Here's Tim's message he sent me, if anyone else wants to read to it to help decide.
Hello Haervii. I'm the guy who was telling you about how to get the Buy.com coupon to work. Here are some
thoughts on the Radeon vs GeForce2. Keep in mind that I have two 1Ghz systems, one with a Radeon and one
with an ULTRA. I had a GF2 but went insane and upgraded to the ULTRA. hehe
-------------------------------
Image Quality: Radeon has the best 32-bit image quality of all the current cards, in the same way that the
Voodoo5 has the best 16-bit image quality of the current cards. The GeForce based cards fall in the middle of
both categories.
Performance: Radeon's 32-bit performance is excellent and basically on par with the GeForce2. It was faster
that the GF2 when it launched, but now the GF2 is a bit faster again because of Nvidia's newest drivers.
However, the Radeon should have new drivers coming by Christmas which will probably boost it ahead again.
But even if they don't, the 32-bit performance is still excellent, and depending on what game and what resoution,
the Radeon is right there with the GF2, sometimes a bit behind, sometimes a bit ahead. The Radeon is really a
32-bit card. It's combination of incredible 32-bit image quality, and solid 32-bit performance is really something to
see. It's only real weakness is 16-bit where the performance is not much faster than the 32-bit. That is where the
GF2 has a big advantage in speed. However, if you get a Radeon you will be playing in 32-bit almost all the time
anyway. It's simply beautiful.
Features: This is where the Radeon really has an big advantage. It has more DX8 support than any other card. It
also has many special features like.........
>> Vertex Skinning <<
The Radeon chip can handle up to 4 matrices for skinning compared to the Geforce2?s ability to handle only 2.
What this means for future games that take advantage of the Radeon, are skinning techniques on in-game
characters and models that move and behave in a much more life-like manner.
>> Keyframe Interpolation (Vertex Mapping) <<
This feature works by interpolating successive keyframes in an animation sequence, and automatically fills in
the gaps between frames, resulting in a much smoother animation. This technology can scale as necessary so
you can have more or less animation depending on the performance level the developer wishes to achieve. No
other card supports this.
>> 3 Texturing Units <<
Having three texture units as opposed to the GeForce2 having only two gives the Radeon an advantage. It can
perform multi-texturing in a single pass when rendering anywhere from 1 Bilinear to 3 Bilinear Textures per pixel.
This greatly enhances the overall performance of the card by not having to take more clock cycles to perform
this rendering. ** Despite having more pipelines, the GeForce2's lack of a third T.U. will cause it a significant
performance drop when it has to make an extra pass to do the extra rendering. It is said that game developers
are already programming their upcoming games to use the extra T.U. of the RADEON.
>> 3D Textures <<
TRUE 3D texturing gives the Radeon the ability to add various kinds of maps onto the texture, giving it a much
more enhanced ?3D? look. The end result is more impressive 3D objects and enviroments. No other card
supports this.
-------------------------------
Now, there are people that say that some of the Radeon's features won't be taking advantage of for a while. The
truth is we don't really know for sure when the game developers will incorporate them, but it's nice to know they
are there.
The Radeon also has the best DVD playback of any card. I was actually able to get rid of my Hollywood Plus
Decoder card. You will not have to buy a dedicated pci decoder card to get top notch DVD playback.
The bottom line is this. The Radeon is a well balanced card with absolutely great 32-bit performance and image
quality. I play most of my games at 1280 x 1024 x 32-bit color, and it would make you drool. It also has the
most DX8 support of any other card, and these features will likely give it a longer life. The only real weakness of
the Radeon is 16-bit. You need to decide how important that is to
YOU. I personally never play in 16-bit unless it's an older game that doesn't support 32-bit. There is a few new
games that don't but 95% do. I want good frame rates, but I also want the richest colors and lush graphics I can
get, and that's where the Radeon shines. If you buy a Radeon, you will be playing in 32-bit. That's what it's
designed for, and that's what it's best at.
The other thing is this. For $133, you simply can't go wrong. The 64MB version of the Radeon is still over $300.
Getting the 32MB DDR versuon for $133 delivered is a deal you won't beat. It's a little slower than the 64MB card
of course, but really not that much.
I hope any of this helps, because I'm typing fast. I am running late to pick up my girlfriend. Let me know of you
need any more info.
Good Luck Haervii