MSI Geforce 3 64Mb Ti200

[Mitzi]

There is an offer on this card today so I can get it for £126 ($176). What I want to know is should I buy this card today to replace my Matrox G400 Max or should I wait a couple of more weeks to see if the prices drop again, due to the arrival of the GeForce4s?

Does anyone have an MSI card? Are they any good?

BTW - I live in the UK, so my options of where I purchase the card are limited, theres no point saying Newegg sells it for less etc etc.

Cheers for any advice.

 

[Sunner]

The MSI cards supposedly have among the worst 2D quality of the GF cards.
And considdering there are some pretty crappy cards out there, thats not a good sign.

 

[Mitzi]

Eek! I don't like the sound of that. I thought they were pretty good cards because the Ti500 got a pretty good review when looked at by Anandtech.

Guess, I'll stay away and get a Gainward or something in a couple of weeks then.

Cheers for the heads up.

 

[plex24]

<< The MSI cards supposedly have among the worst 2D quality of the GF cards.
And considdering there are some pretty crappy cards out there, thats not a good sign. >>



That's a bull. I have MSI Gforce 3 TI 200, Visiontek Gforce 3 TI 200, and Visiontek Geforce 3. I can't tell no difference in 2D. Just make sure you get the retail version because oem does not have fan or heatsink for rams.

 

[jiffylube1024]

I'm running a MSI GF3 Ti200 (overclocked to 220/500 btw ... goes higer but I'm very comfortable with this speed). 2d is quite passable. 800X600 had a very minor flickering issue (and by very minor, I mean nobody in my family/friends/etc can notice it but me). Actually I don't even really see it anymore (it just occurred the first day I got the card). 1024 res is very sharp, and man is it ever fast in games. Btw I'm coming from a Radeon DDR so when I say the 2d is passable, I mean it's pretty close to the Radeon, which says something! Text is a tiny bit blurry at 1280X1024 and above, although it was like that on my radeon as well so I belive it is the monitor (also I'm very picky).

As for tv-out... the quality is pretty crappy, and text is blurry. It's like that on all GF cards. Divx and DVD movies run fine on the tv, and they look pretty sharp, but text is pretty much unreadable and games don't look nearly as good as they do on a monitor. I'm using Svideo out on a new Panasonic Tv btw.

I'm very pleased with the performance with this card. The drivers are quite stable (I'm running the newest MSI beta drivers - ZERO probelms).

 

[oldfart]

The 2D issue was prior to GF3 cards. I put an MSI GF3 Ti200 im a neighbors PC. Works fine.

 

[jonmcc33]

The MSI cards supposedly have among the worst 2D quality of the GF cards.

Get the F out of here. MSI cards are actually pretty good from what I've seen of them. You don't purchase any GeForce3 card for 2D quality anyway so that doesn't make sense. I've seen systems with MSI GeForce cards in them and they are actually very nice.

 

[Sunner]

<< Were were disappointed with the MSI StarForce 822's 2D image quality. The card
received comments such as "blurry" in our tests, leaving it along
the same lines as an older GeForce2 MX card. >>


From Anand's GF3 roundup.
But OTOH from the same roundup


<< The MSI StarForce 822 offers quite the bang for the buck >>



If they've improved that alot lately, I stand corrected, but I didn't find any mention of this in Anand's Ti roundup.

 

[Mitzi]

Cheers for the info guys. In that case, next time the offer comes up (in the next week or so), I think I'll order one or do you think it'll be better to wait for a price drop which the GeForce4s should really cause?

 

[Leon]

It's always amusing to hear people talk about Elsa/Hercules excellent 2D quality, and then talk about bad 2d quality on MSI and PNY cards. What these people don't realize that MSI manufacturers all PNY, Hercules (well not anymore), and most of the Elsa cards, and quality is identical.



p.s. Newegg does sell it for less - only $140

 

[Sunner]

<< and most of the Elsa cards, and quality is identical >>


When did VisionTek stop making the Elsa cards?

 

[oldfart]

Hercules, Creative Labs GF2 cards had horrible 2D quality (MSI). Elsa was pretty decent (VisionTek). Again, that was GF2, not GF3