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| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=21473 |   Ph33rsPhun (7) Apr 03, 2009 - 07:04 am » Edited on Apr 03, 2009 - 07:09 am
| | From the review page about the nvidia card, the section about Ambient Occlusion, there are pictures that nvidia provided, the HL2 pictures show the warning "A.I Disabled"... isn't that a warning that the game isn't running properly? Does the new AO enabled drivers make the game look better but not actually play the game? Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=21456 | Ph33rsPhun (7) Mar 31, 2009 - 08:40 pm » Edited on Mar 31, 2009 - 08:44 pm
| I'm sure that the cooler size was reduced to save production costs, and I'm equally sure that the cooler could be reduced as a result of the smaller die using less energy and producing less heat. HOWEVER, as the review here showed, the 55's reduced cooler ability matches the reduction in heat produced so that in the end the GPU actually runs as hot or hotter than the 65 size chips with the better coolers. So in the end, instead of the end user getting the benefits of the 55 chip, the manufacturer got the benefits bundled up in the reduced manufacturing costs.
As an end user I would rather have those 'rewards' for smaller die production in my system and not in the manufacturer's bottom line.
Like I said before though, a non-reference design cooler on a 260 (216) 55nm probably makes the 55 a better card than the 65nm versions with a reference design cooler on them. So if someone is going to buy a 55 version of the 260 I think they should be willing to pay a little extra for a card with a better cooler already on it OR plan on replacing the reference cooler themselves, especially if they want to get any real world improvement over the 65 versions. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=21456 | Ph33rsPhun (7) Mar 30, 2009 - 08:06 am
| Great article, thanks for the review, I was hoping someone would get around to writing this compare between 260's for us.
One tidbit of additional info though, in addition to the 55's not having the back plate for cooling, if you take off the cover you will see that the aluminum fins are about 1 inch short AND there is one less heat pipe on the 55 reference design as there is on the 65 reference design coolers.
I think the 55's are probably better if you plan on putting an aftermarket or non-reference design cooler on the video card, but otherwise, if you can afford the energy requirements, the 65 looks like a better value because the cooler doesn't need to be upgraded.
Just my 2 cents. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=21249 | Ph33rsPhun (7) Feb 04, 2009 - 09:50 am
| I don't think predicting the future development of physics in DX or in games in general is the point of the article. I think it's intended to help us evaluate our systems now and how we might be motivated to upgrade or set them up with what we have.
For example, now someone might have a better idea if they want to SLI their old card or replace it with a new one. And they will know that turning the physics over to their 'fast' CPU is not really a solution to the physics problem.
I think the author should add one more layer of test results to the article though, and that would address the Physix settings in the nvidia control panel. In it you can select which system gpu will do the physics. Is it worth it to set some unused onboard 8#00 series graphics card on you MB to do the physics, or to plug some older geforce card you have laying around the house to do the physics for you, even if it won't be SLI compatible? Perhaps a 8400 onboard GPU will help a 9500GT play the game but it would slow down a 260 (216) which could do it faster in it's spare time than wait for the 8400 GPU to do it for it.
Those are the questions I hope future Firingsquad articles will help me answer :D
Overall, great article, thanks for the info. Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=20680 | Ph33rsPhun (7) Jul 17, 2008 - 09:09 pm
| | How is the 9800GTX+ a price premium? Isn't it MSRP $199.99? In which case the statement that it isn't wortht he premium price doesn't make sense in comparison to the PNY OC card. Perhaps the GTX+ are coming at a different price range though? Flag this | Edit this post |
| News Link » /news/newsarticle.asp?searchid=18141 | Ph33rsPhun (7) Jul 13, 2008 - 09:33 pm
| I think this article hurt more than it helped.
Situation: old system dies, quick scan of this trusted website and finds this article ~ two weeks before the Spring Build Article came out :(
Followed directions, didn't have enough time to do research outside of this article. Built system. Onboard ATI graphics doesn't like 8800GT nvidia driver, they don't work well together. Every boot up the system asks me to update the driver so Catalyst can take over, turn catalyst off, delete catalyst, onboard chip useless now.
Okay fine, wanted SLI someday anyway, buy old 570 motherboard, beats the pants off AMD chipset with nvidia video card... no more driver conflicts. The other solution would have been to buy an ATI video card, but that costs more than the motherboard. I'll rebuild the gigabyte into a network e-mail web search machine, but it's no gamer without a card and it doesn't like nvidia cards, that SHOULD have been mentioned in the article somewhere. I mention this for future articles to consider such things. Flag this | Edit this post |
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