NVIDIA to ATI Questions

**burnside** · 10-23-2004, 06:38 AM

I'm considering purchasing a ATI 9800 Pro to replace my GF TI 4600 and have a few questions:

What drivers will I need? I'm confused about "catalyst" and regular ATI drivers.

What is a good driver cleaner program? Detonator Destroyer does not support Windows XP.

My system only supports AGP 4x - will this be a problem?

Will I see a significant improvement in frame rates or image quality?

Thanks for the help in advance,
Dale
P4, 2.53 GHZ, 512 MB RDRAM, GF4 TI 4600

**csknight** · 10-23-2004, 08:08 AM

If you go to ATI.com then customer care and "find a driver" it will take you to the most updated version. There's a "full" package and one with just the driver and the control panel. There used to be a link for it on the home page at the bottom left. I don't know if it's still there.

A good driver cleaner program is conveniently called Driver Cleaner.
Get it here: http://www.driverheaven.net/cleaner/ It seems to be tailored to ATI/Nvidia needs.

The 9800 Pro is good up to AGP 8x but is backwards compatable with anything less. It has settings in the control panel to suit your speed. Just make sure you keep "fast write" "AGP write" "AGP read" "PCI write" and "PCI read" enabled.

Image quality I think is great. Check out my screenshots. Go to "screenshots" forum, 3rd page, and click on "2nd posting, I'll get better sometime...."

I get good frame rates even with 3d clouds maxed out and most sliders all the way to the right. I run 6x AA and recently went from 8x AF to 16x.

System specs for comparison:
P4 @ 2.8
1 Gig PC 2700
Radeon 9800 Pro
Windows XP

**burnside** · 10-23-2004, 09:14 AM

Thanks, csknight,

I found the ATI download site and read through most of it. I've always used NVIDIA cards in my sytems, so the ATI features and terminology are new to me. I'm going over to BestBuy shortly, and if they have one in stock for the sale price, I'll likely but it.
Should I install the software that comes with it and then upgrade to the latest deivers, or would it be better to jump staright to the latest downloads?

Dale

**csknight** · 10-23-2004, 09:21 AM

I installed from the CD first. Then I upgraded. That's just because I wanted to get it going and didn't want to wait for the download. (I'm on a 256k DSL)

Terminology was new to me also, but it quickly makes sense. The new control panel is very user friendly.

**burnside** · 10-23-2004, 12:45 PM

OK, I got it. I'm going to download the latest AGP driver for my motherboard (per Install instructions), then uninstall the current video drivers. While I have the case apart, I'll do some light vacuuming to remove accumulated dust and then install the new viseo card.

Dale

**csknight** · 10-23-2004, 02:38 PM

And the result?

**burnside** · 10-23-2004, 03:26 PM

OK, I'm up and running. Results after loading the supplied drivers were disappointing - actually about 3 fps less than my old GF TI4600 on my (4) test saved flights (same resolution, FS9 settings). I downloaded the latest drivers and now I am about equal to the old card re fps. Quality does seem sharper. I now need to play with the option settings on the card - any suggestions?

Dale

**wayuphigh** · 10-23-2004, 05:19 PM

The best drivers for performance that I've used so far were the Cat 4.9's. I run a 9800XT. You may have some settings on the card for AA or AF that are running higher than your 4600 which could be a be of a hit.

~John

**burnside** · 10-23-2004, 05:44 PM

It's hard to get an apples to apples comparison. Before I changed over, I set up 4 flights, 2 on the ground and 2 in the air with different aircraft, and recorded the average fps. Following installation of the ATI 9800 Pro (with latest drivers), I ran each flight again with the same parameters and got almost identical results. I then tried 4x AA and 8x AF (set on the card, AA off in FS9), and tried a flight with the Piper Cheyenne at KSEA - just a quick turn in the traffic pattern. Not only did the aircraft look much better, but I did not get nearly as much slow down in fps on the base leg and final as I usually get with the old card. My old card only supported DirectX 8, so there probably is some improvement with the ATI using DirectX 9.0c. It's going to take some more experimenting with options and settings. By the way, with fairly high settings, I'm seeing 20-30 fps in most areas, and as much as 75 fps at altitude (with default settings on clouds). I think the 9800 Pro is a definite improvement in overall performance.

Dale

Dale