ATI or nVIDIA lets vote.

[amdprescott]

Ok now that we have argued a lot on the Hardware for these 2 vendors (ATI & NVIDIA)
everyone knows that hardware is only good enuf if its software is good enuf for it.
Now lets talk about the Software/Drivers.
Please tell me who prefer the ATI Catalyst over nViDIA's Forceware (formerly Detonator) and y?
And Who prefer Forceware over the ATI Catalyst.

I own an MSI Geforce4-ti4800SE and a Gigabyte Radeon 9800 pro.
I feel the nvidia driver is missing the Vertical Sync. option under Direct 3d.
And ATI catalyst Control Panel makes problems in games when u use the up, down, left ,right keys.
Lets us see what everyone has to say here ....
what u have to say is it even. Or someone is better than the other ..???

~AMD=RULES.PRESCOTT=4=FOOLS~

 

[Vimp]

I have only used NVidia drivers and so far have not had anything to complain about. But to be perfectly honest I can't say I ever seen any change from updating my drivers aside from the odd game not working properly intill I upgrade to the latest drivers. But I have never noticed any speed increase or any problems with the drivers.

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[Rubberbband]

I've owned both ATI (Radeon 64Mb Vivo, 8500 LE, 9600 Pro) and Nvidia Cards (TnT, GF2 Mx, GF2 Ti, GF3 Ti200, GF4 Ti 4200 ViVo). Currently running two computers one with a GF2 Ti and one with a BBA 9600 Pro.
IMHO Ati drivers have come a long way. With Nvidia drivers you can un-instal re-install, instal over the old ones, basically do whatever you want and they still work. Ati Drivers tend to respond better if you do a clean instal (un-instal them using the Un-installer, Unplug the Nic card, re-boot into safe mode, run driver cleaner and instal the new ones.
As far as game compatibility they both have their quirks.

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[TheGreatGrapeApe]

I agree with rubberband. While I haven't used nvidia drivers in a LONG time, I have found that the ATI drivers have come a long way. I have had very few problems with them over time, and have found it more of a system/me issue than the drivers themselves for the most part (recent Fastwrites issue was fixed by latest MOBO BIOS, not Catalyst problem.)

I like alot of the things that ATI has added to their drivers, the single file install, the self-uninstalling, the temperature monitoring (although I haven't been able to use that yet), and the idea of the VPU recovery (which I haven't turned off since the 3.10 release), and they also added roation which is a nice feature (I've used rotated LCDs and am looking at gettting one for home). I also like the Shader effects they added, sure they're gimmicky, but they are nice for making old games come alive with renewed interest.

I do wish Hydravision was updated a little better, nV's solution is much better and actually has the support for more than 2 monitors which would be nice (a rage or early radeon PCI card ain't expensive) and I have heard of issues with the AIWs (although I'm no longer running an AIW card), but the personal cinema stuff from nV is still below ATI's level even with a revamp.

I'm happy with the current state of affairs with the Catalysts, and I'm happy that they release them fairly often to keep up with any issues they find; even if it means more work for me comparing them.

BTW, <b>rubberband</b> you don't need to unplug the NIC card, just disable the network connections if you are worried. But I have to say, you don't really need to do that either if you just X out of the windows autodetect stuff.

I've installed and uninstalled them many times, driver cleaner usually does it for me, but I don't have to if I don't want to. I've installed right over top of old many times in the past. I just use driver cleaner now so that when I go to publish values for people they aren't skewed. But I only once found it necessary to be forced to use driver cleaner and that was after a bad DNA driver install incident.

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