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Which has the better brand, and why?

Reason I'm asking is, since my tryout of Linux, I'm going to be as bold as building my own PC next. What are their strengths and weaknesses?

I honestly can't answer this question in any meaningful, scientific fashion, but all my video cards have always been nVidia, and they've always been top-notch.

nVidia- vastly better linux (and windows) drivers, plus x86_64 Linux driver support *now*.

Nvidia. Last round, ATI cleaned their clocks, but for the newest generation of cards, Nvidia's cards are improving with new drivers at a faster rate than ATI's, they have a more complete feature set, and they just announced some incredibly kickass cards in the $200 range (the 6600 series), while ATI can only counter with the craptastic X600 series, which are just 9600 XTs with higher clock speeds and no significant changes.

I've always found ATI to pack more punch for the dollar, but if you're going to linux going with nvidia might be better, since every ATI card i have linux working with has the same "bug" i.e. the graphics don't start unless i move my mouse around when the GUI starts running.

ATi keep promising better OpenGL support, but haven't delivered it so far.

Until they do, their cards will run like cock in Linux.

Agh, this old Holy War again!?


I've always used nVidia, so my opinion is hopelessly biased. They're good, just make sure you don't get an MX...

Depends.

NVidia has better drivers. I think NVidia also supplies the lowest priced 128 MB, DirectX 9 card, though the chip itself (Geforce FX 5200) only is barely faster than it's predecessor, the Geforce 4, in actual speed.
The high end Geforce FX Ultras suck really bad. I mean they really suck, power
They take a lot of power, have a fan that is actually louder than some leaf blowers, and take up two slots.

With the exception of the new gen cards that just came out, ATI made the better high end card (Radeon 9800XT cost the same as the Geforce FX 5950 Ultra, but is half the size, less noisy, and takes less power).

With the new generation cards, NVidia and ATi are neck to neck (6800 vs X800) for high end (though we have the driver advantage of the NVidia) and with the low end, NVidia ownz, with the 6600 GT for $199 that whups the pants off the Radeon 9800 XT.

GoldenFalcon wrote: Reason I'm asking is, since my tryout of Linux, I'm going to be as bold as building my own PC next.

Get a motherboard with PCIe, and get a $199 Geforce 6600 GT. It'll smack down your buddies with $500 Radeon 9800 XT's, and you can buy a second one if you really crave speed

I have an Nvidia and it's done me good since the beginning.


But anyway, the other guys pretty much have it down. ATI's cards also have problems with many graphical applications, but traditionally have been better for gaming.

But it's neck to neck for this generation, as they've said.