Nvidia or ATI?

[danielj]

It is a question still debated.I am not sure if an ATI video card still have too many bugs or poor perfomance running Celestia.I know that HD 4850 is generally cheaper than the 9800 GTX+/GTS 250 with a similar perfomance,but I don?t know if I go to Nvidia or ATI.
My new computer is:
-Core2Duo E7200
-2 GB DDR2 800
-XFX 8800 GS
-HD 500 GB SATA II+HD 160 GB SATA
-PSU Corsair VX 450

And on July,I will put a new video card (one of above) and more 2 GB DDR2 800.What do you think?
And will I have a boost in Celestia perfomance?Or only with the new video card?

[BobHegwood]

Just from my own experience, mind you, but I'd go for the Nvidia card anytime.
ATI's have often been reported on this forum as having some difficulty with the
graphics of Celestia.

These can be overcome, but not without some work. Have you the patience
for that?

[Reiko]

Go with nvidia. Those seem to like openGL 2.0 better.

[John Van Vliet]

--- edit ---

[LordFerret]

Having been involved with gaming for many years (Half-Life: Day Of Defeat), ATI's were always notorious for having driver problems... nVidia consistently being the serious hard-core gamer's choice. I myself have never had anything but nVidia, zero complaints here!

(my fumbling about while installing my drivers does not count here! LOL!)

[danielj]

Well,I will stick with Nvidia.
I completed my change to my new computer:
Core2Duo E7200
2 GB DDR2 800
XFX 8800 GS
HD 500 GB SATA II+HD 160 GB SATA
PSU Corsair VX 450
Windows Vista Ultimate 64 bit

I will probably buy a 9800 GTX+ or GTS 250,besides more 2 GB DDR2 800,on July.Am I going to feel a boost in perfomance?

[duds26]

Only if you use a lot of very heavy addons.
That configuration is already way above what celestia needs.
(Without a lot of heavy addons.)

There is actually not a need to do that for celestia.
For running Celestia without addons, everything will run as fast as it gets on that configuration.
It will be limited by the screens refresh rate.

Again, without addons.

You might want to try out some heavy virtual textures and stuff to test it.
Then you could see a performance improvement.

When picking out a video card, try to find a recent card.
Newer design means better architecture and Direct X 10 compatibility.

[danielj]

Actually,it?s not a question anymore.I probablly won?t change my video card before August.Anyway,thanks for the answers...

[danielj]

It?s not so heavy addons.I am having trouble even to run Io?s volcanoes with sprites.It?s better than before.My maximum frame rate is above 30 fps even with Jupiter on the screen.However,it can get as low as 11 fps or even 4 fps,depending on the distance and angle!

[danielj]

It?s not always a good idea to update your driver.
I updated to the latest driver 185.85 and things gets a LOT WORSE.Now the Io volcanoes runs between 10 and 15 fps.The biggest anoying thing is that Nvidia don?t accept repplacing with old drivers.So now I have to uninstall the driver and put the original driver of my video card and only then,I can return to 178.13...

[John Van Vliet]

--- edit ---

[Reiko]

Well,I will stick with Nvidia.
I completed my change to my new computer:
Core2Duo E7200
2 GB DDR2 800
XFX 8800 GS
HD 500 GB SATA II+HD 160 GB SATA
PSU Corsair VX 450
Windows Vista Ultimate 64 bit

I will probably buy a 9800 GTX+ or GTS 250,besides more 2 GB DDR2 800,on July.Am I going to feel a boost in perfomance?

I bought a cheap 9400gt and it looks great runs smooth.
Since you are running vista you might see a boost in performance if you get more ram. Vista seems to eat a lot of memory.

[danielj]

Ok,I will only buy another 2 GB RAM module on July.
About the driver.I restaured the computer and the driver is now the old one.

[John Van Vliet]

--- edit ---

[selden]

A warning:

Under Windows XP, the current Nvidia drivers cause confusion in how the system treats the screen resolution. Desktop icon sizes and layout change unpredictably from one reboot to the next. I had to reboot my computer three or four times before they stayed the same.

[cartrite]

A note.
It is always wise to examine the supported products list when updating a Nvidia driver. Some with older cards should not update to the newest driver because the newer drivers may not support the card.
cartrite

[danielj]

What?s the problem?It appears that you didn?t read my post.I updated to the newest driver and the perfomance was WORSER.Probably the 185.85 is useless on Geforces 8,and it only give gains on Geforces 9 or even 200 series...

you do know that the 178.13

NVIDIA Driver Downloads
GeForce Release 178 WHQL
Version: 178.13
Release Date: September 25, 2008
Operating System: Windows Vista 64-bit
Language: U.S. English
File Size: 103 MB

is from 2008
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winvista_x ... _whql.html
and this one is the current vista 64
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winvista_x ... _whql.html

[t00fri]

Daniel,

when I read this, I can't suppress a smile. With my VERY old FX 5900 Ultra/256 MB NVIDIA card and a very old computer (Pentium4 3.2 GHz/3 GB RAM) and everything activated like galaxies (+labels) globulars (+labels) etc,
+++++++++++++++++++++
I still get 36 fps on my 1600x1200 monitor screen.
+++++++++++++++++++++
See here:


Compared to mine, the system you are talking about is an absolutely HIGH-END one, Nevertheless, I can smoothly display 64k VT textures without the slightest problems etc.

Of course, I would never have bought Windows Vista, since from the start it was obvious to me that it was a dead animal, now being taken off the market ASAP!

I still use Windows XP SP3 or Linux with great performance.

Fridger

Or with 8192 stars of Omega Centauri rendered together with large-size Io, still 36fps

[danielj]

It is true,but Io volcanoes with sprites are not static textures.They are pseudo animations.And the interesting thing is that I had similar problems EVEN with Windows XP!
But in fact,things are a bit more complicated.The problem seem to be with Celestia 1.6.0.Because Celestia 1.5.1 loads much faster and display high textures without problems.Another thing that can be take in account is the number of addons you have.I have more than 15 addons and Io itself is using 2 addons:iovolcanoes and iovolcanoes-sprite.So it is not necessarily a problem with Vista or even with a particular configuration...
I am not using a fresh install.I?m using Celestia 1.6.0 SVN 4632.

[t00fri]

It is true,but Io volcanoes with sprites are not static textures.They are pseudo animations.And the interesting thing is that I had similar problems EVEN with Windows XP!
But in fact,things are a bit more complicated.The problem seem to be with Celestia 1.6.0.Because Celestia 1.5.1 loads much faster and display high textures without problems.Another thing that can be take in account is the number of addons you have.I have more than 15 addons and Io itself is using 2 addons:iovolcanoes and iovolcanoes-sprite.So it is not necessarily a problem with Vista or even with a particular configuration...
I am not using a fresh install.I?m using Celestia 1.6.0 SVN 4632.

Of course I don't use Celestia 1.5.1 but rather always the latest 1.6.0SVN version.
Certainly, this was my point "between the lines" : add-ons will slow you down badly! I never use any (for various reasons...)

Fridger