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Ritteri&Bubbles
11-03-01, 01:42 PM
Hi folks!Women,children, and........................Canadians! After the odd debacle a few threads back that got closed, I got a few ideas,(one which will SHOCK quite a few of you Im sure)and checked out some things,made some phone calls etc.

Anyhoo, I do carry the ATI RETAIL 8500 card(the one with the cool skull with fangs)and decided to pull out my trusty Ti500 and run this card for the next month. I have found some things out that kinda shocked me.

1st off, this card is factory default at 250/250, somebody else made a claim about ATI "screwing them over" because of the clock settings. But ALL the cards I have been using for me, or display are all at 250/250, so is Mr. M. actually not getting screwed over, or are we all getting screwed over?? Any thoughts??? I use Powerstrip for my card readings, any other good utility to use to check chip settings??? Send me a link so I can verify my findings please. Also, after a few phone calls made, powermagic does NOT make the video cards. ATI actually makes them, all powermagic does is slap a sticker on the chip fan(and you can see the ATI sticker below it too)so I wouldnt consider them an "OEM" card technically, but then again, Im not so sure either.
2nd. I like the hydravsion, have it running both my Viewsonic PS790 19" monitor and Viewsonic VG171 17" LCD flat panel with DVI input. There is defiently some fun potential here! Also, although the fps count is lower on many games, when they do run right, the video quality is exceptional. Especially on the LCD panel. Desktop, I notice no real difference when both cards are tweaked to potential, but we will see over the next few weeks, lets see if ATI keeps their drivers every 3 weeks promise. They should be a new set due out in a week.
3rd. Chip data utilities, anybody know of good ones to find running spec of chips in use let me know. I already have powerstrip, there must be others...........
4th. Is the DAC supposed to be at 400mhz or at 350mhz??? I thought ATI advertised 400 DAC?? All the cards I have are at 350mhz. So this makes 2 potential advertized claims fall short(DAC and mem/core).Again help me out here.

foxmulder
11-03-01, 04:22 PM
After having read several of you earlier remarks I was ready to add you to my ignore list. I'm glad I didn't as you seem to have changed your attitude toward the members of this forum. Great move.
I'm sure someone with your recources and experience can be a valuable contribution to our comunity. I think your approach to try out the Radeons is a good one and I will be interested to hear about your experiences. I am very interested in both the GF ti and the Radeon cards. We all know the numbers so let us know your honest subjective opinion. If ATI manages to impress you with their card then it must really rock. If not, well at least you can't be blamed for not trying it.

I've heard a lot about games crashing. Could you tell me what games specifically and what OS you're using?

About ther clock speeds: If it turn out to be true that the clock is at 250 instead of 275 that would be a rippoff:mad:

I don't use an ATI card (yet) but if I come across any programs that might be usefull I'll let you know

funnyperson1
11-03-01, 04:27 PM
try radeon tweaker, probly more accurate as itsz designed for ATI.....

Ritteri&Bubbles
11-03-01, 06:27 PM
Just to let people know, I really havent changed my tune, or atitude,Im sarcastic by nature,and people shouldnt take me serious either regardless of how many Canadian jokes I make! Just retaliate with American jokes, I can sure think of hundreds myself! I never really questioned the hardware of the Radeon card. What I question(still) is the software driver support, and ATI's front office(or lack of).
Also, my witty sarcasm is my own trademark, which I think some people take seriously. Dont. I play no favorites, its just how I am. I have been redoing one of my home grown project machines and decided to switch out cards and see if I personally can learn more about this card in depth and maybe find out if I can stabalize it on my own personal command rig!:D :cool: And besides, I do like Hydravision! If you got 2 monitors(or an extra lying around) you too can pretend to be Bill Gates!:D

Anyway, ill plug in the ATI utility and see what it shows me. But Im getting the impression that ATI is knocking down original specs(maybe due to the stability issue?)a bit. Ill get back to you on this. As for tonight, Im going to try and run a full blown game of NFSPU knockout without a crash.If you check out my system specs(drooling??)below, you can see my rig is the best of both worlds(super stability based off of a KG7 mb and ECC Registered RAM)having both rock solid stability and is also an overclockers dream(4 HD's in RAID 0,XP Athlon,Redundant cooling system,HUGE PS etc)!!!! THis is goal #1. Goal 2 will be 2 hours worth of Starcraft Broodwar(should be easy!), and goal 3 will be to run Original Unreal all maxed out in highest res without a crash. Its gonna be a rough night, but somebodies gotta do it!:D Ill post back this evening on how stuff went.

foxmulder
11-04-01, 11:22 AM
You poor man. I feel so sorry for you. I would just hat e to "have" to play games all night:)

Keep us posted

Ritteri&Bubbles
11-04-01, 01:04 PM
Well, SC went without a hitch(kind of expected)lastnight, and so did Unreal actually. And it looked great too! NFSPU though was another story. Artifacts all over the screen along with some system lockups...........no patches avaialbe from the game itself, and the Ti500 runs it perfectly. So I am looking for suggestions with this. I consider racing games to be the true ACID test of a video card. And this being on of my favorite games too.

BTW is motor city online any good??? Or how about ALiens VS. Predator which just hit our store. I have yet to try em and dont want to load up a game on our demo machines if they arent any good. Let me know on this.

]-[itman
11-04-01, 01:16 PM
AVP2 is an AWESOME game especially at a LAN party! If you do use this game it's a little bloody and make sure you pick one of the brighter levels as some can be pretty dark and hard to see. Single player is fun too.

Zuck Gou :)
11-04-01, 02:09 PM
AVP2 is really awesome. I suggest being Predator and going through his different visions. It'll look so good on an 8500/Ti500.

Default
11-04-01, 03:01 PM
i hope i still have my 275/275 clock rate when i get my card back:eek:

Zuck Gou :)
11-04-01, 03:03 PM
Originally posted by Default
i hope i still have my 275/275 clock rate when i get my card back:eek:

Your RMA worked?

Default
11-05-01, 07:35 PM
yep:D :D :D :D :cool:

chillipants
11-05-01, 08:03 PM
kool :)

OnDborder
11-05-01, 09:44 PM
I just installed a R8500 in today, from CompUSA, and have 274.5(275) on both engine and memory. So I assume mine is 275 by default.

Yodums
11-05-01, 09:58 PM
Originally posted by OnDborder
I just installed a R8500 in today, from CompUSA, and have 274.5(275) on both engine and memory. So I assume mine is 275 by default.

Cool deal!

Ritteri&Bubbles
11-05-01, 10:19 PM
what program showed you that you were running at 275/275???

OnDborder
11-06-01, 10:50 AM
PowerStrip 3.01 build 196
Right click icon in task bar>Performance profiles>configure>engine clock