Stuff that peels your potatoes with paring knives of ANGER.

[Ulti]

My x800 held up really well, until just recently. Everything just started requiring shader 3.0, and the card was like "Wait, I don't have this. oshi-"

[Spectere]

Another thing about ATI is that their model lines are confusing as hell.  nVidia has always done a good job giving customers an excellent idea of what they can expect from a certain card.  For instance, you can tell at a glance that a 7800 is better than a 7600, and that it's an entire hardware revision up from a 6800.  Let's just say that with ATI, the X300 and X800 are two completely different hardware revisions.  And oh, that's not all!  To make matters even more confusing, ATI released an X1050.  It's based on the same basic GPU as the X300 is, is less powerful than the X800, yet is branded in such a way that would make you think that it's part of the R400 GPU family.

It's just so damn stupid.

[Bobbias]

Agreed. How is the x550 related to the x300? And how decent (for $90) is the x550?

[Spectere]

The x550 is in the same chipset family as the x300.

Older mid-range GeForce cards (6600, 7600) tend to be around that price range and are a much better chipset across the board.  The x550, for instance, doesn't support Shader Model 3.0 while my 6600GT (which only cost US$129 back in January 2007) does.

Also, going back to my rant, nVidia has much better and more stable drivers than ATI.  I'd avoid ATI for that fact alone.

[Bobbias]

I always did like NVidia better, lol. It was instinctual, but I just seemed to like NVidia's cards better all around, even though the FX series sucked balls.

[Ulti]

It's funny, because I remember back when Doom 3 was coming out, everyone was like "Dude, nVidia sucks, get an ATI card, Radeons are the shit!". I ended up getting an nVidia anyways, just to spite them :3

[Spectere]

I think the FX line was out when Doom 3 was coming out, so that could have been why.

The FX line was really only weak when it came to Pixel Shader 2.0.  The only problem is that its greatest weakness was its primary new features.  They also ran quite hot, from what I remember.

The lowest-end FX -- the 5200 -- was as powerful as a standard GeForce 3 when it came to doing normal graphics.  Definitely not bad for a budget card, and right on par with how things should be.  When PS2.0 was used, however, it was abysmally slow.  I guess the FX 5950 Ultra was a pretty solid chipset, but I think the 6000 series was about out by the time that was released.

[Bobbias]

Well, I had a FX 5600, and it was decent, but considering PS2.0 was so slow, most of the games my brother and I wanted to play that were kinda new used PS2.0, and so it kinda sucked. We had that card for quite a while, and only stopped using it when I got this computer.

Oh, and about them running hot: I'm not sure how hot mine ran, since they didn't have the hardware to check temperature, but my fan on my card died, and I had to buy a replacement for it. I began to get corruption, driver resets, and other bad issues (BSODs when it started to really overheat), and it wasn't until the fan completely failed that I noticed (As in, it didn't spin.) what happened was this: The fan uses magnets to spin it, and the part that the fins are attached to sits on a metal rod sticking out of the center. The plastic part that the fins are part of actually came right apart from that metal pin so that even though the mechanism should work, because it had nothing to spin on, it didn't move. That caused the card to overheat REALLY quickly. As in, about 2 minutes under load and I'd get garbage on the screen, and another minute or two and it would BSOD.

[A2P]

This is all caps lock for fucking emphasis, so be warned.

I FUCKING HATE IT WHEN SOME ASSHOLE DECIDES "OH I CAN'T BEAT ANYBODYS SCORES ON ITG HERE, OH WAIT, I KNOW" AND FUCKING DELETE FUCKING EVERYTHING.

GOD DAMN IT. THE ONLY PROOF I HAD A QUAD STAR WAS ON THAT MACHINE. AND NOW IT'S GONE. FUCKING GONE!

YOU BLEW IT UP! DAMN YOU!!!! DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!!!!!!!!!!

[Bobbias]

Why are they allowd to delete it? Seriously, that's just stupid to start with.

[Spectere]

I began to get corruption, driver resets, and other bad issues (BSODs when it started to really overheat), and it wasn't until the fan completely failed that I noticed (As in, it didn't spin.)

Oh, don't worry.  If you do decide to go with ATI, you'll get things like that even when there aren't temperature issues.

Why are they allowd to delete it? Seriously, that's just stupid to start with.

In other words, they sucked up to one of the arcade operators enough to get them to clear the scoreboard.

Also, my condolences, A2P.

[Bobbias]

Scene kids. Nothing more needs to be said.

You know, I actually like the way scene kids (well, moreso hardcore kids) look. There's a pretty good local hardcore scene right now, actually. Also, Grindcore is amazing music.

[A2P]

In other words, they sucked up to one of the arcade operators enough to get them to clear the scoreboard.

Also, my condolences, A2P.

12/07/07...NEVER FORGET

PS It was more someone hacked a code to get into the operator menu and decided to be all like "let's delete the scores because this I dont like this girl and I can never be better than her!!!!!!!!" but same difference.

[Spectere]

PS It was more someone hacked a code to get into the operator menu and decided to be all like "let's delete the scores because this I dont like this girl and I can never be better than her!!!!!!!!" but same difference.

Or, if your machine is anything like the one in Boardman, they just pushed the coin return button into the machine and used a pool stick to hit the operator button.  Heh.

That mentality is ridiculous.  What makes them think that their shitty scores won't just be overwritten?  It's like if I were to reset the scores on the ITG2 in Maryland; it would only be a matter of time before the board is almost completely filled with 99s and 100s again.

[A2P]

Too bad our machine won't, because now the machine is getting pulled...