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 Grand Theft Auto IV
 ATI Problems - an analysis
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XLM1  |
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PC gamer union
Group: Members
Joined: May 3, 2008
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Hello all, i was abstinent some time, but having now GTA IV, it makes me come back. I have also an ATI (4850), though experiencing most of the problems stated here. I have the luck wo work for an IT-Company which distributes also hardware. Given this, i had the opportunity to mess around with diffrend hardware and software configurations. My conclusion is: GTA IV is havily optimized for NVIDIA putting ATI into the posion to "just being able to play it". So, what iīve basically done is, to test GTAIV on various rigs. Also, most of my friends also having GTA IV, also have ATI-Cards, so we met today in the company to mess around in the lab. I donīt have the time, to write down all the (five) configurations we tested, but only the conclusions: 1. All ATI-Cards have problems. Some differ from others but all share one prob: poor performance in terms of fps. 2. They performed really bad, indepentend of CPU and RAM and OS (XP SP3 / Vista SP1). Having this said, it leads me to conclude, that R*-Bitches optimized it so havy for nvidia, that there are consequently Problems with ATI-Cards. In the past there were also situations with games, which were optimized for ATI cards thus leading NVIDIA user to have problems. This is an fact, which results in optimizations for a specific kind of architectures. In my case we used an 2900XT, 3850XT (Overclocked), a standard 4850 and a factory overclocked 4870 from Sapphire. We tried diffrent drivers from ATI and other ones (Catalyst etc.). Still having the same problems. Like some guys already said on this forums: ati put things straight in terms of "fixes" some times, but as you know from some games, those fixes only prevented crashing etc. So there are always limits within a fix can do things. I guess, that in GTAIV those limits are very low, so that a fix wonīt do things better concerning fps correlated with texture quality. Also, i feel somehow acknowledged by the fact, that the pre-release version sent to some Magazines (european and us ones), didnīt even "support" ATI cards thus the game was crashing. Here is a link to a german mag, which tested the performance of GTA IV on a broad range of Systems with the pre-release Candidate (November): Keep an eye on the box on the lower right, displaying the unablity to play on any ATI-Cards Click Me They also state, that there were problems with some Geforce 7-Series, but the source of the problems was driver-side. Also there is a Quad-Core CPU needed to run the game while it does crash with "simple" P4s. The overall Quality adjustments you can make in GTA4 depend only from the memory of the GPU. I have the feeling and to some extend also an acknowledgement, that (a) GTA IV is a bad port like it precedors and (b) this time NVIDIA did suck some cocks @ R*. As some of you may know, i am a consequent person. I said to myself in the past, that i wonīt buy a console if GTA IV isnīt shipping for PC. In this case i brought it back to my vendor, because i wonīt buy myself a NVDIA, just because some assholes are horny on money and advertising. This thread was not intended to display my consequence or anger, but give those ppl with ATI-Cards some input. There is still hope, that an adjusted driver (its not a damn fix!!) will pull it. So keep hoping if you want to play this game, not purchasing a console. In my case: R* kiss my ass  This post has been edited by XLM1 on Dec 2 2008, 12:10 |
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| Tomern11 |
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UKIVCLAN.TK
Group: Members
Joined: Aug 6, 2008
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| QUOTE (XLM1 @ Dec 2 2008, 12:24) | Let me put things straight: ATI user still can play the game! But what i was trying to state is, that having a good rig doesnīt guarantee good graphics / fps, when you have an ATI. There might be also some problems with NVIDIA ( on the 8800GTS we only occured some flackering of the leaves), but compared so the problems of good ATI cards (mspaint-shadows, AA problems etc.), it still has better graphics and performance! Iīm saying this, having in mind that Resolutions of 800x and low-settings arent the way the game is meant to be played (  what an ironical sentence). |
So if i have an core 2 quad 2.4 GHz, 3 GB RAM, and an ATI radeon 3870 HD 512 mb i'll hardly max it?! |
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| Malik |
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IV
Group: BUSTED!
Joined: Feb 10, 2008
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| QUOTE (Tomern11 @ Dec 2 2008, 13:20) | | QUOTE (XLM1 @ Dec 2 2008, 12:24) | | Let me put things straight: ATI user still can play the game! But what i was trying to state is, that having a good rig doesnīt guarantee good graphics / fps, when you have an ATI. There might be also some problems with NVIDIA ( on the 8800GTS we only occured some flackering of the leaves), but compared so the problems of good ATI cards (mspaint-shadows, AA problems etc.), it still has better graphics and performance! Iīm saying this, having in mind that Resolutions of 800x and low-settings arent the way the game is meant to be played ( what an ironical sentence). |
So if i have an core 2 quad 2.4 GHz, 3 GB RAM, and an ATI radeon 3870 HD 512 mb i'll hardly max it?! |
ull hardly low-medium it |
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| GTA_XP |
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Homie
Group: BUSTED!
Joined: Jan 14, 2008
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| Homer Simpson |
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Mod God(Retired) & Beer Drinker
Group: Members
Joined: May 22, 2002
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| GTA_XP |
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Homie
Group: BUSTED!
Joined: Jan 14, 2008
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