Why can I never remember how much HATRED I have for all ATI video cards?
It didn't used to be this way, but they are junk every time I deal with them anymore. Sure maybe they make some good GPUs but when the driver support is so incredibly, unfathomably, pathetic, I wonder why I keep having hope.
The latest cause of my rage is I went to download a driver, after having installed the card, and the "service is unavailable". Even when it is for the last few years I have had little good experience. Is there any hope of improvement?
With nVidia, I never have issue one, always superior in every way except perhaps in the actual chips and technology (that goes back and forth according to some "experts"), but if they can't write drivers that just work, what good is a bunch of pricey hokey *** hardware anyway?
Thank God I remembered what brand the card was (Sapphire), and model specifics without having to rip it out. Now I guess I have to cross my fingers! Thank you Sapphire for supporting your cards like ATI will not support their GPUs!
Mostly it is my fault for not checking first and for having so much **** plugged into my super-machine and setting it up before I had the drivers, but still shame on you ATI!!!
I prefer ATI. I believe their video cards have a richer color palat, but I also do not like their drivers. I usually will only use the drivers that ship with the card. nVidia drivers are much easier to deal with and to update. Only had ocasional problems with updated nVidia drivers not being able to play my Blu Ray movies, so I had to go back to the previous drivers. The ATI updates did not even want to load!.
I see that I will have to update my system information if I am going to post regularly again!
Current Main Rig:
AMD FX55 @ 2.9 GHz
2 GB PC 3200 DDR RAM
ABIT KN8 SLi motherboard
ATI X1900XT O/C to XTX speeds
I think it's more a matter of choice and experience. I myself have owned numerous Nvidia and ATi cards in the past years and can only remember having one or two issues with both brands usually caused by operator error. A buddy of mine feels like you do, he has had nothing but bad luck, and experiences, with ATi cards though he had to admit that he thought the Ati cards looked better graphic-wise. Still I've known people who will only buy ATi or only buy Nvidia so again it's a matter or experience.
I'll buy anything that works, but it started with a TV Wonder 650 PCI that was made for XP only even though it was sold long after the emergence of Vista. I would keep looking on their site and they kept promising drivers but they never delivered. At some point with enough screwing around I was able to get the card working in Vista, but by that time I was using 7 and again the card became junk. I don't know if they ever delivered on the promised drivers because I gave up. Ever since then though it is a constant problem with drivers; it's always the antithesis of the constantly updated, perfectly smooth driver experience that is nVidia. I'd be happy to go back to ATI (I used to have a 9700 Pro I loved for a long time), but until they can get their software quality to match their hardware quality....
I just don't see buying one unless I get a hell of a deal and there is no way in hell I could ever recommend an ATI card to a novice level user (a customer) because my experience is that it all too often gets them back to me with driver trouble and gets me billable hours which is not good when you strive to be the best, most honest and economical tech in town!
ati driver issue is also driving me toward nvidia, especially now that i am using ubuntu in more of my systems. i guess ati don't worry too much about the niche market that is linux.
Reply With Quote
.
Bookmarks