"Far superior" image quality with 8800GTX?

Could somebody explain to me how the ATI X1950XTX's image is any better or worse than the nVidia GeForce 8800GTX's image on this page? The article suggests the 8800GTX's image quality is "far superior" - I absolutely do not see that!

[EDIT: Keep in mind I'm talking about the Oblivion images specifically - the ones at the bottom of the page.]

I found it but I don't know if I'm allowed to link to it - it's right on their front page at the moment. They have pictures comparing anisotropic filtering methods. The 8800GTX is a massive improvement here, and I could hardly stand to play a game with it looking like it does on the Radeon. Seriously, when I upgraded to an nVidia GeForce 6600GT from a GeForce4 Ti4200 I was taken aback by the poor quality texture filtering. Why should games look worse with a new card? I almost wanted to put my old card back in, but I'd already given it to my dad...

So yeah, I'm glad nVidia has found it in their hearts to get their crap (back) together with the filtering, as they've had their issues with it as well. I think the reason is because nVidia and ATI were in such competition that they thought they had to make painful optimizations in order to stay ahead, but with this new hardware it's just not necessary - it's fast, and they've got ATI beat for a while!

I shouldn't hold my breath on that one, though.

I don't see how that can't simply be indicative of differences in the (in-game) time of day when the screenshots were taken. That's what I thought it was when I saw it, especially because the vegetation/sky didn't look the same either.

I think it would be helpful if the screenshot were taken at a more stable time of day. Now, if you compare the tree in the very right of the pictures, you'll see that more light is shining on it for the 8800GTX. Why would this be? Shouldn't the same amount of light be shining on it regardless of what card is used? Or else how can game developers depend on things to turn out as they want them to turn out? Admittedly having no professional experience in these areas, I still think this points to different-time-of-day. How could there be that much variation otherwise?

And if not, I'd like to know what makes it look different. HDR? It doesn't seem HDR would affect how lighting is applied to that tree, or would it? Is nVidia using some more "accurate" form of lighting..? Couldn't that interfere with some games, if so, as they depend on lighting working a certain way to be experienced as intended?

I just don't think we have enough information to determine if the 8800GTX's image quality is "far superior" or not from that example in the article. What's supposed to be superior? Because if it's the lighting, I just don't buy it.

Also, and this goes along with my post in the feature requests forum, I think the textures for the 8800GTX look "dirtier"! JPEG compression artifacts seem to plague them more, which has nothing to do with the card at all but hinders our ability to judge image quality.

Yes, yes, I know. But that doesn't distract me from the fact that "far superior" image quality is touted by THG without this being sufficiently proven, at least in that one example

I see no jaggies in the X1950XTX image. Are we looking at the same pictures? In fact, the leaves look sharper and cleaner to me in the X1950XTX image due to the artifacts in the compression of the 8800GTX image.

Sure, but of course in a screenshot FPS really makes no difference, and that's what Image Quality is about (or at least part of it). Also, the 8800GTX is approximately 2x better-performing than the X1950XTX at its best, not 3x. And I could be wrong, but I think 300,000 boxes could be rendered with no problem whatsoever on cards generations old. But more to the point - can anyone prove that there is a significant quality difference between the two images produced by the cards? Because given those two images, I certainly can't.

who cares to some SHARPER TREES & Brighter Building when you drive at 320KM/H with a Mercedes MClaren SLR in Need For Speed Carbon ?or When you Dodge the Bullets in F.E.A.R or Quake or Battlefield 2142 ??... and who cares about some Brighter field when you have a Army of 100Units in Dawn Of War Dark Crusade...??
come on Guys... i see no point in image Quality of 8800GTX that makes it better than any X1900 Series cards...
and i`m so dissapointed with 8800GTX Performance compare to a X1950XTX ,there isnt much FPS difference in F.E.A.R...
only fools will buy 8800 series cards in these prices when you can buy a R600 card in a few months...

Just buy what's in your budget, almost any newer card is likely to be an improvement. Most smart people never waste money on brand new hardware tech, as it's not really being utilized by software and is overpriced. You're kind of stupid if you run out and buy the very first of any product of any kind anyway - without a test period to see how well it works on the masses, how can it really be recommended? Look at what happened to the original purchasers of the original Xbox... I'm glad I waited, mine still works!

Your calling enthusiast stupid ? lol, whatever if i had a problem with my 8800 i would send it back period.


In my country the things cost more and if i had to buy a 8800gtx it would cost me $100 more than it would in US and our cars cost 4x for the same car

If something is wrong i have 2 years to send it back thats how it is, atleast in my country

dunno i dont give a damn about consoles =P so i dont know what happened

To tell you the truth, i can barely see a difference between the two images, and frankly, i prefer ATI's output a little better due to the "warmer" colours.

This is at least the 2nd thread compaining about how "not great" the 8800 is. Maybe if you actually bought the card it would be easier for you to notice the differences rather than going by a review and benchmarks. At least the AMD fanboys didn't create threads stating how "not great" the Core2Duo is compared to older Athlons. You're killing me with this, if you don't think the 8800 is worth having, then don't buy it! Sheesh...

+1 post for me!

I would have to agree that there really doesn't seem to be much of an image quality difference here. I flashed between the two and other than the already mentioned lighting difference on the right hand side and some other very minor differences (not differences in quality either) I can't tell any difference at all. I surely could not see justifying buying a card for 800 just to get a few more fps especialy when the current directx 9 cards are doing fine with it. I personally am going to wait until there are many game titles out using directx 10 and for Vista to get at least somewhat patched up before I make that transition. It will be about 6 months I am thinking so perhaps the improved of this card (8850 maybe?...remember the 7900-7950 and the 1900-1950?) will be out by then and it will cheaper too! No advantage of this card right now to be able to run a direct 9 game faster when the current cards are already running them fast as hell. My $.02.

Tom's hasn't had very reliable review information for a couple of years. Ever since Tom left as editor it has slow digressed in objectivity and writing quality.

I think the wording "Far Superior" is a little much. I do however see a difference in the comparisons I've seen.

I think the comparisons I've seen for the most part are shadowy pics (not sure if the same as the ones you mention) and are fairly poor examples because its hard to see any detail much less the difference. But there is a difference and even tho to me its not "Far superior" it is still better which is great imo if not mind-blowing.

honestly the thing that always stick out the most for me is the jagged lines along walls and such

If I'm not mistake that's where antialiasing comes into play?

Wow I agree some folks need to ease up on the caffeine, a simple question on image quality leads to personal attacks on each other. Frankly I don't see much difference in the images, but without the early adopters companies would have little or no incentive to put out cutting edge new products. So I for one applaud those who have the money to buy the fastest most cutting edge hardware. It allows the hardware companies to do the research to put out products the rest of us can afford. Of course the new NVidia card should look better than ATI's older card, of course the new core2 duo should be faster than AMD older 64 bit processors, neither makes me want to run out and buy them, simply because it is the latest technology and is a little better. But when they become mainstream and the prices drop I am glad the early adopters have tested the new hardware for me already.

I couldn't really see a difference either...

Unless the monitors were 24" Eizo's, I think you're all urinating up a rope.

NO IT'S NOT!

That wasn't my intention at all. God. Did you read my opening post? It's not my fault people started talking about FPS, etc. The point is that the difference between the two Oblivion images is negligible yet THG calls the 8800GTX's image "far superior".

NeonDeon: I don't consume caffeine.
Most of the rest: you're completely missing the point...
My point was that it looks like they loaded up the save with one of the cards and took a screenshot right away, whereas on the other card they got up to get a drink of - well, let's see COFFEE since we're so into accusing people of drinking it - and when they got back it was later in the day in-game. This would easily explain the lighting difference, and that's exactly what it looks like to me from these shots, which frankly makes the claims of 8800GTX image quality superiority (at least in the comparison of these images!!) seem BS. If it weren't for some of the images I've found on other sites, that's what I would think.

Now I'll acknowledge that it's just my opinion and some of you actually think the 8800GTX looks crisper and cleaner - it probably does, and I have seem some shots which point this out, but I don't find this evident in these Oblivion images here at THG at all when you dismiss the lighting difference which seems obviously unrelated to the capabilities of the cards. I could be wrong, but if you look at the angles of the light shining on the rocks and such, they're different between pictures, hence different time of day, hence darker in the X1950XTX image..

Anyway, I've already said all this.

Read this on the human eye. Movie frame rates are different than computer monitor frame rates. They cannot be compared with each other.

Past 30fps, you can't tell a signifigant difference. The optic nerve has a finite rate of interactions per second with the brain (we will say its a 1024 bit bus or something ) and even though your eye can "see" things at very high fps because the "pixels" in your eye have no real refresh rate, the brain cannot get them and process them quick enough to make a difference. The previous post about fighter pilots can be explained: the pilots were shown a grey screen and then a very fast (~1500 fps frame) was flashed. The contrast was picked up by the eye and it said to the brain: "Whoa, wha?... Whoa. Dude.... That was sick... Dat's da $#!t, man," and the brain was like, "Far out..."
-cm

I agree with the subject this thread was made (and not the insanely horrific flaming spiral of crap it has subsequetly taken)

The words "Far superior" are irresponible...I would say "slightly sharper" at BEST.

When I first looked at the pics I thought "there's no difference at all"...

Even now, I have them BOTH open, on my dual 22in LCDs (one in each monitor) and I see little difference if any...

ANYWAYS, you are silly if you buy virgin technology in its first run...SILLY SILLY SILLY...wait till the drivers get better, DirectX 10 gets crisper and wait till they cards get a 1 gig of memory....768 is just stupid...soon they'll ALL have 1 gig...HECK AT THE VERY LEAST WAIT TILL ATI RELEASES THEIR CARD JUST FOR COMPETITION'S SAKE AND A PRICE DROP!!!!!

Listen.. if it doesn't take my p40n and make my girlfriend jealous.. than it just isn't worth the money for the 8800mixerplix.

How you think the R600 will be better than the 8800 ?

Spec wise, it's like twice as powerful...boy people sure love to speculate...why not just wait and see? LOL. No wonder we have so much hype.