Presenting: nVidia ForceWare !

[chaosblade]

nVidia Has now officially released the new Set of Detonators, or as they are now called, "ForceWare" Drivers . This set is marked as 52.16 and is WHQL & International . I dont think there's much difference between the other 52.16 leaked versions and this one .. Check out nVidia's Press Release about the new naming scheme and drivers :

http://www.nvidia.com/object/IO_9304.html

[Yeloazndevil]

hmm new name....the old name was better

[Betamax]

Aye they probably want to force us to update or something ;).

Anyways, I'll probs grab them when I get home.

[fivefeet8]

Some have said that the reason for the "Forceware" name is because Nvidia is going to add it's Nforce Drivers making "Forceware" totally unified for all Nvidia products including motherboards.

[Samor]

hm...is this worth checking out for GF4 ti users or should I keep the 45.23's ?

[Boltzmann]

I guess I'll give them a try tomorrow (unfortunately I've to go to University this night).

At least I'll be able to see if anyone has a problem before I try them :D

[chp]

I heard that they want to update "ForceWare" once the year.. meaning "rare" builds.

[Phoenix]

hm...is this worth checking out for GF4 ti users or should I keep the 45.23's ?


In some benches you'll get about 20%-25% speed ups, IQ and performance is slightly enhanced, but as we know this subjective at least for benchmarks.
Yeloazndevil had reported that he experienced low FPS rates with this sets on his GF4 Ti 4200 as for me I haven't been affected to much with my GF4 Ti 4600.

Some have said that the reason for the "Forceware" name is because Nvidia is going to add it's Nforce Drivers making "Forceware" totally unified for all Nvidia products including motherboards.

I don't like that idea. They should left different sets for Nforce chipset mobo owners and video cards only owners, I'd say what do I want for the nforce drivers if I have mobo equipped with anything else than nvidia mobo chipsets??

[fivefeet8]

I don't like that idea. They should left different sets for Nforce chipset mobo owners and video cards only owners, I'd say what do I want for the nforce drivers if I have mobo equipped with anything else than nvidia mobo chipsets??

Yea. I agree, but like I said, it's not official, just what some people were suggesting. I've installed them and there are no Nforce Drivers with them. But who knows, maybe Nvidia may add them in later.

[ChrisRay]

Some have said that the reason for the "Forceware" name is because Nvidia is going to add it's Nforce Drivers making "Forceware" totally unified for all Nvidia products including motherboards.


Well detonator didnt really make sense anyway. Since detonator drivers were originally implied to "Detonate" TNT (Dynamite) Cards.

[Noxious Ninja]

Some have said that the reason for the "Forceware" name is because Nvidia is going to add it's Nforce Drivers making "Forceware" totally unified for all Nvidia products including motherboards.

That would be dumb. Unified video drivers is one thing, but bundling motherboard drivers and video drivers together? Bleh. I hope they provide seperate packages.

[bahamut_2006]

hm...is this worth checking out for GF4 ti users or should I keep the 45.23's ?

im still stuck with a geforce 4 ti 4200, and these drivers made no noticeable increase or decrease in speed or quality.

[Dukelord]

I'm curious as to what versions of nVIDIA product it is compatible with

[RF]

Damnit! I want nforce drivers now! If they arnt released by the end of october, damn we should call the damn bbb or something! ARG IM SO PISSED AT THOES FCKS!@

Sry, but I had to vent that out...

[ZappaZ]

Tried the Starstorm version on my GF4 4200 and got improved IQ in some games but only very small changes in fps (upwards) , overall it seems like a good deal.

[Gamer1]

personally i wouldn't like the yearly updates.

i want annual updates, or updates when something new comes along instead of a strict yearly updates.

why... a problem for a game might have been solved and an update would be very nice instead of waiting a whole year for a fix.

for people complaing about constant updates... if you don't want to update, then don't. you don't have to. no one is making you. as a yearly update would have the same effect except it's a longer process.

hehe... here's what i meant to say, thx for chrisray for pointing this out:

i want constant updates or when something new comes along instead of a strict yearly updates.

why... a problem for a game might have been solved and an update would be very nice instead of waiting a whole year for a fix.

for people complaing about constant updates... if you don't want to update, then don't. you don't have to. no one is making you. as a yearly update would have the same effect except it's a longer process.

:hdbash: :hdbash: :hdbash: :emb:, hehe...

*in a hulk like vioce: vocabulary limited... talk... hard... sense no....

[ChrisRay]

personally i wouldn't like the yearly updates.

i want annual updates, or updates when something new comes along instead of a strict yearly updates.

why... a problem for a game might have been solved and an update would be very nice instead of waiting a whole year for a fix.

for people complaing about annual updates... if you don't want to update, then don't. you don't have to. no one is making you. as a yearly update would have the same effect except it's a longer process.



Umm. I hate to do this but. You realise annual means yearly right? So you just said. I want yearly updates, And then said yearly updates are a bad idea.

[grahf]

Anyone tested these with Pete's OGL2 plugin? I just downloaded them and took them for a short test. Everything seems to be improving. Games such as WC3 and Battlefield 1942 has noticeably higher fps. Halo still has more or less the same speed. Guess Gearbox did a lousy job on the port afterall. Unfortunately I haven't had a chance to test pete's plugins. Anyone who did please post your results.

[Raziel]

They're called "Forceware" cause they're part of a software suit called Forceware (GeForce, nForce, dunno how they'll call the sound cards), which has yet to be released, the whole suit includes nForce drivers, but they'll stay separated from the gfx drivers of course.

[chaosblade]

Soundstorm ? i thought they erased that idea .. since nForce 3 arent going to have it anymore .. maybe they are making them stand-alone sound cards ?

[Yeloazndevil]

Soundstorm ? i thought they erased that idea .. since nForce 3 arent going to have it anymore .. maybe they are making them stand-alone sound cards ?
yea Nvidia is gonna make Soundstorm a stand alone sound card to compete with Creative Labs, etc :)

[fivefeet8]

Have you guys checked on the Forceware 50.xx release notes? Interesting things listed for enhancements.

Under Nview:
Internet Explorer Pop Up prevention? oO
Kinematic Mouse actions?

Under Directx graphics:
Floating Point Render Targets
Multi Element Textures

Under OGL:
Windows 9x rotation support?
New supported Extenstions
wgl_arb_make_current_read
GL_arb_pixel_buffer_object
GL_arb_occlusion_query

[chaosblade]

Damn, Soundstorm was great ! Maybe i should look into buying that card once its out ;)

Fivefeet: nView, the IE popup killer ? weird ..

[fivefeet8]

Did some tests with OpenGl extension viewer. Fx cards are now %100 OGL1.5 compliant.

[Katsuya]

I have a GeForce 2 MX400 should I even bother with these?

(Using 45.23 right now)

[SkyeHack]

They're called "Forceware" cause they're part of a software suit called Forceware (GeForce, nForce, dunno how they'll call the sound cards), which has yet to be released, the whole suit includes nForce drivers, but they'll stay separated from the gfx drivers of course.


No.... They are called "Forceware" because nVidia is "forcing" us to use crappy drivers. :) If you don't believe me check out all the benchmarks with these drivers. Even the 9700 Pro with 3.8 catalyst are faster then the FX5950 with the forceware drivers. :) :) :)

[Samor]

but that's coming from an Ati fan, looking at your avatar and such ;)

[liquid]

psh benchmarks I don't trust em anymore. I'll just be glad if I can get Pete's OGL2 to work on my ancient GeForce 3 (without having to switch to nv1x mode).

[Quark]

No.... They are called "Forceware" because nVidia is "forcing" us to use crappy drivers. :) If you don't believe me check out all the benchmarks with these drivers. Even the 9700 Pro with 3.8 catalyst are faster then the FX5950 with the forceware drivers. :) :) :)

Really, now? And where would you be getting those stats from?
here? (http://www.gamersdepot.com/hardware/video_cards/nvidia/nv38_36/004.htm)
how about here? (http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/evga_e-geforce_fx_5950_review/page4.asp)
possibly here? (http://www.hothardware.com/hh_files/S&V/geforcefx_5950u(4).shtml)
Maybe this? (http://techreport.com/reviews/2003q4/geforcefx-5950ultra/index.x?pg=5)

Hmm, I'm sorry. I seem to have found contradictory results everywhere I looked.

Anyway, most people would be looking at Radeon 9600 XT vs GeForce 5700, cards people can actually afford. And in that case, the results are pretty similar. You could win with either card, though my personal experience say stay away from Ati.

Edit: Quick Addition, for all those people that have forgotten Quack3 and thinks NVidia's the only one who plays dirty:
Optimizations (http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031023/nvidia-nv38-nv36-19.html#questionable_optimizations_in_atis_drivers )

[Archlyn]

Anyone tested these with Pete's OGL2 plugin? I just downloaded them and took them for a short test. Everything seems to be improving. Games such as WC3 and Battlefield 1942 has noticeably higher fps. Halo still has more or less the same speed. Guess Gearbox did a lousy job on the port afterall. Unfortunately I haven't had a chance to test pete's plugins. Anyone who did please post your results.

I tested them just now, and my GF4 is on of the ones that hangs and causes a Runtime error.

No change. :(

[SkyeHack]

Really, now? And where would you be getting those stats from?
here? (http://www.gamersdepot.com/hardware/video_cards/nvidia/nv38_36/004.htm)
how about here? (http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/evga_e-geforce_fx_5950_review/page4.asp)
possibly here? (http://www.hothardware.com/hh_files/S&V/geforcefx_5950u(4).shtml)
Maybe this? (http://techreport.com/reviews/2003q4/geforcefx-5950ultra/index.x?pg=5)

Hmm, I'm sorry. I seem to have found contradictory results everywhere I looked.

Anyway, most people would be looking at Radeon 9600 XT vs GeForce 5700, cards people can actually afford. And in that case, the results are pretty similar. You could win with either card, though my personal experience say stay away from Ati.

Edit: Quick Addition, for all those people that have forgotten Quack3 and thinks NVidia's the only one who plays dirty:
Optimizations (http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031023/nvidia-nv38-nv36-19.html#questionable_optimizations_in_atis_drivers )

Im sorry but I only TRUST reviews from RESPECTED websites. As you can see here:

http://www.warp2search.net/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=15020&22313

http://www20.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031023/index.html

"Nvidia still can not pull out good performance in DX 9 games. The ATI Radeon 9700 Pro even beats the GeForce FX 5950 Ultra... "

Why stay away from ATI? There Catalyst drivers are better then these new forceware and old detonator drivers and games look and play better mostly then on nvidia cards. nVidia cards suck at DirectX9 games and pixel shading or am i lying? Stop being a fanboy man and look at the truth. And I speak from experience cause I owned a Nvidia Card and happily switched to ATI and will be with ATI for a long time to come probably. :) :) :) :)

[Samor]

no offence, but aren't you kind of an ati fan yourself? ;)

[Kane]

Actualy, that Tomshardware review which you say shows ATi in a good light says that ATi are most likely cheating in Aquamark, Halo and UT2k3. Further nVidia's AF is better than ATi's. ATi's FSAA beats nVidia's and raw DX9 pwerformance is better on the ATis however, the blasting that you gave them is sorely unjustified as the gap is so miniscule now. You are acting like an ATi fanboy and is shows so blatently in anything you do.

[SkyeHack]

yes i am a "FAN" of great cards and since ATI makes the greatest cards on the market i guess I am a fan of the company. But I was also a fan of nVidia back when they were a great company also. :)

[SkyeHack]

Actualy, that Tomshardware review which you say shows ATi in a good light says that ATi are most likely cheating in Aquamark, Halo and UT2k3. Further nVidia's AF is better than ATi's. ATi's FSAA beats nVidia's and raw DX9 pwerformance is better on the ATis however, the blasting that you gave them is sorely unjustified as the gap is so miniscule now. You are acting like an ATi fanboy and is shows so blatently in anything you do.

Damn the gap is so miniscule now that if you pick sides with eithier ATI or nVIdia you are a fanboy. Ill try next time not to blast anyone so blatently anymore kane. :thumb:

As for Quark, I guess if you pick nVidia's side and blast me with more links then I blasted him with, you aren't as much of a fanboy and doesnt get reprimanded, too. :rolleyes:

[Demigod]

Well detonator didnt really make sense anyway. Since detonator drivers were originally implied to "Detonate" TNT (Dynamite) Cards.
Perhaps, although the name TNT doesn't mean dynamite. Still, it's not like "GeForce" makes any sense either.

Really, now? And where would you be getting those stats from?
here? (http://www.gamersdepot.com/hardware/video_cards/nvidia/nv38_36/004.htm)
how about here? (http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/evga_e-geforce_fx_5950_review/page4.asp)
possibly here? (http://www.hothardware.com/hh_files/S&V/geforcefx_5950u(4).shtml)
Maybe this? (http://techreport.com/reviews/2003q4/geforcefx-5950ultra/index.x?pg=5)

Hmm, I'm sorry. I seem to have found contradictory results everywhere I looked.Heh, you seemed to have picked all the Nvidia-optimized benchmarks (Nvidia pretty much "optimizes" for every major benchmark test). Try to find tests using non-standard benchmarks for a far more accurate measure of performance. Standard DX9 tests like Tomb Raider and Half-Life 2 beta are also a good measure of the GPU's computational power.

Anyway, most people would be looking at Radeon 9600 XT vs GeForce 5700, cards people can actually afford. And in that case, the results are pretty similar. You could win with either card, though my personal experience say stay away from Ati.
Funny, as I would say stay away from Nvidia. I just detest all the "optimizations" they're doing. They pretty much have new driver releases for every new benchmarking tool, which says a lot about their motives (optimize for standard benchmarks, make their investors happy, screw enthusiasts). I want a videocard, not a marketing tool.

Edit: Quick Addition, for all those people that have forgotten Quack3 and thinks NVidia's the only one who plays dirty:
Optimizations (http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031023/nvidia-nv38-nv36-19.html#questionable_optimizations_in_atis_drivers )
I read over that a while ago and the "cheating" done by ATI is negligible at best. Their optimizations count for about 5% improvement (which could actually be done by legitimate optimizations) while with Nvidia it's around 50% - 100% (which cannot be done without some serious modifications to the software).

I find it funny how Nvidia originally criticized the Radeon 8500 for their optimizations to Quake 3 and now they're doing it themselves, but on a much larger scale. Can you say hypocrites?

[SkyeHack]

I 100% agree with DemiGod! These are 100% facts as I was trying to state but since I have an ATI avatar you all called me a "FANBOY"! Well, hear the truth from DemiGod now! ie. Kane, Quark.......

[chaosblade]

I agree with Demigod. ATi's speculated optemizations are tiny compering to nVidia's Foul play so far .. I would defintly stay away from nVidia the next time ill buy a GFX card .

Though there's the new XGI lineup too .. i wonder how these will fair up against the two giants at the moment, ATi and nVidia Of course .

[ChrisRay]

I 100% agree with DemiGod! These are 100% facts as I was trying to state but since I have an ATI avatar you all called me a "FANBOY"! Well, hear the truth from DemiGod now! ie. Kane, Quark.......

__________________



Firstly. The Issue with Epic and UT2003 resolves around ini files. The Radeons "Do not" render all textures correctly unless you change the INI files yourself.

It has been this way for a long time. I suggest any Radeon user who wants to play this game the way the developer intended, Change the texture values in the ini folder.

Secondly. 3dmark2001 Nature test, Ati was the first to make an impact to its Image Quality which adversely effected its performance. THis came before the Geforce 4 Ti and the Det 40 increases, This occurs on both the 8500 and the 9500 + Series. It effects the image Quality on the water and the Blowing Leaves.

Nvidia later followed suit.

ATIs original "Quality" Anistropic Filtering, Did Full Trillinear on multiple texture stages, Due to its adapative state it still did not filter all angles. This is fine. It's a hardware limitations.

Later after the Geforce FX was introduced, ATI saw the Quality of the 5800 Ultras Aggressive Anistropic Filtering, And thus decided it was ok to lower the Quality of the r300's Anistropic Filtering. Now ATIS quality only does trillinear filtering on the first texture stage and billinear on the rest. Very Similar to Nvidias method but Nvidia filters all angles.

[Phoenix Flame]

Well, I got another 150 points with the FFXI benchmark using these drivers so I guess it's an improvment. Better than nothing.

[ChrisRay]

Well, I got another 150 points with the FFXI benchmark using these drivers so I guess it's an improvment. Better than nothing.

Planning on playing that game? After my next upgrade I intend to buy it ;)

[SkyeHack]

I think Skyehacks motivations have always been pretty clear. And yes this is a charactor assassination. He's always been so proud of his card, Proud enough to Post TV shots of Final Fantasy 10 and claim they have 6x FSAA through the TV Tuner,

Proud enough to start dumping in Fivefeets threads about benchmarks from Valve and Half Life 2. The Word Objective would never be in your vocabulary. Being unable to see past the rotty exterior of a specific brand name.

Skyehack. Can you give me a detailed in depth review as to why the Geforce FX architecture is stingy to standard DX 9.0 High Level Shader Language?

Skyehack, Can you explain to me. The Inherit Architectual disadvantage to the ATi Radeon 9500+ Line of Anistropic Filtering?

Skyehack, Can you explain to me the proccess for Certified drivers from Microsoft?

Hell Skyehack, Can you explain why post proccessing saturation is not possible on Ati Radeon cards and is on Geforce cards?

First of all, could you please give me the direct link to where I posted in my old thread that I claimed that my TV tuner card enhances Final Fantasy X edges, which I was playing on my PS2 and viewing through my computer at the time.

If giving information about a product in a thread while staying on topic (unlike your post) is being objectional, then call me out.

As for your well asked questions, I myself would probably not be able to answer them as you are much more intellectual and compentant then I am and probably already know the answers to. It's my first year at the University of Florida and in my classes (Personal Computer Systems Repair I, Introduction to Computers & Programming, Local Area Network Concepts and Computer Hardware Decision) we haven't gone over the chapters that would have answer those questions.

My motivation has been clear. I support ATI 100% and I believe they are a better product from what I read, what people tell me, from what I see with my card and my past experience with my other nVidia card.

I think the only characther your assassinating is yourself......

[ChrisRay]

First of all, could you please give me the direct link to where I posted in my old thread that I claimed that my TV tuner card enhances Final Fantasy X edges, which I was playing on my PS2 and viewing through my computer at the time.

If giving information about a product in a thread while staying on topic (unlike your post) is being objectional, then call me out.

As for your well asked questions, I myself would probably not be able to answer them as you are much more intellectual and compentant then I am and probably already know the answers to. It's my first year at the University of Florida and in my classes (Personal Computer Systems Repair I, Introduction to Computers & Programming, Local Area Network Concepts and Computer Hardware Decision) we haven't gone over the chapters that would have answer those questions.

My motivation has been clear. I support ATI 100% and I believe they are a better product from what I read, what people tell me, from what I see with my card and my past experience with my other nVidia card.

I think the only characther your assassinating is yourself......


It took me a whole 30 seconds to find it.


Final Fantasy X on PS2
1024x768 6xFSAA 16xAF Options maxed :)



http://www.ngemu.com/forums/showthread.php?t=39821&highlight=Final+Fantasy



giving information about a product in a thread while staying on topic (unlike your post) is being objectional, then call me out.


Ahh the pinnacle of objectivity right here.


No.... They are called "Forceware" because nVidia is "forcing" us to use crappy drivers. If you don't believe me check out all the benchmarks with these drivers. Even the 9700 Pro with 3.8 catalyst are faster then the FX5950 with the forceware drivers.


My motivation has been clear. I support ATI 100% and I believe they are a better product from what I read, what people tell me, from what I see with my card and my past experience with my other nVidia card.


Clear enough to enter fivefeets FX 5900 PC screenshot with the Half Life 2 benches and crap on someone who is hella happy with their purchase decision? Thats not constructive. Nor does it help. You Simply want to make fun of those who happen to be less fortunate in certain scenerios than yourself. Something I have come to expect from you.

[SkyeHack]

It took me a whole 30 seconds to find it.






http://www.ngemu.com/forums/showthread.php?t=39821&highlight=Final+Fantasy





Ahh the pinnacle of objectivity right here.


[/b]




Clear enough to enter fivefeets FX 5900 PC screenshot with the Half Life 2 benches and crap on someone who is hella happy with their purchase decision? Thats not constructive. Nor does it help. You Simply want to make fun of those who happen to be less fortunate in certain scenerios than yourself. Something I have come to expect from you.

Final Fantasy X on PS2
1024x768 6xFSAA 16xAF Options maxed :)

WOW, isn't it wierd that there always is a smily face on the line "1280x768 6xFSAA 16xAF Options maxed :)" when I posted Playstation 2 screens and when I posted PC games there is no smiley face on that line? Coincidence or what?

Did I make up these benchmarks with Photoshop or something? I mean these are real benchmarks that I posted. I didn't have to crap on someone as the benchmarks did it for me. It was news pertaining to the subject (as this thread is leaving its topic) and was constructive. You are just interperting me wrong because I was happy with my GFX card and posted lots of pictures of it and have an ATI avatar. I am not making fun of no one. I am just trying to help people make a good decision. I am not forcing anyone to do anything. I always thought of you as a Computer Guru like DemiGod but this was the last thing I would have suspected from you. This shows how much you know about me and how less I have come to know you.

[ChrisRay]

Did I make up these benchmarks with Photoshop or something? I mean these are real benchmarks that I posted. I didn't have to crap on someone as the benchmarks did it for me. It was news pertaining to the subject (as this thread is leaving its topic) and was constructive. Your just interperting it wrong because I was happy with my GFX card and posted lots of pictures of it and have an ATI avatar. I am not making fun of no one. I am just trying to help people make a good decision. I am not forcing anyone to do anything. I always thought of you as a Computer Guru like DemiGod but this was the last thing I would have suspected from you. This shows how much you know about me and how less I have come to know you

You seem to mis understand the point. It was out of place and uncalled for. And completely in the wrong place. Threads like that are bragging right threads for the users, People view them to see what the hardware is doing for that Individual.

If you wanted to post those screenshots. There were a hell of alot more relevent places for it. And you just did it for attention. And I can assertively say Fivefeet did not apreciate the derailing job you did to his thread. You didnt see him go into your thread and start crapping on your purchase did he? You know why? It's called Maturity and respect. Something you seem to have failed to concept at this point.


Next time you want to post Anti Nvidia posts. Why dont you go to the Hardware forum where they belong?


Final Fantasy X on PS2
1024x768 6xFSAA 16xAF Options maxed

WOW, isn't it wierd that there always is a smily face on the line "1280x768 6xFSAA 16xAF Options maxed " when I posted Playstation 2 screens and when I posted PC games there is no smiley face on that line? Coincidence or what?


You're just playing Semantics now. I mean come on. Even if you were just making a terrible attempt at sarcasm. It didnt do anything for you. As matter of fact, It just made you look like you had no idea what you were talking about. Or Hoping no one else would notice it,.


This shows how much you know about me and how less I have come to know you

What I know of is you what I have seen. I've seen you post pictures of yourself that are not you. I've seen you go after Kane with really bizzarre posts. I've seen you crap on others thread, Post rhetoric like you did in this post. I may not "know" you personally. But I do know I have no respect for what you post on these forums.

[SkyeHack]

You seem to mis understand the point. It was out of place and uncalled for. And completely in the wrong place. Threads like that are bragging right threads for the users, People view them to see what the hardware is doing for that Individual.

If you wanted to post those screenshots. There were a hell of alot more relevent places for it. And you just did it for attention. And I can assertively say Fivefeet did not apreciate the derailing job you did to his thread. You didnt see him go into your thread and start crapping on your purchase did he? You know why? It's called Maturity and respect. Something you seem to have failed to concept at this point.


Next time you want to post Anti Nvidia posts. Why dont you go to the Hardware forum where they belong?




You're just playing Semantics now. I mean come on. Even if you were just making a terrible attempt at sarcasm. It didnt do anything for you. As matter of fact, It just made you look like you had no idea what you were talking about. Or Hoping no one else would notice it,.




What I know of is you what I have seen. I've seen you post pictures of yourself that are not you. I've seen you go after Kane with really bizzarre posts. I've seen you crap on others thread, Post rhetoric like you did in this post. I may not "know" you personally. But I do know I have no respect for what you post on these forums.

Before I begin, It's funny how you edited your first post from:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally Posted by ChrisRay
I think Skyehacks motivations have always been pretty clear. And yes this is a charactor assassination. He's always been so proud of his card, Proud enough to Post TV shots of Final Fantasy 10 and claim they have 6x FSAA through the TV Tuner,

Proud enough to start dumping in Fivefeets threads about benchmarks from Valve and Half Life 2. The Word Objective would never be in your vocabulary. Being unable to see past the rotty exterior of a specific brand name.

Skyehack. Can you give me a detailed in depth review as to why the Geforce FX architecture is stingy to standard DX 9.0 High Level Shader Language?

Skyehack, Can you explain to me. The Inherit Architectual disadvantage to the ATi Radeon 9500+ Line of Anistropic Filtering?

Skyehack, Can you explain to me the proccess for Certified drivers from Microsoft?

Hell Skyehack, Can you explain why post proccessing saturation is not possible on Ati Radeon cards and is on Geforce cards?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


To: http://www.ngemu.com/forums/showpost.php?postid=627833&postcount=39

I can only speculate :rolleyes:

Now, O.K. I will be a man and swallow my pride and say that I am sorry that I posted those benchmarks on fivefeet's thread. However, I did see them moved into the appropiate thread very soon after and I didn't know that fivefeet's thread was completely derailed singlehandly by me. I apoligize if that was the case.

I really doubt the smiley face made me look stupid and I myself thought it was a wonderful sarcastic attempt. I wonder why no one objected in the thread itself and all of a sudden 3 months later someone complains. Hmm.. I just think its you.....

How do you know I post pictures that aren't me? Have you seen me in real life? I don't think there is a discrepency in the pictures that I post of myself and my room. The only time I have really gone after Kane was when I was learning flash and made a funny Fash move for him in general discussion (but you might detest it was funny at all) in which I declared my love for him. Yes I guess I admit to crapping on other threads somewhat and the only reason why I am rhetoric is because I have apolgizied for it. So now that we ALL know that you don't like me and have no respect for me, after the last hours worth of posts you made, we can try to get back on topic as we do not want to de-rail yet another threead, and I will now stop trying to explain myself. Thank you, ChrisRay! :thumb:

[fivefeet8]

No.... They are called "Forceware" because nVidia is "forcing" us to use crappy drivers. :) If you don't believe me check out all the benchmarks with these drivers. Even the 9700 Pro with 3.8 catalyst are faster then the FX5950 with the forceware drivers. :) :) :)

Why is this thread about Forceware drivers becoming an Ati vs Nvidia Thread? Dx9/PS2.0 performance have always been upped by Ati cards. New drivers isn't going to change that. Now when you look at OGL, dx8 games, the picture is more or less even. Plus if you looked at the performance increase from previous detonators(40.xx) to the Forceware 50.xx's, the performance gap in dx9/ps2 just got a little smaller. You say these drivers are crappy, yet you aren't using an FX card yourself. Your comparing these drivers dx9/ps20 performance to your R9800 dx9/ps2 performance which isn't what this thread was about from the beginning. If your going to make Fanboyish talk, do it in the right forum. There is a thread for that you know.

I've been at hardware message boards where any thread about Nvidia becomes and Ati vs Nvidia war. I don't want to see that happen here.

FYI skyhacke:

I moved your HL2 benchmarks to the appropriate thread because I do respect your opinion even though they were blatently placed in the wrong place. But if you continue with these types of blatent attempts to start Ati vs Nvidia topics in inappropriate threads, that respect will dwindle to nothing.

[SkyeHack]

Why is this thread about Forceware drivers becoming an Ati vs Nvidia Thread? Dx9/PS2.0 performance have always been upped by Ati cards. New drivers isn't going to change that. Now when you look at OGL, dx8 games, the picture is more or less even. Plus if you looked at the performance increase from previous detonators(40.xx) to the Forceware 50.xx's, the performance gap in dx9/ps2 just got a little smaller. You say these drivers are crappy, yet you aren't using an FX card yourself. Your comparing these drivers dx9/ps20 performance to your R9800 dx9/ps2 performance which isn't what this thread was about from the beginning. If your going to make Fanboyish talk, do it in the right forum. There is a thread for that you know.

I've been at hardware message boards where any thread about Nvidia becomes and Ati vs Nvidia war. I don't want to see that happen here.

FYI skyhacke:

I moved your HL2 benchmarks to the appropriate thread because I do respect your opinion even though they were blatently placed in the wrong place. But if you continue with these types of blatent attempts to start Ati vs Nvidia topics in inappropriate threads, that respect will dwindle to nothing.


Yes, I was using a FX card for your information. My classmate bought a 5900 Ultra for a computer that hasn't been completely built yet and he was testing it on my computer to see all his componets were working correctly. I was comparing these drivers with the FX 5900 Ultra on my computer with the old detonators and the new forceware drivers and my friend and I reached a conclusion that these drivers were "crappy". But I didn't mention that, did I? So I guess my talk will be acceptable in this thread for it is in the right forum. :D

I guess you didn't see my apology with making passionate blatent ATI comments. I'll try not to be so blatent next time but if you feel it is fair to stop respecting me, like ChrisRay has, then go ahead and be my guest. I mean its your choice, I can't force you to like me. Oh btw, thanks for my 2 thousandth post! I will cherish this moment forever! :onthepull

[fivefeet8]

Yes, I was using a FX card for your information. My classmate bought a 5900 Ultra for a computer that hasn't been completely built yet and he was testing it on my computer to see all his componets were working correctly. I was comparing these drivers with the FX 5900 Ultra on my computer with the old detonators and the new forceware drivers and my friend and I reached a conclusion that these drivers were "crappy". But I didn't mention that, did I? So I guess my talk will be acceptable in this thread for it is in the right forum. :D

You didnt' mention it and you said they suck because they are still losing performance to the Radeons in dx9/ps2 benches. You then continue with that and say Fx cards sucks in dx9/ps2 a few posts later. Which btw, we've all heard from you and other people at one point or another before in the ATi vs Nvidia thread and clearly not what this thread was suppose to be about.

Why don't you compare the dx9/ps2 performance from the dets 45.23 to the forceware 50.xx? Why don't you compare AF per application/ control panel from detonator driver to forceware driver? Why don't you load up DM-icetomb and Dm-Rustatorium in Ut2k3 with dets 45.23 and Forceware 52.16? Compare the OGL 1.5 compliance between dets 45.23 and forceware 52.16? Why don't you give examples of why they suck besides comparing them with Radeons in dx9/ps2 benches? And since this is an emulation message board, why don't you try running very High X and very high Y in petes OGL2 gpu plugin with the 45.23's? :D


I guess you didn't see my apology with making passionate blatent ATI comments.

Saying your sorry is one thing. Learning from your mistakes so you don't have to appologize is another. If you really want to argue the validity of your arguments about dx9/ps2 benchmarks, Ati Vs Nvidia, then read my posts in the Ati vs Nvidia thread. I've pretty much said how I feel about the whole deal there. You can keep spewing the same rhetoric over and over to your hearts content in that thread.

[GSDragoon]

Anyone that says the Forceware drivers suck compared to the 45.23's doesn't know what they are talking about. Unless they play one of the few games that have buggs with them.

[Quark]

Sweet, I got called a fanboy by a fanboy! Just to clean things up:
1)I did not say "ATI Suxxors!!!" I said, given personal experiences I would stick to Nvidia. This is given that they have similar performance. Why? Excluding Pete's OGL2 plugin, I've never had a problem with Nvidia cards/drivers. I have had tons with ATI.

You flat out stated "ATI is better than Nvidia," and I showed plenty of evidence to the contrary. Either way, perhaps these games are used as benchmarks for the reason that they are the most demanding on the GPU and/or widely used/played? In a similar viewpoint, I could despise ATI because they fail to get the speed up for popular games.

I also don't care if a cheat gives 5% or 50%. If it reduces image quality, it's wrong. Nvidia has done it; ATI has done it. Both companies have problems (for instance, ATI's new drivers messing with peoples hardware). Did anyone else notice that the latest Catalysts try to push up the hardware specs? It's doing a good job of overheating people's cards if they had it set to overclock. Weren't the specifications choosen for a reason? Why would you change that, risking hardware, in order to up your benchmark speed?

I'm not saying Nvidia's clear of blame in anything. If I was, then I would be a fanboy. I'm saying your precious ATI isn't all that.

[Shadow_Cast]

Does anyone else get hiccups in stepmania? I also found that some games started locking up (well only stick soldiers and a couple freeware OGL games that worked fine before) when I found that it was antialiasing and anistropic filtering crashing them.

[sxamiga]

I must say that I agree with what Quark said in his post. ATI and Nvidia are both guilty of certain things and both their top cards do some things that the other card can't. But it all really boils down to which you prefer, ATI or Nvidia. If you like ATI, then buy a 9600/XT, 9700 pro, or a 9800 pro/XT and if you like Nvidia then buy a 5700 Ultra (when it comes out), 5900 Ultra, or the new 5950 Ultra. It does not matter as long as YOU are happy w/it and it performs how you would like it to.
As for the technical stuff that you ChrisRay and you SkyeHack were talking about, well I would suggest that you go over to guru3d.com and read their review of the 5950 Ultra and the 5700 Ultra, all 23 pages of it. I did last night. Every single page. Also I would suggest that you take note of the comparison to the top ATI cards and other older ATI and Nvidia cards. If you do, you will find that the 5950 Ultra IS the top card right now. It beats the 9800 pro in most benchmarks and it also tops the 5900 Ultra (but not by very much) in most benchmarks. The 5700 pretty much blows away the 9600 (the card it is ment to compete with) and even approaches the 9700 pro in performance. They even talk about the new 52.16 drivers and Nvidia's card's short comings as compared to ATI's cards. But the bottom line is still this, no matter what you may say, no matter what you may think, right now Nvida has the top card out.
The other things is, if you own a 5900 Ultra (like fivefeet8 and I do) and you are thinking about the 5950 Ultra, don't. The 5950 Ultra is not that much better a card than the 5900 Ultra and the 5900 Ultra can be safely overclocked to match its speed.
sincerely,
sx/amiga

[Demigod]

Sweet, I got called a fanboy by a fanboy! Just to clean things up:
1)I did not say "ATI Suxxors!!!" I said, given personal experiences I would stick to Nvidia. This is given that they have similar performance. Why? Excluding Pete's OGL2 plugin, I've never had a problem with Nvidia cards/drivers. I have had tons with ATI.Fair enough. I've never had problems with my previous Nvidia cards as well, although I can say the same for my ATI cards.

You flat out stated "ATI is better than Nvidia," and I showed plenty of evidence to the contrary. Either way, perhaps these games are used as benchmarks for the reason that they are the most demanding on the GPU and/or widely used/played? In a similar viewpoint, I could despise ATI because they fail to get the speed up for popular games.Showing benchmarks where Nvidia wins is not evidence that they are superior. I could link to some HL2 or TR benchmarks and say the same thing. And of course they use those games because they're most demanding, but you missed the point. I mean Nvidia optimized for the benchmarks within the games. A lot of games like UT 2003 have specific benchmarks (flyby, botmatch) where the camera moves in a fixed set of directions. It's very easy to optimize for these and get a really good score, provided reviewers use them. I mean I actually believe those scores of the FX 5900 when I first saw them. Man was I ever deceived (honestly, I didn't expect it).

I also don't care if a cheat gives 5% or 50%. If it reduces image quality, it's wrong. Nvidia has done it; ATI has done it. Both companies have problems (for instance, ATI's new drivers messing with peoples hardware). Did anyone else notice that the latest Catalysts try to push up the hardware specs? It's doing a good job of overheating people's cards if they had it set to overclock. Weren't the specifications choosen for a reason? Why would you change that, risking hardware, in order to up your benchmark speed?Uhh, ATI's optimizations didn't sacrifice image quality (please don't make assumptions). They only noticed it because they recorded the numbers. And I believe the feature you're talking about is called OverDrive and only works for the XT line of cards. If you're not then I don't know what you're talking about. I've used the 3.8 drivers for quite a while now and haven't noticed anything about them. They do not mess with my hardware in any way and my GPU works as fine as ever. The 3.8 drivers even have the VPU Recover feature to safely recover from VPU failures. So, um, what were you saying about ATI risking stability again?

Oh and I'm not so sure what you mean by "It's doing a good job of overheating people's cards if they had it set to overclock." If you're saying that people who overclock their cards are having problems with the drivers then I say that it's their own damn fault. ATI is not to blame for people who do stupid things.

[Shadow_Cast]

Guys, we have a thread for this kind of conversation. (http://www.ngemu.com/forums/showthread.php?t=41426&highlight=ati)

[ChrisRay]

Uhh, ATI's optimizations didn't sacrifice image quality (please don't make assumptions). They only noticed it because they recorded the numbers

Actually ATI's 3dmark01, Optimisations do sacrifice Shader Quality, Same with its newest Anistropic Filtering changes (pre 3.2 compared to post 3.2)

[Quark]

Showing benchmarks where Nvidia wins is not evidence that they are superior. I could link to some HL2 or TR benchmarks and say the same thing. And of course they use those games because they're most demanding, but you missed the point. I mean Nvidia optimized for the benchmarks within the games. A lot of games like UT 2003 have specific benchmarks (flyby, botmatch) where the camera moves in a fixed set of directions. It's very easy to optimize for these and get a really good score, provided reviewers use them. I mean I actually believe those scores of the FX 5900 when I first saw them. Man was I ever deceived (honestly, I didn't expect it.)
ATI is winning some battles, Nvidia is winning others. This is universal on every website I've visited. Therefore, ATI is not the winner. It's that simple, nothing more nothing less.

Uhh, ATI's optimizations didn't sacrifice image quality (please don't make assumptions).
Perhaps you should check up on the quack story? Or the latest here (http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031023/nvidia-nv38-nv36-19.html#questionable_optimizations_in_atis_drivers ) I'm sure I see the words "image quality" written there. And yes, this was linked above.

I've used the 3.8 drivers for quite a while now and haven't noticed anything about them. They do not mess with my hardware in any way and my GPU works as fine as ever. The 3.8 drivers even have the VPU Recover feature to safely recover from VPU failures. So, um, what were you saying about ATI risking stability again? Oh and I'm not so sure what you mean by "It's doing a good job of overheating people's cards if they had it set to overclock." If you're saying that people who overclock their cards are having problems with the drivers then I say that it's their own damn fault. ATI is not to blame for people who do stupid things.

My friend has one of the new Radeons. He's got significant cooling in his system, and overclocked his video card. When he upgraded to Catalyst 3.8, his temperatures spiked without him changing anything. This isn't just him, it's been mentioned all over the internet. Thus, he now has a great cooling system that can only handle the standard video card speed because ATI has changed the workload on the cards. Card specifications are determined based off stability - there are good reasons centered on stability that a card can be overclocked and still be functional. Yet ATI has used it's latest drivers to destabalize their video cards in the attempt to get a few more frames per second. That's throwing out all the reasons you've set those specifications to begin with. How can you be gauranteed stability when ATI decides to overwork their cards?

Also, Gamer's Depot (http://www.gamersdepot.com/ed/cat38/001.htm) has a new editorial about the Catalyst 3.8 drivers. Again, all I'm saying is that ATI is not heaven's little angel. So people should stop treating them as such.

[ChrisRay]

Perhaps you should check up on the quack story? Or the latest here I'm sure I see the words "image quality" written there. And yes, this was linked above.


The Unreal Tournament issue requires the Ini File editing.

Rendering issues in Halo are problems on both cards for different situations

I have some bad news for you buddy, The Rendering issues with Aquamark are simply gamma problems. If you look at the images I'm about to provide you, You Will see that ATI is rendering the correct image.

Leave it to Toms Hardware to write an article with such a blatant error in it, Just by looking at this picture, All it takes is adjusting the Gamma a bit to fix the rendering issue on the ATI card, Which is rendering it at a lower gamma, Which would not produce higher frame rates.

Of Course tom :eyeroll: Said there were no gamma issues. Which is no surprise since I doubt Lars actually did any testing.


ATI is winning some battles, Nvidia is winning others. This is universal on every website I've visited. Therefore, ATI is not the winner. It's that simple, nothing more nothing less


This is the way I see it, And it's an unfortunate reality, I like the FX line, It has a lot of unique features, But the problem here is.

The spots were the Geforce FX wins its, usually by small margins (except Quake 3 which is an archaic engine anyway) Where the Radeons win, The Radeons win by a great deal. Paticularly in shader intensive aplications.

Nvidia made a huge mistake by only putting in 4 FP units that share there computational power with texel addressers, The damage has been done however.

The areas where Nvidia does win, Paticularly in Anti Aliasing situations, Can be pretty much taken for what its worth, Nvidias 4x Anti Aliasing "isnt" anywhere near ATI's 4x AA, Nvidias 4xS Anti Aliasing is a good comparison to ATIS 4x AA, But then Nvidia takes a performance hit behind ATI,

Understanding that the FX is winning is one thing, But it is doing so with less quality, So it kind of makes the win here nor there. That being said. I am still buying an FX 5900 in the next few days, I want the card, I am curiious about the architecture, And I wish to experiment with it some more.

[Gamer1]

Perhaps you should check up on the quack story? Or the latest here (http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031023/nvidia-nv38-nv36-19.html#questionable_optimizations_in_atis_drivers ) I'm sure I see the words "image quality" written there. And yes, this was linked above.

http://www.elitebastards.com/page.php?pageid=2416&head=1&comments=1

maybe you should look at that... Tom's hardware... yea... leave it to them to find out the "truth"... *cough athlon 2800+, *cough p4 extreme edition

*i wonder if ati's paycheck to tom's didn't come this month, or maybe some payoffs aren't happening...

[GSDragoon]

This is about the forceware drivers.

Keep the discussions here, http://www.ngemu.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=41426

[sxamiga]

Okay enough now. This is turning into another ATI vs. Nvidia thread and we already have one of those. It has been made a sticky in fact. Please take this kind of discussion there. I'm closing this thread now as we just don't need more of this kind of thing.
sincerely,
sx/amiga