****Gabe's recommendation for video card****

D

d8cam

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As most of you know by now if you read this post, I sent Gabe this e-mail:

2 quick questions.

1. I have the following: 1.7ghz Pentium 4, 1GB of PC2700 DDR Ram, plenty of hard drive space, and plan on getting one of the higher-end Geforce FX 5200's or 5600's, and I have the SB Audigy 2. Will this run ok?

2. Secondly, in the Half-life 2 development process, what was the first thing (back in 1998 or 1999) that you all finished part of and really got excited about? In other words, when did you all think in your heads that this is going to be something amazing?

Thanks.


Gabe said:

I'd suggest an ATI 9800 for your setup, not NVIDIA.

Ken's first demo of the new character technology.


Well, I then e-mailed Gabe with this:

Which one do you suggest? The 9800 128MB sdram, the 9800 128mb ddr ram, or the 9800 pro 256mb?


Gabe said:

9800 128 DDR is what I have at home.


Very interesting. It looks like that will be the card I am getting. AND NO I am not an ATI fanboy...I just want the best recommended card!

And the 9800 is not for everyone...if you have a higher end Geforce FX or the Radeon 9700 or near it, you should be fine....although thats me speculating.
 
No. The new info is that he recommended the 9800 128 ddr over the sdram 128 or the 256 for my system.....he was specific in the second e-mail that he sent me 10 mins ago. This should help people with similar systems.
 
No its not.....there is a 100 dollar price difference between the three cards:

ATI Radeon 9800 128MB SDRAM- Retails for $299
ATI Radeon 9800 128MB DDR- Retails for $399
ATI Radeon 9800 256MB DDR- Retails for $499

I am just providing useful information...please don't act like my post has no use whatsoever...if Gabe took the time to type a few words then I am going to post about it....take it for what it is: news!

I posted it here and in the "Gabe post" for one reason: we can discuss it here but we cannot discuss it in the "Gabe post."
 
Guys, we know HL2 developers and ATI have a contract so that's why he's recommending the 9800 Pro. Don't get me wrong, I do prefer ATI over Nvidia. Heck I have a 9700Pro. Not only that, I also think that the 9800 Pro should be Gabe's choice even if they didn't have a contract with ATI. :D
 
positive6.jpg

:p
 
/me scratches his head wondering why Gabe is promoting ATI so much.

Not that im complaining, ATI is Canadian. :thumbs:
 
Is Game the Main Guy working on Half-life?? and doesn't he have things to do does he really answer every email from people asking what card they should get or did you get lucky?
 
Uh, he didn't "recommend" the DDR 128 over the 256. He said "9800 128 DDR is what I have at home". Just because Gabe doesn't buy a new video card every month doesn't mean somehow the 128 version is better than the 256, lol.
 
Yup their Canadian, I live not too far from their head office.
ATI corporate profile
Corporate Profile
ATI Technologies Inc., the world's largest supplier of 3D graphics and multimedia technology, designs, manufactures and markets innovative and award-winning multimedia solutions and graphics components for the personal computer, set-top box and consumer electronics appliance markets. An ISO 9002 company, ATI is the world's leading supplier of video and 2D/3D graphics accelerators to OEM and retail customers. Founded in 1985, ATI employs more than 1,700 people at headquarters in Thornhill, Ontario, and in offices in the United States, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Barbados, Malaysia, Japan and Hong Kong. ATI is a public company whose shares trade on the Toronto Stock Exchange and NASDAQ.
Click to expand...

Ontario is a province of Canada and im not too far from the Thornhill area.
 
Originally posted by d8cam
No its not.....there is a 100 dollar price difference between the three cards:

ATI Radeon 9800 128MB SDRAM- Retails for $299
ATI Radeon 9800 128MB DDR- Retails for $399
ATI Radeon 9800 256MB DDR- Retails for $499

I am just providing useful information...please don't act like my post has no use whatsoever...if Gabe took the time to type a few words then I am going to post about it....take it for what it is: news!

I posted it here and in the "Gabe post" for one reason: we can discuss it here but we cannot discuss it in the "Gabe post."
Click to expand...
There is no 9800 SD-Ram. You must be thinking of the lower clocked 9800 ('non-pro'). In that case, I'd reccomend it over the 9800 Pro just because of the price vs. performance difference And the fact that the non-pro will clock to pro speeds and over).
 
Originally posted by Yatta
Guys, we know HL2 developers and ATI have a contract so that's why he's recommending the 9800 Pro. Don't get me wrong, I do prefer ATI over Nvidia. Heck I have a 9700Pro. Not only that, I also think that the 9800 Pro should be Gabe's choice even if they didn't have a contract with ATI. :D
Click to expand...

Then why mention anything?! Shut your ****ing mouth.
 
Originally posted by Radea
You must be thinking of the lower clocked 9800 ('non-pro'). In that case, I'd reccomend it over the 9800 Pro just because of the price vs. performance difference And the fact that the non-pro will clock to pro speeds and over).
Click to expand...

I agree, My 9800 non-pro can run games great with solid fps with 4xaa and 4xaf, heck even 8xaf.
 
Originally posted by nsxownzme
Then why mention anything?! Shut your ****ing mouth.
Click to expand...
I just wanted to share my thoughts. Please have some respect and manners. I'd really appreciate it. Thanks.
 
Actually I hear it hase some hardware/technical advantages that cannot be achieved through software for older cards such as the Radeon 9700 Pro.
 
omg, why the hell did you post this thread? OF COURSE a 9800/5600/5900 class is going to run the game with sweet fps!!! how 'bout some lower end, like a P4 2ghz/amd 1.4-1.8ghz with an 8500/9000/9100/9200, or fx 5200/ti-4200, etc.
 
yes, the 9800 Pro does contain several architecture and technology improvements over the 9700 Pro that cannot be acheived through softmods

the 9800 Pro is more than a 9700 Pro with upped clock speeds
 
It's sad that Valve is doing this to Nvidia. The programming team at Valve is really lazy if they can't fix this issue for Nvidia card.
 
I agree, My 9800 non-pro can run games great with solid fps with 4xaa and 4xaf, heck even 8xaf.
what an informative post... why not try 128-tap... lose 2fps

the 9800 Pro is more than a 9700 Pro with upped clock speeds
sure, but does that make it worth the huge price difference from a 9700? no
 
I am surprised Gabe hasn't given us more info about how the game will run on lower-end comps... now, we know they've said it will be very scalable and run well on a PIII 800/gf2 gts, etc., but they haven't provided us with any comparison screenshots/performance numbers; now I remember MaxPC (I think) doing an article about the technical features each generation of card will do, but that is nothing compared to seeing it in a shot... imo, they should take a break from answering 10 e-mails a minute and do something everyone will benefit from; that will give a very good idea of the quantitative aspect, not just generalization "blah blah yeah your comp should run the game well at medium details"

get where I am going with this?
 
The shots would look like poo-poo. Lol.

Anyone that has a low end PC and can't afford a high end anytime soon should just get the Xbox version I suppose.
 
The shots would look like poo-poo. Lol.

Anyone that has a low end PC and can't afford a high end anytime soon should just get the Xbox version I suppose.

yeah, that's reallyyy smart... first they'd have to spent $180 on the Xbox, then $50-60 on the game, good call, lol :p but I'm being serious.... they SHOULD release low-end shots.. if ppl look at it and say "wtf HL2 looks like crap" then they need to read first and not be so damn sarcastic
 
Lucky me... I already bought a 9800 128 DDR.

And an Asus A7N8X Deluxe.

I also have 1 gig of DDR 3200.

And an AMD 3000+.

Yummy stuff indeed.

I heard the reason for no AA in the vids... its a DX 9, and video card problem... the issue could likely be fixed in the ATi Drivers, and DX9 software... but with nVidia cards like the 5900... its all done in the hardware and can't be fixed with drivers. There is i guess bleeding and such in how Valve did it if you turn on AA.
 
my radeon 9700 pro overcloked is best than a 9800 pro in bench... watercooling power.... :cheese:
 
ATI has paid valve to promote their products , ruthlessly. They were at the ATI booth after all.
 
actually, NVidia cards can't use AA with HL2, neither can ATI cards, but that may be fixable with drivers, where it is VERY unlikely to happen with NVidia...

figs
 
CANADIAN YOU SAY?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!? im canadian and i want an ATI
 
I like Nvidia better than ATI for a few reasons. Half-Life 2 will run slightly better on ATIs though.
 
Originally posted by PSX
The shots would look like poo-poo. Lol.

Anyone that has a low end PC and can't afford a high end anytime soon should just get the Xbox version I suppose.

yeah, that's reallyyy smart... first they'd have to spent $180 on the Xbox, then $50-60 on the game, good call, lol :p but I'm being serious.... they SHOULD release low-end shots.. if ppl look at it and say "wtf HL2 looks like crap" then they need to read first and not be so damn sarcastic
Click to expand...

Well, what if they already had an Xbox. Also, even if they didn't it would be a lot cheaper than getting a new high end system that would at least play the game somewhere near its best...
 
Originally posted by DimitriPopov
ATI has paid valve to promote their products , ruthlessly. They were at the ATI booth after all.
Click to expand...

christ, i'm so sick of hearing this

i swear, do you people ever stop to think, that maybe, just maybe, there's no conspiracy going on here? that maybe at the moment, ATI cards just run HL2 faster and looking better?

if Nvidia cards played better and faster and they showed HL2 on Nvidia cards, you'd all be screaming that they were paid by Nvidia.
 
Originally posted by Doobz
christ, i'm so sick of hearing this

i swear, do you people ever stop to think, that maybe, just maybe, there's no conspiracy going on here? that maybe at the moment, ATI cards just run HL2 faster and looking better?

if Nvidia cards played better and faster and they showed HL2 on Nvidia cards, you'd all be screaming that they were paid by Nvidia.
Click to expand...

No. You're a fool if you can't realize that ATI and Valve have an agreement. The game could run the same way on an Nvidia if Valve really wanted it to...

And HL2 won't run any much faster or anything on an ATI, it just will have proper anti-aliasing...
 
We work with all the graphics card manufacturers. ATI and NVIDIA have made the biggest investments in time and engineering to make sure Half-Life 2 and their hardware work well together. We are not trying to give an advantage to one company over another, as the people who play our games certainly wouldn't want us to do that.

With that said, Half-Life 2 appears to be the first game to really be pushing the capabilities of DX9-level hardware. At E3, we ran on ATI hardware because ATI's hardware did the best job. Since then both ATI and NVIDIA have worked diligently to improve performance and quality, not just because they think Half-Life 2 will be a title that will help sell DX9 hardware, but also because it is a good test case that will aid them in understanding the behavior of their hardware for future games.

As we get closer to shipping we will release Source based benchmarking tools that will let people analyze this themselves.
Click to expand...

as you can see, it's not Valve doing the Nvidia or ATI based optimizations.

fool
 
well keep in mind that VALVe has 2 content servers by nVIDIA, so they may not favor ATI ;)
 
guys even if they had a contract with ATI....and they dont.....it wouldnt matter

its not about the best company...its about the best performance....hell....if a new company came out with the best card would i stick with ati or nvidia???...NO!
 
Half-Life 2-----ATi more supported

Doom 3------nVidia more supported

There both sides are equal now.
 
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