Decided to return XFX 6950 unopened

[Alaska Wolf]

So, you're willing to pay an obscene premium for the latest and greatest but, you don't want to deal with s hot fix?

$280 or $380 for a VIDEO CARD, either way I'm playing in crazy territory.

 

[happy medium]

Well, at least it will be different. I've been running ATI cards since the 9700 Pro.

Hey, whatever floats your boat man, there is nothing wrong with a gtx570 purchase. I think you'll like the driver stability and Nvidia's better game support out of the box.

Enjoy your puchase and get back to us with some user comments if you can.
thanks

 

[SlowSpyder]

What was the last straw.. that AMD released a driver?

 

[Deathhorse]

I think you just had buyer's remorse, and was just looking for a excuse.
Whatever.

lmao i was thinking the same thing. But doesnt it feel like every time you buy a video card you feel cheaped. Cause it drops in value faster then a car off a lot.

 

[thedosbox]

Maybe it's the numerous hotfixes. It's bad enough to have to install a new driver every month, but every week or more. Didn't a recent driver need 5 hotfixes.

LOL - I ran the stock 10.4's for seven months, and only installed the 10.12's last week. Similar periods elapsed between driver installations when I ran a 8800 GTS.

There's a difference between needing a new driver and being OCD about it. Or spreading the fangirl FUD.

 

[Barfo]

Cool story bro!

 

[akugami]

Maybe it's the numerous hotfixes. It's bad enough to have to install a new driver every month, but every week or more. Didn't a recent driver need 5 hotfixes.

I agree. It's better to go the nVidia way and update every 3 months only. Just make sure you cross your fingers and hope nVidia don't release another driver that kills your video card.

Your post added nothing and is just meant to troll.

As for updating drivers, I don't even bother updating after every driver release. It's just not needed unless the drivers are fixing an issue with a game you're having or the drivers offer a general improvement over a wide range of games.

 

[happy medium]

LOL - I ran the stock 10.4's for seven months, and only installed the 10.12's last week. Similar periods elapsed between driver installations when I ran a 8800 GTS.

There's a difference between needing a new driver and being OCD about it. Or spreading the fangirl FUD.

To be honest after months of hassel with my 5750, I finally found a driver that plays nice. It was months ago ,I'm not even sure what one it is.

My point is, if everything works,don't mess with it.

The only downfall of that theory is, I don't get the performance enhancements from a new driver release, but for the 4 or 5% performance improvement I'm missing, I'll take the stability anyday.

I just here to many stories about new drivers fixing one thing and breaking another. I will only upgrade now if I have to.

Truth is I'm scared to do it, I don't want the headache.

I think this is what the op is saying.
He probrobly said screw it , I'm gonna "set it and forget it" with Nvidia drivers and a gtx570. No hot fixes, no worryies, just out of the box gaming fun.
TWIMTBP for the win in this case.

i know peolple are gonna cry and say but but but nvidia drivers kills cards but do you really think that gonna happen again?
Well lets hope not.

 

[SolMiester]

I think the driver issues are a valid point and no need to call out troll...Just look at the thread comparing driver releases....9.10>10.3>10.7!! Results were up and down like a whores draws!....95% of people who have experienced cards from both manufacturers acknowledge the nVidia out of the box support is better than AMD, the other 5% just wont admit it....LMAO!

 

[SlowSpyder]

I think the driver issues are a valid point and no need to call out troll...Just look at the thread comparing driver releases....9.10>10.3>10.7!! Results were up and down like a whores draws!....95% of people who have experienced cards from both manufacturers acknowledge the nVidia out of the box support is better than AMD, the other 5% just wont admit it....LMAO!

I wonder if the people who destroyed their cards with the 196.75 drivers feel Nvidia has the upper hand in driver quality?

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

$280 or $380 for a VIDEO CARD, either way I'm playing in crazy territory.

Yes but, you chose to pay it. Sounds more like buyers remorse.

 

[happy medium]

As for updating drivers, I don't even bother updating after every driver release. It's just not needed unless the drivers are fixing an issue with a game you're having or the drivers offer a general improvement over a wide range of games.

I agree, if you read my prior post, but what about divx gpu support and performance improvements. Why should "we" AMD card owners have to be afraid to update our drivers and have these advancements.
Thats not fair and is one of things that keeps AMD from being a supeirior gpu company at the moment.IMHO

 

[happy medium]

I wonder if the people who destroyed their cards with the 196.75 drivers feel Nvidia has the upper hand in driver quality?

Please put the bias hammer down for a minute read our posts and understand our position.
Join the community and state what will be better for "us" gamers.
Thanks.and be happy

 

[SolMiester]

I wonder if the people who destroyed their cards with the 196.75 drivers feel Nvidia has the upper hand in driver quality?

how many people you think that is?, you would of thought people be screaming all over the net about it, however fact of the matter is, NV users dont update their drivers much, therefore not many bothered and those that did obviously caught the problem....and I didnt think every card was affected and also those that did got support\replacement?

 

[happy medium]

Yes but, you chose to pay it. Sounds more like buyers remorse.

Yes, I see your point, but please see mine. I traded my gtx260 (and cash) for my 5750, if I would have known what the next 3/4 months were to bring me,honestly I would have kept my card or bought a new faster Nvidia card and spent the extra money for it.

As of now my card runs cool and quiet, and overclocks like a champ.
It a great piece of hardware but the driver problems I had just left a bad taste in my mouth.

Now its allmost time for a new card, do you think I'm gonna pay a little more for stability/sanity, I sure will.

 

[CosmicMight]

Well, at least it will be different. I've been running ATI cards since the 9700 Pro.

You never explained your rationale - I'm curious.

And I don't care, mind you. I'd rather have the stability of an Nv card myself, but I do not get caught up in all the nerd rage that goes on between Ati + Nv around here. I've owned both (actually, I think I owned a 9700 myself at one point, lol).

 

[happy medium]

how many people you think that is?, you would of thought people be screaming all over the net about it, however fact of the matter is, NV users dont update their drivers much, therefore not many bothered and those that did obviously caught the problem....and I didnt think every card was affected and also those that did got support\replacement?

turning this into a pissing contest gets us nowhere.
We all know from time to time this stuff happends.

Lets try and keep the conversation civil.

 

[SlowSpyder]

Please put the bias hammer down for a minute read our posts and understand our position.
Join the community and state what will be better for "us" gamers.
Thanks.and be happy

I'm not being biased, I just think it's funny when people can claim to know if AMD or Nvidia has better drivers. Different people only have their own experiences to go by. Most enthusiast rigs are fairly unique, from their own mix of hardware to their overclocks and cooling to their house's wiring. So someone saying AMD or Nvidia has better or worse 'out of the box' support than the other company simply based on their mix and match computer is very likely not representitive of the bigger picture of everyone who uses those companies drivers.

I haven't used an Nvidia card since my 7900GS, it had great drivers overall, but what was frustrating is I could never Alt+Tab out of games. I always had to exit if I wanted to use my desktop and then relaunch the game. Minor, but annoying none the less.

My AMD drivers had been perfect until my display driver would stop responding whenever I watched Flash videos. I was getting annoyed with AMD as driver revision after driver revision wouldn't fix the issue. One day I set my video card's overclock down from 950MHz on the GPU for a different reason, and suddenly videos worked fine. Here I was, 100% game stable, so I assumed it had to be AMD's driver when it was in fact me pushing the GPU further then was truly 100% stable.

Both companies have their better and worse drivers. I just don't buy for a second that Nvidia has better 'out of the box support', or at least nothing I have seen points to one company being better than the other.

 

[hclarkjr]

wish you would have rerouted it to me!! i am getting the same card as soon as i get the cash for it

 

[dlamb2471]

This may look like a first post and all, but I've been reading AT & the forums for years. Just decided to jump in a little...

Maybe I'm just not playing the affected games, and maybe I'm a serious minority in this sense, but I haven't had any major driver issues the last couple of years with my ATI cards...Just got a 6950, previously had a 5850, 4850, 3870...Prior to that it was mostly Nvidia. I don't have any issues with Nvidia, it's just been a couple of years of being in an ATI/AMD mood. I certainly have seen some very buggy drivers over the years dating back to my Voodoo 1...just not hitting the major ones any more I guess.

 

[toyota]

How long did it take to find those numbers?

Anandtech shows a 21W difference under load between 570/6970 with Crysis and and 85W difference with Furmark, both in AMD's favor. Idle temps tied and under load with Crysis, AMD was 4 degrees cooler, Furmark load, 5 degrees cooler. Idle, noise was 0.4dB in Nvidia's favor, and under load 3.3dB in favor of AMD.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4061/amds-radeon-hd-6970-radeon-hd-6950/24

reviews are really annoying because they can vary greatly from each other. its almost like some sites are testing a completely different card.

xbit has the 6970 using noticeably more power
anandtech has the 6970 using much less power
techreport has them basically even
hardwarecanucks has the 6970 using much more power
techpowerup has them basically even
hardocp has the 6970 using noticeably less power


wtf?

 

[happy medium]

Both companies have their better and worse drivers. I just don't buy for a second that Nvidia has better 'out of the box support', or at least nothing I have seen points to one company being better than the other.
__________________

Agreed, I had a gtx260 in one hand and the 5750 in the other about 10 months back and my experience was alot like yours with ny5750, except it was not my overclock.

Its was powerplay problems for my video.
Grey screen/blue screen game freezes.
I buy new games that I like as soon as they are released, and that also was no fun with this card.
I had some problems with game menu's, some games crashing to the desktop.
Not saying it wasn't fixed, but I don't remember having that problem with my gtx260.

 

[MentalIlness]

While I have never had one single problem or issue with Nvidia drivers, I have never had any with ATI cards either.

But.....

Since NV is so good with drivers "And I mean that" Then why don't they fix EVGA Precision to where it stops keeping my set fan speeds at startup ?

 

[akugami]

I agree, if you read my prior post, but what about divx gpu support and performance improvements. Why should "we" AMD card owners have to be afraid to update our drivers and have these advancements.
Thats not fair and is one of things that keeps AMD from being a supeirior gpu company at the moment.IMHO

Well, one of the biggest knocks of years past on AMD/ATI was driver support of their GPU's. AMD now provides greater emphasis on driver improvements. Obviously resources are not unlimited and AMD's drivers are by no means perfect but I'd still rate AMD's video decoding support as adequate and it's gaming support as roughly equal with nVidia. Obviously they lack in areas like GPGPU but that's an area most gamers and general users simply won't run into.

It's still ridiculous and an obvious troll post to knock AMD on greater support of their drivers because the other end of the spectrum (which we've been through) is to let their drivers languish by not providing enough support.

Monthly release dates do mean that some bugs in the updated drivers are more likely to slip through the cracks as the hotfixes are mostly meant to be bug fixes prior to the next monthly release. However, as shown with nVidia's "killer drivers", it is not a slam dunk that having a driver released every few months mean it's bug free. nVidia has had to release immediate fixes (similar to the hotfixes) to bugs introduced by new drivers in the past as well.

 

[happy medium]

previously had a 5850,

Did you buy it after the 10.3 drivers? I think they were released in the beggining of April.
Thats when the drivers started getting better.
When was the 5xxx series released? October of last year? 5 months with semi-broken drivers. Thats enough to piss anyone off and I KNOW I'm not alone.