Radeon 8500 or GF3?

[The Coolest]

I'm planing on buying a new vid card, it could be that I won't but any way. I'm thinking to go ATI again, but how do u feel and what would u suggest?

[el]

well dell has teh 8500 for 203 and g3 Ti can be found for about 150 so it is your call. I think the 8500 is a great card but still has a few driver issues.

[Cisco Kid]

El,

If you are gonna give prices compare 2 cards that are equal

8500 compares with Ti500
8500 is the cheaper and better route and stomps the ti200


ti200 compares to say a 7500 radeon (price wise) or Ultra and beats it 7500 and competes to G3 , its the best deal

overclock the 7500 and they are good I am gonna hit 330/540 once my Crystal Orb goes on... sweettt

best bang for buck right now would be 8500 flat out

cisco kid:cool:

[Yodums]

For the bang of the buck would be the Radeon 8500.

Its like 100 dollars cheaper than the GeForce 3 and GeForce 3 surpasses it by 10fps.

Perhaps in the future ATI will get better drivers and it will out preform nVidia cards.

But another good card is also the Ti200 it can overclock to GF3 speed and faster than the GeForce 2 Ultra.

[funnyperson1]

if you are spending more than 200$, the 8500 is definately more bang for buck, for under 200$ the Ti200 is hard to beat....

[Silversinksam]

I just ordered a Radeon 8500 and I'll have it in a couple days......stay tuned


If it sucks or the drivers **** me off, it will be on sale in the F/S section lol

[-Exi|e-]

If you dont wanna spend to much money on a card, go for the GeForce 3 Ti 200, i got mine up to 240/500 which is Ti500 speeds, might not be as fast but still a great overclocker. If money is no issue then go for the 8500 or the Ti500. Although i read some reviews saying that ATI still had some bugs to work out with Smoothvision (blurry menu screens and such) nothing major but still annyoing. I had a Radeon 64DDR before and was really satified with it, i needed an upgrade and didnt want to spend 530$ canadian on a GeForce 3 Ti 500 or 449$ for a Radeon 8500, so for 329$ the Ti200 was a good choice i think.

[The Coolest]

Performance wise ONLY, what do u think?
w/o driver consideration

[funnyperson1]

At this point id say that they are about the same in performance, with Ati winning because the 8500 has more features (dual monitor/dvi among other things), and its cheaper, and i believe that with the next driver release(sorry had to say something about drivers:)) the 8500 will be on top in performance....

[donny_paycheck]

You mean default performance levels? GF3 is faster then, but I dunno how high you can oc 'em. Also, a lot of GF3 cards have a DVI built in. Mine does but I will never use it as they are too expensive as far as I know. No dual monitor support that I know of. That's a cool thing I'd like to try sometime if I had an ati.

[donny_paycheck]

*edit*:
Go here (http://www4.tomshardware.com/graphic/01q4/011107/index.html) for tom's hardware review of the GF3, Tis and Radeons all put against each other.

[Cisco Kid]

Originally posted by -Exi|e-
If you dont wanna spend to much money on a card, go for the GeForce 3 Ti 200, i got mine up to 240/500 which is Ti500 speeds, might not be as fast but still a great overclocker. If money is no issue then go for the 8500 or the Ti500. Although i read some reviews saying that ATI still had some bugs to work out with Smoothvision (blurry menu screens and such) nothing major but still annyoing. I had a Radeon 64DDR before and was really satified with it, i needed an upgrade and didnt want to spend 530$ canadian on a GeForce 3 Ti 500 or 449$ for a Radeon 8500, so for 329$ the Ti200 was a good choice i think.


$329 Canadian for a Ti200 is too much imho. I bought a 7500 for $199 Canadian on sale, stock cooling the card runs 300/500 over default which is 290/460 I am at 310/500 solid as a rock, and I have gone to 320/520 with no mods to the card. I have just added ramsinks with ASII and am adding a Crystal Orb I just got with some ASII on the gpu.

I am 99% poositive the card will do 335/540 , I would love to compare the 2 cards if you can post a link to your 3DMark2K1 scores. I am sure you will beat me in 3DMark2K1 but for $130 cheaper I think the 7500 is a damn good deal right now in Canada/

At Futureshop.ca and London Drugs in BC for $199 Canadian, plus a bonus 250 airmiles for those who collect to your aeroplan account , can not beat the deal.

Cisco Kid :D

[Default]

i'll download 3dmark 2001 again and show you the big smack down the radeon 8500 lays on the geforce3 Ti500. I'll also have the card clocked at default then 300/300 and finaly 306/306:D. all tests will be run on an athlon 1.4 @ 1.6 (10*160) DDR.

[Ritteri&Bubbles]

After using BOTH a PNY GeForce 3 Ti500 and a Retail Radeon 8500 here is what I have concluded:

1. Radeon is a great benchmarker.
2. Radeon dual monitor support is very buggy and doesnt work very well.
3. Radeon does not interact well with some DVI LCD panels
4. Radeon and WIndows XP dont work well together yet.
5. Many issues running games(ie still crashes)and many features(like smoothvision)arent worth enabling as fps takes a huge hit.
6. Radeon has really good text(ie 2d)
7. ATI dvd player doesnt work well either in XP
8. Radeon is priced cheaper and should be too as its still not a finished product and just like other ATI products may never be finished
9. Radeon needs much better drivers.
10. Radeon isnt very good at DX7


1. GeForce 3 doesnt bench as well.(though its easier to finish a benchmark test)
2. GeForce 3 does not have dual monitor support(but does have Svideo and DVI outputs)
3. GF3 works perfectly with ALL monitors(sets correct resolution)
4. GF3 works great with ANY operating system
5. No real issues running ANY games
6. GF3 also has very good text,2d,DVD
7. DVD player works flawlessly
8. GF3 more expensive, but price can be justified(product actually works as its supposed to)as its an overall solid performer
9. Always new drivers being released improving performance
10. Runs DX7 games great!(most games are DX7 still)
11. Doesnt put features on chipset that will kill performance making features essentially worthless(Like smoothvision and trueform which need alot more RAM to run well)

Personally after running my Radeon for over a month, I have found it to be a big hassle...STILL, and I gave this card a chance too. I sell BOTH products and will give the NOD to the GF3 series regardless of the price difference over the inferior 8500.

In truth being, this card will never be a GF3 killer. Spec wise from a hardware point of view it probably can theoretically be about 5 percent faster than a GF3 if they ever get drivers up to snuff, but this is theoretical and a 5 percent difference between both cards would be unoticeable to us while playing any game or running any program, and the fact that Nvidia constantly puts out new drivers, many of which continue to squeeze out more performance from this card puts ATI in a situation where I dont think they will ever beat a GF3 ever. And in reality its actually about Even to 50 percent slower than a GF3 card depending on the game or benchmark and this is VERY noticeable. Smoothvision has proven to be garbage in my opinion, especially how it takes some pretty big fps hits when enabled. This card IMO should be priced at about $200 for a RETAIL version at best. As I think this card is still overpriced even though it is cheaper than a GF3 product. If your looking for bench scores, get this card. But if your looking for a superior gaming/dvd experience then the 8500 is a lemon. Pay the extra $50-$75 and save yourself headaches. And even if it is 500 points behind the 8500 in 20013Dmark, at least it will be playing your game without and issues and doing it at a much higer fps rate with equally good visual quality. This is the bottom line IMO.

[RangerJoe]

i agree with what Ritteri&Bubbles has said, my friend has the 8500 and is always bitching about how so many of his games crash, and if they work, then his fps is nowhere near what a top competitor should do. my brother has a gf2 ultra and he will beat the 8500 in any games you through out there. and if he has smooth vision enabled, then i can get my voodoo 3 to run at a higher fps....the gf3 is an all around good performer, and depending on what retailer you get, you can have some excellent overclockers

[-Exi|e-]

Originally posted by Cisco Kid



$329 Canadian for a Ti200 is too much imho. I bought a 7500 for $199 Canadian on sale, stock cooling the card runs 300/500 over default which is 290/460 I am at 310/500 solid as a rock, and I have gone to 320/520 with no mods to the card. I have just added ramsinks with ASII and am adding a Crystal Orb I just got with some ASII on the gpu.

I am 99% poositive the card will do 335/540 , I would love to compare the 2 cards if you can post a link to your 3DMark2K1 scores. I am sure you will beat me in 3DMark2K1 but for $130 cheaper I think the 7500 is a damn good deal right now in Canada/

At Futureshop.ca and London Drugs in BC for $199 Canadian, plus a bonus 250 airmiles for those who collect to your aeroplan account , can not beat the deal.

Cisco Kid :D


Isnt the 7500 only Direct x 7 compliant? Benchmark quake3 or somthing and then we will compare, i dont trust those bad reviews (tom and others)

BTW: Default clocks for my card are 175/400, went has high as 250/520

[fiveohhh]

I'llThrow my vote down for gf3 Ti 200's as a bang for buck. I got mine at the BB sale for $100, but you can find 'em for 170 at uite a few places. And the new ones O/c preety good if your into that. But liek I said bang for buck, you can't beat a 3dmk 2001 score of 8400 with a $100 dollar card=)

[mrpcman]

right now, the 8500 is the way to go. it's cheaper than the 500 and it's only a few bucks more than the 200.

[funnyperson1]

the most important thing will be to see how it runs after Ati hopefully puts out new drivers on the 15th, so far theyve been pretty good about realeasing new drivers every couple weeks...

[thestramel]

Originally posted by RangerJoe
i agree with what Ritteri&Bubbles has said, my friend has the 8500 and is always bitching about how so many of his games crash, and if they work, then his fps is nowhere near what a top competitor should do. my brother has a gf2 ultra and he will beat the 8500 in any games you through out there. and if he has smooth vision enabled, then i can get my voodoo 3 to run at a higher fps....the gf3 is an all around good performer, and depending on what retailer you get, you can have some excellent overclockers

Doubtful that the Voodoo3 or gf2ultra beat the 8500 unless you have 4xquality AA enabled (I suppose). I've only experienced problems with an opengl game, CS. Ironically, this game ships with the retail Radeon. I've had no serious problems with any of my Directx7 games.

[Ritteri&Bubbles]

People should read my post more carefully. Why would or should I be biased one way or another? I actually make more money per card selling Ati products.