista drivers are actually all they could possibly be
> at the moment, but they're much more stable and mature than the Nvidia
> ones).
>
> Just my opinion of course and I hope it is of some use. I await what will no
> doubt be large flame posts questioning my eyesight, parentage, ability to
> operate a computer, etc. from fanboyz of both camps.
> rob
>
>
>

The brand of the card has more to do with stability than the actual chipset.
I have had very good luck with Gigabyte cards using either ATI or NVidia
chipsets. The ATI seem to have a crisper display. With ATI you can buy ATI
branded cards direct from ATI which have support from the chipset
manufacturer. As far as I know there are no NVidia branded cards.

As far as ATI vs. NVidia, currently the drivers that are built into the RTM
release are the most stable for both. I'd give a slight nod to ATI but some
people have had problems with the sleep function on some motherboards.
Changing to an NVidia card often fixes this. By the time Vista is publicly
available this will probably change. In the past I have have found that
overall ATI drivers (without installing the Catalyst Control Center) are the
most stable but this changes as new drivers are released. I usually install
the drivers that came with the card and never change them unless there are
problems. Note - this is for business use. For gaming it's a whole different
story.

--
Kerry Brown
Microsoft MVP - Shell/User
http://www.vistahelp.ca


"joymac" <joymac@community.nospam> wrote in message
news:80AB43C2-4B5C-41DE-A8CE-E44131ADFB35@microsoft.com...
>I am presently running vista ultimate on a amd Athlon 64 x2 with aNvidia
> Geforce 7300 gs microsoft drivers as I had some troubles with Nvidia
> driver
> installing and am going to wait till driver is out of bata before trying
> again. Performance index is only 3.2 on business and gaming graphics same
> machine using RC2 and Nvidia driver result was 3.4. I have the task of
> upgrading serveral machines to Vista shortly and am tring to get a idea of
> the best cards to use on slighly less powerful machines but must have dual
> monitor support vga/dvi vga/vga or dvi/dvi. Not lookng for company loyalty
> responces. Thanks
> --
> Trying to make sense of it all

/joymac/ said:

> I am presently running vista ultimate on a amd Athlon 64 x2 with aNvidia
> Geforce 7300 gs microsoft drivers as I had some troubles with Nvidia driver
> installing and am going to wait till driver is out of beta before trying
> again. Performance index is only 3.2 on business and gaming graphics same
> machine using RC2 and Nvidia driver result was 3.4. I have the task of
> upgrading serveral machines to Vista shortly and am tring to get a idea of
> the best cards to use on slighly less powerful machines but must have dual
> monitor support vga/dvi vga/vga or dvi/dvi. Not looking for company loyalty
> responses.

With PCI-E video adapters overtaking AGP, it makes sense to spend the
minimum necessary on outdated technology.

I can only say that here an MSI NVidia 5200 128Mb card does just fine -
using a 22" widescreen LCD fed via VGA. Aero is fully functional, and
video seems as peppy with Vista Ultimate RC2 as it did under XP for
typical word processing, accounting and Net surfing. No games tested.

"joymac" wrote:
> Mainly for business Also should include that the cards I will be looking
> for
> are AGP. This is going to be a recomended product so stability is
> importannt
> as well if I can give a report that it has an index of ?? that much better
> thanks for the info.

Last April I bought the Asus A9550GE/TD AGP 8X 128 DDR Video Card w/TV-Out &
DVI to upgrade an old underpowered P-III 800MHz box with AGP 6X slot and it
has performed well - no problems-does Aero. It gets a Graphics Index of 2.9
and Gaming of 3.2 not impressive but should do business apps OK. I bought it
for ~$60 with free shipping from here:

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/Produc...uctCode=324507

Without question, the "best" video card out today is the nVidia 8800 GTX. I
have two XFX 8800 GTX XXXs in SLI mode. There's nothing that can touch these
cards.

"joymac" wrote:

> I am presently running vista ultimate on a amd Athlon 64 x2 with aNvidia
> Geforce 7300 gs microsoft drivers as I had some troubles with Nvidia driver
> installing and am going to wait till driver is out of bata before trying
> again. Performance index is only 3.2 on business and gaming graphics same
> machine using RC2 and Nvidia driver result was 3.4. I have the task of
> upgrading serveral machines to Vista shortly and am tring to get a idea of
> the best cards to use on slighly less powerful machines but must have dual
> monitor support vga/dvi vga/vga or dvi/dvi. Not lookng for company loyalty
> responces. Thanks
> --
> Trying to make sense of it all

Unless you have pockets for Nvidia G8xxx series with Direct-X 10,

Recomendations are Nvidia 76xx and up. ATI 18xx and up.
Higher end of mid-line DirectX 9c cards.
256M video ram

On the machines we have trialed so far, graphics is the number one
bottleneck. All current machines, aftermarket video cards (ie not onboard).