FF7 - Got Hardware Acceleration Working; CD-ROM problem!

[Goku7]

Ahh, forget it! This new driver not only doesn't work with FF7, it doesn't work with any other game. That's it. No more. I am grateful that Software Rendering mode works on 2000.

Thanks everyone for all the information, help, tips, and etc. Out of all this I know that I'm never again going to purchase an ATI card. :erm:

See you guys around. Take care.  

Whoa, slow down there, dude.  The Rage Pro series of ATi cards was indeed notorious for rather bad drivers.  However, they've made some pretty good strides in their current product lineups (i.e. the Radeon), and ATi is pretty much the king of hardware-accelerated mpeg1 and 2 decoding, so not all of their stuff is junk.

Don't count ATi out completely.  Besides, the Canadian economy's gotta be kept alive somehow!

[Caddberry]

I had an ATI Rage Pro... AGP 8MB .. god that thing was crap.. just down right awful.. then again it was only 8 MB .. but damn it was crap.. for that reason alone i hated ATI.. so i am kinda leary when it comes to the Raedon..

Off topic.. a friend of mine told me that Canada just legalized Marijuana all over the country.. true? false? cuz if it was then that would stabilize the economy..

[Lord Kane]

>then again it was only 8 MB

The S3 Savage was only 8 meg, but it managed to do a shedload with it. Admittedly the drivers for it were cack, and it exploded on my but.....

[Threesixty]

I forgot about this thread.....

Anyway, I recall that Rage cards only worked with FF7, with only, about, 2 drivers. Obsolete drivers....

Here is a link, I don't know if the drivers are compatible with your ATI card, or how easy it will be to try them......I suggest that your next video card to be a Geforce. It the only brand worth buying, in my opinion.

http://www.ati.com/support/infobase/3354.html

[ficedula]

Well, as far as FF7 goes, I have a Radeon and all I needed to do was apply the NVidia patch and it all worked, no problems at all.

ATI may have a history of bad drivers, but the Radeon's mostly have all of that sorted out - I've not had any issues with mine. Plus, at the moment, the Radeon 9700 *is* the fastest card you can get - no question about it. Based on my experience, I'd definitely buy another ATI; especially given the features you can find on them (when was the last time you saw the low end budget GeForce with Monitor out, TV-out *and* Digital monitor out? And the ability to have all three on at once? )

[Lord Kane]

when was the last time you saw the low end budget GeForce with Monitor out, TV-out *and* Digital monitor out? And the ability to have all three on at once?

What like the GeForce 4 Ti4200?

[Aaron]

(when was the last time you saw the low end budget GeForce with Monitor out, TV-out *and* Digital monitor out? And the ability to have all three on at once?  )

Heh, my TI 4600 has that, but... its not exactly low end budget I guess.  Never tried all three at once, but I think with the detonator 40 drivers you can do all kinds of funky stuff with the multi-monitor outs... it has options to turn the screen sideways and stuff.

[ficedula]

What like the GeForce 4 Ti4200?

What, so the GeForce 4 MX's don't exist anymore - someone's destroyed them all? (No great loss, IMO...). Last time I heard, they were the current NVidia budget card...

[Aaron]

Heh, MX are pretty cheap, but Ti 4200's can sell for just over $100, which isn't really that expensive considering that I bought my Ti 4600 for $300, and the performance difference isn't that much.

[Goku7]

Well, the performance difference may not be much, but the hardware support difference is.

IIRC, everyone bashes the GF4 MX series because it doesn't have pixel shader support (dunno about vertex shaders...), and therefore acts like a GF2 with shiny new packaging and a misleading name, lol.

So, in the event that I absolutely had to buy and use an nVidia card (God forbid, LOL!), I'd definitely NOT go for the MX series.

[Aaron]

Yes, MX don't have hardware support for as many effects as the Ti.  I think it can do Vertex Shaders (err, my TNT2 could do vertex shaders...) but it can't do Pixel Shaders.  However, depending on what you want to use it for, it might not be a bad card, especially considering that the MX 420 is just over $50 I think.

[Lord Kane]

The MX is a good stopgap card if you are looking for something cheap to keep you going till there are more games wich support DX8+ effects. It is just a GF2 with a rocket shoved firmly up it's a$$crack tho.

[dgp9999]

Why don't you all get S3 Virge DXs? That card was alright.... came with Tomb Raider too!  

My friend has a GeForceTi 4600 (Asus Ultra Deluxe) and it's got a weird connector on the back of it which we aren't sure what it is. It kinda looks like:

____________________
. . . . . . . . . . . |___|___|
. . . . . . . . . . . |___|___|
____________|___|___|

It's really strange.

[Synergy Blades]

dgp9999, check this image of it:

http://www.hardocp.com/images/articles/1026265995XVRLEnILCZ_1_16_l.jpg

From the article itself,

You will find the standard VGA port and DVI port, but there is also a port called TV. This lets you hook up the multimedia break out box you also find pictured here. With this you have full VIVO, S-Video, and Composite In and Out. There is also a provided DVI cable that splits off into one VGA and one DVI port allowing you to have Dual VGA support.

I think what you're describing is the DVI port...?

[Aaron]

Mine has VGA, DVI, and S-Video.  DVI is for some new flat-panel monitors that use a fancy digital signal.  Never been able to tell the difference between a flat-panel on DVI and a flat-panel on VGA, though.

[Goku7]

Never been able to tell the difference between a flat-panel on DVI and a flat-panel on VGA, though.

So......is that a good thing about flat-panel monitors?