GeForce4 Hype -- All I can say is *yawn*

[Breadfan]

So whats up with all this Geforce4 hype lately? I was waiting patiently, waiting to see what was coming out in early February. And now, what do I see? A bunch of watered down, rebadged GF3's!!!

I read the GF4MX was going to be the GF3MX, which is the NV17. The NV17 lacks full dx8 support, and is essentially a souped up GF2MX with better memory and a higher clock.

Who cares?

And talk about misleading! You think, "Hey, Geforce 4 , betcha thats better than the GF3!" And you're wrong! Sure, we can tell the difference, but I know alot of people who don't read reviews who might walk into best buy and think that.

So right now we have these cheesy GF4's. I really see no point in buying one. They seem to perform as well or worse than the GF3ti200 anyway...plus, atleast with the ti200 you get dx8 support! Even better, while the GF4mx might be cheaper, it'll surely drive down the ti200 prices...I've now seen a few below $140.

Sure as a budget card, there might be some goodness in the GF4mx. But I don't see any reason to get all excited about another budget card, especially one who's name and number indicate it should be better than those iterations before it.

I have to agree with Ed...the ti4200 looks promising. Ofcourse, that won't be out until March.

Makes me wonder, why did I bother getting excited about early February?

And I'm glad I'll never make the mistake "Well the Geforce3 supports dx8, so any Geforce4 must have full dx8 support!" Ofcourse, I feel sorry for those who will.

Quite honestly, nVidia is annoying me right now. Sure, consolidating a product line isn't such a bad idea. Have one name with various iterations that range from budget to top end.

But this isn't what nVidia has done! nVidia has taken the Geforce4 name and applied it to graphics cards with DIFFERENT GPU's! The difference between a GF4mx and GF4ti isn't just memory or gpu clocks or disabled/enabled features! I personally see something wrong with that.

Just my little rant as I wonder why I was looking foward to seeing some GF4 reviews in early February...

Mike

[Pinky]

I guess this (http://forums.overclockers.ws/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=61124) had you in mind all along... :)

[deathstar13]

the "nads" protest line starts over there ~~~~~~~>

"nads" nvidia - again -disgusts -someone

please see me for your pickit sign!

[Pinky]

Originally posted by deathstar13


please see me for your pickit sign!

I'm "seeing" you :p

[Silver]

Actually I have to agree with you (now that I know the difference). It is morally wrong. It would appear to be a new marketing philosophy but is not what has been done in the past and is truely misleading. It is a gf2 with a faster core and gpu. I understand having a line of cards to fit all however this is not the same line.

[Breadfan]

Originally posted by Pinky
I guess this (http://forums.overclockers.ws/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=61124) had you in mind all along... :)

Yup. Infact, seeing as though I'm sorta in the market for a video card, I've been seriously considering the ATi 8500 All in Wonder.

Decent performance, plus tv tuner and many multimedia functions.

I'm gonig to be moving outta my house in a little while, which means no more using my parnets big tv and dvd player :) Figure I can buy that card now, and regardless of how many systems I own when I move out, I'll have a card capapble of turning my 20" monitor into a nice tv/dvd/vcr combo :)

Quite honestly, getting 200fps vs 150fps isn't gonna make me frag any better at all. Now, if I was running at 14fps and went up to 50fps, that might make a big difference :)

All just a bunch of hype though. The point is, I think video card selection should be done by having meet criteria. Will it play games well? Does it have room for future games? Does it meet any other multimedia needs/desires?

Keeping that in mind makes me seiously consider the Ati 8500 AIW. I'd buy it anyday over a GF3ti500. Ofcourse, thats just my opinion.

Mike

[]-[itman]

Honestly i agree with you. I think that they should have called the GeForce4mx at the most a GeForce3mx. IMO they should have called it what it really is GeForce2 Ultra Ti(;)). However i can't say that nvidia sucks and we should protest them. Yes they use a lot of marketing ploys but who doesn't? They've just been playing the game everyone's played for who knows how long. The biggest example of this i can think of is Bill and his new os WOW!:rolleyes: but i like windowsXP. It's just not the revolution he was talking about. If we do protest nvidia then someone else(ATI) will come in, take over, and do the same thing. As far as marketing goes my #1 pick would be AMD(but this isn't the time or forum to talk about that). As far as their cards go, I like the GF4 Ti series. I think they're great! It's just that there's absolutely no use for them and there probably won't be for a while to come now.

[rogue1979]

Well, I agree alot of this is hype. I still use a Geforce 2 Ti 500. I was considering getting a Geforce 3 Ti 200 cuz they are so cheap. Everbody saying it is twice as fast, wonderful, great and all that crud. I finally got someone with a GF3Ti 200 (overclocked) to run 3DMark 2001 with the three tests disabled that my "lowly" GF2 can't run (rip off). The results were a whopping 13% difference and his cpu was slightly faster. All my games that I play in the resolutions I like are running smoothly with good framerates, can't see where 13% speed is gonna help me. I just wonder what some people base there opinions on when they tell me at 1024 x 768 x 32 the GF3 is twice as fast as a GF2. Are they just trying to justify the extra money spent? The way I look at it is if I were to shell out $400+ for a video card, it better be 3 times better than a $130 one. We all know if you wait 6 mos you can get that $400 video card for $150 anyway, that seems the smart time to buy.

[Ritteri&Bubbles]

I also think everybody should be basing their opinions on Nvidia's new bread n butter product, The Ti line of GeForce4 cards, these are clearly the performance cards, any fool could tell anybody that Nvidia's MX lineup has always been a budget value minded product, not a performance product, and price shows that especially, Basically Nvidia is just trying to unify their lineup, just like ANY other manufacturer does. The new MX linup does have quite a few features that will still appeal to many folks the the GF2 doesnt have, most notably the DVD hardware decoding. So dont wave the red flags yet. People here who start bitchin about the MX lineup are rediculous in their claims, they are enthusiasts to begin with and should be looking at the Ti lineup. Our Ti4600 rocks the boat here and we are 100 percent impressed with it. Ti4400 and 4200 will have great potential too, these are the cards people in this forum should be looking into anyway. Remember the performance enthusiast is a small part of their total market place. For every Ti4600 they will sell, they will sell 1000 units of a GF4 MX series card to an OEM distributor or manufacturer. Nvidia did what any smart business would do, and their market share proves it.

[customrig]

128mb of DDR with the 4600 that will blow anything off the face of the planet. I can't wait.:D :D

[]-[itman]

Originally posted by customrig
128mb of DDR with the 4600 that will blow anything off the face of the planet. I can't wait.:D :D

The 4200 and the 4400 have 128mb of DDR also. Don't forget that the new Radeon8500 has 128mb of DDR ram also. However i do agree with you that the 4600 will be the most powerful card out. But there are more than just performance to look at when getting a video card but that's been covered in more than 1 other thread in this forum and doesn't need to be discussed again here.

[slim_lim]

Personally, I just really mad about NVidia's decision to retain GeForce2 core, rebadged as GeForce4MX, as their mainstream product. By doing so they effectively shot the the game industry in the foot. Since developers can no longer assume that the mainstream user will have a fully directX 8 hardware compliant card in their system in a year or two, they'll be reluctant to support the advanced graphics features of directx8 and stick with directx7 feature set. This in effect makes the bells and whistles on the newer Geforce and Radeon cards useless, because they are going to be underutilized. So, in effect, Nvidia has doomed us to continue playing technologically backwards games for some time to come.
High-end 3d card owners: Doesn't it make you feel good to own an expensive card with advanced rendering features that you know aren't going to be used? :rolleyes:

[Breadfan]

Originally posted by Ritteri&Bubbles
I also think everybody should be basing their opinions on Nvidia's new bread n butter product, The Ti line of GeForce4 cards,

In a sense, this is one of my main points of my rant :)

All the hype about February 5th or 6th, and what do I see? Some cheesy video card that does nothing for me!! I think the ti series is quite nice. Its a decent step foward, and another progression of technology and speed. I'm impressed.

But all this excitement over early February, and its all really wound around the MX versions? Some places didn't even know nVidia was gonna hold back the ti until march. Makes me wonder how public that information was. Sounds to me like nVidia is trying to hype it up...tease the hardcore gaming crowd a bit. I wonder how many people couldn't take the excitement today and have already pre-ordered their ti's??

Not that there's anything wrong with that :)

When the ti's are out I'll celebrate that as a neat day...not a great day mind you, a neat day. But when the MXs came out and displayed their awesome amount of lackluster performance, all I can do is *yawn*.

But when the top low-end Geforce4MX can't even beat the lowest end GF3, doesn't that just seem wrong?

And when the majority of people buy those becuase of their attractive prices, then we're gonna be running DX7 games for quite a bit longer...

Mike