Archived from groups: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt (
More info?)
jbrandonbb@hotmail.com (JB) said:
> David Besack <daveREMOVEbesack@mac.com> wrote in message
> news:<cbb8no$796q$1@netnews.upenn.edu>...
>> > The 9600 is about
>> > 30% faster in most games, but it isn't fast enough for games like
>> > Far Cry and who knows how it will perform in Doom3 or HL2.
>>
>> Just another data point - I play Far Cry with a 5200 ultra and it
>> runs smooth at 1024x768. The only thing I've had to do is turn down
>> shadow and fog to low settings. Other than that the game runs very
>> nicely.
David, your post didn't show on RR so I can reply directly... The last
benchmarks on Far Cry that I saw, put the 9600 at about 33 FPS and the
5200U at about 26 FPS at 1024x768, so even with things turned down, the
5200 is very marginal for Far Cry, forget about Halo.
> Speaking of getting games to play their best, I read that the 5200 is
> the cheapest card that supports DX9, which makes me think that's why
> Dell includes it.
If I'm not mistaken, the 9800XT is an option for the 8300, or it used to
be.
> And DX9 games like Doom3 are just around the
> croner. But that the 5200 is really too slow to keep up and won't
> work that great. Then there's the new X800 and NVidia 6800 cards that
> seem way too expensive. The 9800 seems like a good compromise.
Personally, I wouldn't buy a card now to play Doom3 or HL2 because as
soon as those games come out there will be a plethora of cards optimized
for them. Cards you buy today, including the 9800, will be forgotten in
6-8 months. If you plan on playing Doom3 & HL2, then I would be tempted
to wait until Christmas to buy a card.
> Really, I'm looking for graphics similar to what you get with
> Chronicles of Riddick for Xbox with dynamic per-pixel lighting,
> normal mapping, etc. I have yet to see anything that even comes close
> to the realism in that game on PC.
I have the demo sitting here but haven't played it yet, I've heard it's
damn nice. I'm anxious to see it on my hdtv.
> I have Unreal T 04 sitting here
> waiting to be played, though. My old computer has a RADEON 8500,
> doesn't seem fast enough...
I downloaded the demo and could never get it to run stable so I didn't
buy the game. Only deathmatch would work, any other mode would lock up
the computer. I might pick it up used. I using a G4 Ti4200 and the demo
looked great while it was running.
--
Mac Cool