Radeon 7500 cards "Powered by ATi": Do I Need to worry about quality or anything?

[Athlon4all]

Title says it all, looking to get a Hydravision capable R7500 with DVI-VGA adapter for $80-$90

 

[Adul]

not sure, I havent heard complaintfor cards made by other companies.

 

[nortexoid]

HELL YES!

be careful...i'm not sure about the higher-end cards, but i've seen ATI's Xpert 2000 Pro 2d quality, and it's awesome at 1280x1024....i ended up picking up a powered by ATI card from Club3D for a system I built for someone, and ended up running it at 1280x1024 on my monitor, and honestly, it was completely fuzzy...it was atrocious...i emailed them and told them how crappy their components were...

they're definitely cheaper, and it's not merely because they're no-names...or maybe that's why they're no=names...because of the crap components they use to undercut competitors.

luckily my friend only drives a 17" monitor at 1024 w/ that card...needless to say.

i'd personally stay away from all powered by companies except hercules and probably gigabyte.

 

[Athlon4all]

Hmmm. Thankz for the input. Anyone else have a comment?

 

[jm0ris0n]

Some of the "Powered" use SDR instead of DDR memory. I don't know how they get away with calling it a 7500, but they do. Also, be prepared to get anything from 4ns memory chips all the way up to 5.5ns. If it is a powered card and has drr for 80 bucks chances are you will get the 5.5NS chips. Expect a memory clock of 183~240 on the memory chips.

Good luck, its kinda like playing the lottery

 

[Athlon4all]

hehe yea It is. I've noticed many of them have SDR, thanks!!!

 

[Zukatah]

Yes there is a difference in quality. Reviews show that some cards by PowerColor are crippled with bad IQ. The Hercules and Gigabyte on the other hand seem to do quite good. It really depends on the manufacturer. If you want to play safe, get a Build by ATI, that way you don't have to wait in order to get the drivers released (ATI's drivers are not always compatible with the 3rd party cards), you are sure about IQ and support.

 

[Wolfsraider]

athlon4all

your better off in the long run buying built by not powered by unless you really comb over the specs
some powered by cards have trouble with drivers most are underclocked and use less quality parts

i own almost all ati cards and all of the ones i now own are "built by"

 

[smp]

The 2D quality on ATI cards is good! If it is no good on the 'built by' cards it's probably due to cheaper filters ... like the GeForce 2 cards, some of them suffered from poorer 2D quality, but it wasn't the fault of the chipset, it was the fault of the manufacturer and the components on the card. With ATI's history of good 2D I don't know if I would trust someone else.

 

[Eggplant]

hello guys
sorry for jumping in but i've got to ask.
i was planning to buy the AIW Radeon 7500, should i get the idea it's a wrong choice?
is it supported by w2k pro?
is there an alternate video card with a TV out/in ( can be used as a tv ) better or equal to the radeon around the same price?
thanks alot!

-Rose

 

[Athlon4all]

The AIW series I feel is the best of its class. You really can't go wrong with the 7500, 8500DV or 8500 128Meg AIW. All of them use the same sofrware, just different speed grades and I think the 8500DV has a few other features that the 7500 and 8500 128Meg lack, I'd take a look at Anandtech's TV Tuner/Capture Video Card Article. He compares all the AIW's, the Matrox G450 eTV Marvel, and a couple nVidia offerings as well. Good luck!!!

P.S. Thanks guys, turns out, I was able to find someone selling a R7500 Built by ATi with DVI-VGA Adapter for $85, thanx again everyone!!!

EDIT: Forgot the link

 

[jpprod]

One should always keep in mind that it is entirely up to the card manufacturer how the final 2D image quality of a video card is. You don't have to look hard for the proof. The 2D image quality of Matrox Gxxx, 3dfx Voodoo3/4/5 and ATI Rage/Radeon series cards have been praised in the past, and all of these cards have traditionally come from the same manufacturer than the graphics chip itself. Meanwhile, the biggest manufacturer of consumer-class graphics chips to third parties, nVidia, has been criticized for the medicore 2D image quality of TNT/GeForce-based cards.

With ATI's shipments of graphics chips to third parties growing, you'll be seeing more and more Radeons with less-than-optimal 2D. Buyer beware.

 

[Rand]

For the vast majority of third party ATi Radeon boards you should not need to worry about 2D visual quality nor quality of manufacture at all. Presently ATi i still manufacturing the overwheliming majority of third party branded ATi graphics cards.

So far as I'm aware only Club3D, and Gigabyte are the only third party ATi based graphics cards that are actually manufactured by the respective companies.
Most are manufactured on the same line as ATi's own cards and merely sold to the third party for branding.

 

[rockhard]

I would also avoid the Hercules as it only has a single RAMDAC for the model with both DVI and HD15 connectors.
Even though it has the two connectors it cannot drive two monitors!
It can only do dual head with a TV! :/
If the 2D on my previous Hercules cards - GF2MX and GF2Ti are anything to go by i would not trust a Hercules card IMO FWIW.
If i was buying a 7500 i would be tempted to pay the extra for the real deal with the dual head and crisp 2D.