walllizzard's Full Review: ATI RADEON, (32 MB) AGP Video Card
Hello everyone, so you must be interested in the new line of ATI RAdeon cards. Well your not alone, ATI in my opinion has finally come out with card that could mean stiff competition for NVIDIAS chipsets IE: G-Force and G-force 2. I used to be a die hard fan of NVIDIA cards, having had in the past an old TNT2 card. However since having my Radeon 32mb DDR card my opinion has drasticly changed. I know what your thinking, ATI has always gone for the amount of a product they sell,not caring about who buys them or how well they function. In the past this was true, but then they hardly had any competition until this past year with Nvidias new chipset release. With the introduction of Nvidias chipsets I thought for sure no one would be even close to claiming the King of the Video Card mountain but this is not so, ATI has come through with a wonderful, magnificent video card that will surely have everyone rethink who is the King of the Video Card mountain.
I bought ATIs new card out of being curious, seeing all the reviews on their 64mb DDR card. I finally decided, after long hours of reviewing dozens of forums online, to purchase the 32mb DDR card for several reasons. One of the first reasons was the price, I purchased my card, retail version, for around $170 from an online vendor. The Radeon 32mb DDR video card is considerably cheaper than its bigger brother, minus alot of the bells and whistles that the 64mb Radeon includes. I didnt need all the video inputs or the different outputs. The 32mb DDR Radeon is the perfect fit for any one who just wants a simple, yet kick some serious ass , relatively inexpensive, high performance card. I was also tired of all the hype with Nvidias new chipsets, I wanted to tell some of my tech head friends that I bought a card that was much cheaper than theirs yet could perform just as well as the more expensive cards. Another reason I opted for the 32mb instead of the 64mb is that in reality most games dont truly utilize a full 64mb card, both the 32 and 64 run fairly close in most test scenarios. Once again it came down to price and the 32mb DDR Radeon won out over its brute brother. You know what I cant even refer to Radeon cards as male in gender because no male could keep up with where, hopefully, these new cards will likely go.
Lets talk about installing. I had a few problems when I first installed my card, I was having a hell of a time. Like most men I didnt call tech support, I just played around until I wanted to rip the darn thing out of my machine. Well, when I finally called ATI tech support I was pleasantly surprised to reach a real live person who knew what he was talking about. My problem had come from when I had installed my new operating sys, Windows Me, I chose the clean install method. When I tried to install my video card I couldnt access the control features. I found out from the tech support that the Windows Me CD did not have the correct driver versions for my VIA chipset. As soon as I downloaded the new drivers and bios for my mother board, my PC came alive as I finally saw what the Radeon could do. Just a reminder for anyone who might have a VIA chipset mother board and is having problems with installing and running the Radeon series, all you have to do is download the new drivers and bios from Via's home page. Your problems will be solved.
Well lets get back to what I saw right off the bat. My 2D performance was markedly improved from my old TNT2 card, I could hardly believe my eyes. The colors were so much brighter and the images were much clearer. My 3D performance also improved , all of my games ran with out any flaws, no hesitation, I could hardly play some old games they ran so fast on the new card. I tested my card with the self test on MDK2, I achieved frame rates well over 100 fps, the average was a whopping 78 fps. My PC only has a PIII 667, 20.5 7200rpm HD, 224MB of PC 100 RAM and a ASUS P3V4X MB. As you can see I dont have a really fast Pc but with the 32mb DDR Radeon you dont need a 1.ghz processor to achieve great frame rates and smooth game play.
Perhaps one of best things about the new 32mb DDR Radeon is its DVD playback performance. With its built in, hardware controlled, DVD decoder, the Radeon is the best DVD playback of any video card on the market. Even on my modest system the images that were played back were beyond belief. It was almost as good as my home theater sys. All controls are easily accessed through the taskbar icon. To change the screen settings in gaming or desk top applications, is a breeze thanks to the very simple interface that ATI has provided. For most of my gaming I use a combination of performance versus quality settings which yielded great graphics and performance
I could talk about performance numbers and use graphs but I dont want to take up your time. If your in the market for a new video card and have say around $170 then the 32mb DDR Radeon is for you. I hope Ive given a good testimonial to ATI's newest charge to regain video card nirvana. All I can provide to you is a few good words about this card, its up to you, the consumer to research and really look at the whole picture, in deciding if this card will rock your gaming world or not. I can only hope that ATI will continue to keep updated drivers, excellent tech support and continued growth forward in the gaming community to become King of the Video Card mountain.
This 512MB memory module designed to enhance the performance. Compatible with select Tyan, SuperMicro, Intel, Gateway and Nokia models. PC DDR-SDRAM D...More at MacMall
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