Falconise

TYVM Falcon! It's nice to see a colleague of sorts here! Whether nVidia Quadro or AMD/ATI FireGL is the better choice, really boils down to which price range you are looking at. Although I have no personal experience with the two lines, I read a very good article comparing them all (CPU Magazine July 08 -- Pro Graphic Battle Royale). The only two cards to score the highest of the lot (4.5 of 5 stars) were the nVidia Quadro FX 3700 and AMD FireGL V7700. The two cards performed similarly, but seems to me the Quadro edged out the FireGL in most tests. The biggest difference between the two is the price: Quadro FX 3700 at $1599 and the FireGL V7700 at $1099. That's a $500 (30%) difference for roughly the same performance. This adds up real fast if you need 10 of them! In the lower end, the Quadro FX 570 is only $199, where the cheapest AMD/ATI card they tested was the FireGL V7600 at $999. Apples and oranges. So, a couple of big questions before I can take a stand, since it really boils down to: which exact models you are looking at? How many systems will you be assembling? In other words, budget. If you need 5-10 systems in the end, I would suggest building only two at first. Identical in every way, except one has a Quadro the other has a FireGL. Let a couple of the architects use a system for a couple weeks, then swap them into the other system for two more weeks. Then, consult with them to see which of the two they prefered and why. Now you can go ahead and make more of the systems using the prefered vid card and maybe a few other tweaks to the component list (that you discovered when building and setup of the first two). If you only need 2-5 systems then this may be a little difficult to pull off, and would be best if you could return for exchange, the video card you decide against. A good supplier should not have a problem with this, when he is getting several sales out of the deal in the end. If you are looking at the lower end cards, it seems nVidia is the only player in town. In the mid range $1000+, it seems the FireGL is a huge bargin, providing the users like it. In the highest range $1900 - $3000, it seems there is little benefit for the massive price jump. Here is a quick scan of the article results table: .

That card might be a little weak for gaming. There are some greatdeals on the GeForce 8800GT, and 9800GTX+ Recently saw the 8800GT for $100, and the 9800GTX+ for $200. Both cards have plenty of horsepower to run games at high settings and high FPS. These cards have been reduced in price because of the Radeon 4870's and 4850's being more powerful in their price range. It sort of put the 8800 and 9800 in limbo (used to be $200 and $300 respecitvely). The 4870 is a little pricey, but the 4850's are also a good deal these days. I tend to stay away from ATI/Radeons because they do not offer lifetime warrantys line nVidia cards from eVGA and XFX do. Also, I do not like the ATI control panel, takes way too long to launch and requires Microsoft Netframework to be installed first, which means after a fresh install you need to do all your patching without the vid driver installed! .

Thought of this analogy yesterday. If a computer were a piston engine... The cpu speed is how fast the car is going. The ram speed is what gear the car is in. At a constant speed of 2.66GHz... Ram at DDR2-667 is lugging along with great gas milage. Ram at DDR2-800 has just come out of overdrive to pass. Ram at DDR2-1066 has just kicked into second gear to pass on a hill. Ram at DDR2-1200 is winding out first gear in a street drag race! Each gear can maintain a particular speed, but each progressively faster RPM has more power at it's disposal and burns more gas. .

Yes, thats me! I have to do some work on my main rig, sold a vid card and dvd in it and have to setup new. But then out comes the IL2 disk and try to refresh myself of all the keys. Lol, last time I tried to fly, I couldn't get off the ground. The tourqe was getting me. .

LOL, thanks!

OMG, if I could only avoid that myself! I constantly break things trying to fix them a bit better!