Radeon 9500 Pro vs. Ti4200

[Sturmur]

I'm torn between these two cards: ATI Radeon 9500 Pro
Albatron GF4 Ti4200P Turbo

I know that the Albatron goes ahead of the ATI in most tests but the ATI kicks it with AF + 8x AA. Plus it has DX9 complience.

What I'm wondering is...

Will AGP 8X be a big thing when the world shifts toward them ?

Will the Geforce 4 ti 4200s be able to handle all aspects of DX9... Once I had a Radeon 64mb DDR ViVo and it couldn't run the Nature Game in 3dMark 2001 because of a outdated pixel shader. Will this happen with the GF4 in DX9?

and

Will the GF4 Suffer in benchmarks in not being like ATI's cards and be 'DX9 supported'?

Thanks.

 

[AMD_Man]

The R9500Pro will be faster in almost all of the tests, will have a lot better image quality and more features. There's absolutely no reason to consider any Ti4200 (even the Albatron Turbo) over an R9500Pro unless you're an nVidia fanboy.

Intelligence is not merely the wealth of knowledge but the sum of perception, wisdom, and knowledge.

 

[Spitfire_x86]

Get the Radeon 9500 Pro.

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[pane00]

What I'm wondering is...

Will AGP 8X be a big thing when the world shifts toward them ?



8X AGP is a marketing ploy. The difference between 2X and 4X AGP is sqwat. Run 3Dmark and disable 4X and watch the difference it makes. The best I've increased my score was by a measley 90 points. My Xmas Video Card will be the 9500 Pro. Give ATI some time to mature the drivers. Nvidia's had years to mature. Plus look at 40' series drivers, those are a lame attempt to keep ATI at bay. In all the reading that I've done the testers couldn't overclock the 9500pro quite yet. In 8x AA it beats the 4600ti in most benchmarks.

 

[kcordloh]

I hate to disagree but for a savings of $60 you can get a decent Geforce4 TI 4200.

Will APG 8X become a big thing? yes. AGP became a big thing, think of AGP 4X as PCI slots when they were first introduced; and AGP 8X slots as AGP slots now. It will be forever before AGP 8X is taken advantage of, right now it's a marketing ploy for the "I gotta have the biggest and the best" consumer. Eventually it will be, but by the time it is I'll bet your card will be long gone.

If I was going to spend $200 on a card I'd scrounge up $30-$50 more and try to find an ATI 9700 (non-pro). Or I'd spring for a TI 4400. If you replace your card often (every 6-10 months) then the ATI 9500 PRO is worthless in my opinion. Why? Because if you wait until the latest Nvidia card comes out the ATI 9700 Pro prices will drop slightly. As a long term investment wait for the next generation NVIDIA cards, or opt for a ATI 9700 or 9700Pro; if you game heavily.

I myself have a Geforce4 TI 4200 on order because I play games that don't require DX9, and won't for awhile. You'll be hard pressed to ever find me springing more than $160 on a GC, $180 is the limit.

Everyone thinks differently. I happen to like ATI 9700 series, but like most farmers kids I haven't got a feasible budget for that.

If you play 2+ hours of fast paced shoot 'um up games every day and hate your current card, get the fastest you can afford.

But if you have $200, I'd say wait and get the ATI 9700. It kicks the Geforce4 TI 4600 & 4400's butt, both of which slaughter the 4200, which the 9500Pro usually beats by 2-5%

 

[dhlucke]

dx9 is coming out any time now. I forget the date. dx9 games are being released during the holidays from what I've heard.

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[AMD_Man]

I completely disagree with kcordloh. The Radeon 9500 Pro matches the performance of a Ti4400 in raw performance (without AA or AF). However, when both AA and AF are enabled, the Radeon 9500 Pro rivals even the Ti4600 for significantly less. By the time the Radeon 9500 Pro is available, you will be able to get it for ~$150 US in some stores. The Radeon 9500 Pro also support DX9 unlike the GF4 family. Comparing the Radeon 9500 Pro to a Ti4200 is like comparing a GeForce3 Ti200 to a GeForce4 Ti4200 where the Ti4200 is the Ti200 and the Ti4200 is the Radoen 9500Pro. The Ti4200 is a previous generation card that can't even begin to match the Radeon 9500 Pro. It seems to me kcordloh is refering to the benchmarks Anandtech did but they were prerelease benchmarks and they did not correspond the trends a lot of other sites were seeing with the Radeon 9500Pro vs. the Ti4200.

Intelligence is not merely the wealth of knowledge but the sum of perception, wisdom, and knowledge.