Lets say i wanna play counter strike at 800x600 with 2x fsaa and truform(does this even work on cs?) and play a dvix video on my tv at the same time..would this work?...what are the limits of the tv -out and hydra vision?...is it worth spending around 130-150 for a retail 8500 to upgrade my geforce 2pro?
i really do like the idea of playing movies on my tv while doing other stuff.
Can you really watch a movie while playing CS? You must be dead a lot...lol! It's a good question though...that would be really cool if you could. Anyway...this is going to sound really stupid...but I suggest you take a look at MOHAA if you like CS. MOHAA has an awesome MP mode that is just as fun as CS (I know it's hard to believe until you try it).
You can't have video overlay in your secondary display, which might cause a problem. I think Matrox cards can do video overlay through either screen, but haven't seen any other consumer-level cards capable of this. I'm not sure if 3D acceleration has to be in the primary display as well. If not, then yeah, that'd work... Counterstrike isn't exactly the most demanding game out there (but running w/2xFSAA might be pushing it slightly). I wish I was still using two displays then I could test it out for you!!! (the other one had to go back to a mate last week). I'm talking about using two monitors though, not a monitor and a TV, so maybe it's perfectly possible to do what you are saying. Wouldn't suprise me; Hydravision is an awesome feature.
IMO, Wolfenstein has better MP than MOHAA, although Medal of Honour is definitely the best single player game you can buy at the moment. Looks gorgeous on the 8500 too!
Oh yeah, here's a piccy I took of Truform in Half-Life. This was almost at the lowest level, so you can see how effective it is. Performance hit (in this, albeit a very old game!) was almost negligeable at this level.
If you can get an 8500LE for 130-150 then you will see a huge leap from your GF2, especially if you make use of the mulitple monitor feature and play a lot of videos/DVDs. That's far enough below the price of the GF4Ti's to make it a more attractive option, especially with the scope to voltage mod and overclock up to 300/600MHz+.
yea i was kinda worried about the overlay problems..i know i couldn't when i had a secondry pci card...i was hoping that the card might be able to support it.....so if the secondary display doens't have overlay doesn't that pose a problem for playing any kinda movies on it? because don't most software dvd and media players use overlay?
oh and it it worth it to get a retail over the oem? it is a difference of 140-160. i might even be able to get a 50 mir on the retail bringing it to 110 but i am not sure.
i am assuming that truform works in counterstrike in addition to half life. i might have to try the full version of wolf sometime too(the mp demo didn't entertain me that much).
Mutha: 8500 Le for 130-150? You can get a full blown 8500 64MB DDR for $150. OH yea I'm sorry I forgot... You live in that other American state across the Atlantic
Just kidding around with ya. But yea the 8500's are getting dirt cheap.
-unfrgivn
If god hadn't intended for us to eat animals then why'd he make them out of meat?
Originally posted by unfrgivn: Mutha: 8500 Le for 130-150? You can get a full blown 8500 64MB DDR for $150. OH yea I'm sorry I forgot... You live in that other American state across the Atlantic
Just kidding around with ya. But yea the 8500's are getting dirt cheap.
-unfrgivn
Ah well... I got mine more or less upon release, costing $200 US.
Just nailed 10,000 in 3DMark2001. Can't complain, can't complain...
MuFu.
EDIT: just had a quick look around; 8500LE's are now more expenisve than they were when I got mine! (AND I was lucky enough to bag an early ATI sample w/3.6ns memory through a third party, yeah!!!). The ATI-branded LE's are going for about £160-190. Is this because of memory prices, do you think? Hercules seems to have a nice version out for £140. Still, I think "Suckered" is the word when it comes to us poor folk in the UK.
Originally posted by dfgsd: yea i was kinda worried about the overlay problems..i know i couldn't when i had a secondry pci card...i was hoping that the card might be able to support it.....so if the secondary display doens't have overlay doesn't that pose a problem for playing any kinda movies on it? because don't most software dvd and media players use overlay?
oh and it it worth it to get a retail over the oem? it is a difference of 140-160. i might even be able to get a 50 mir on the retail bringing it to 110 but i am not sure.
i am assuming that truform works in counterstrike in addition to half life. i might have to try the full version of wolf sometime too(the mp demo didn't entertain me that much).
Yep, nearly all video is displayed through an overlay; even streaming formats are overlayed. I don't fully understand how this works and why it is not often possible on a second display.
Counterstrike is Truformed, although there can sometimes be some weird glitches that turn guns into sausages.
As for whether it is worth getting the retail over the OEM, I am not sure too sure. Personally I would get an LE and hope that it has 3.6ns memory. That way it can be easily modified up to full retail speeds and beyond. Most of the early 8500LE's were just retail boards that had a couple of different resistor values, but now they're coming with 4ns memory and lower quality cores. If you get a retail card, you are guaranteed the faster memory and will more than likely be able to overclock to 300/600MHz. If you can get one for $110 then that's an amazing deal; buy one for me too, I can sell it for twice that over here!
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