Opinions sought on video card for PS

Matrox

"Mark" wrote in message

I just bought a new monitor and I was wondering what benefit if any there would be in getting a better Video card. Right now if I create a black to white gradient across the display I see significant banding, for

instance.

Would this be an issue of the screen or the card delivering the signal to it? Would a better card enable me to properly calibrate the display with

a

product like the BasICColor Squid?
Right now the ‘puter has an Intel 82865G graphics controller. Any recommendations?
Thanks all,
Mark

In article <91rmd.3537$ says…

Matrox

"Mark" wrote in message

I just bought a new monitor and I was wondering what benefit if any there would be in getting a better Video card. Right now if I create a black to white gradient across the display I see significant banding, for

instance.

Would this be an issue of the screen or the card delivering the signal to it? Would a better card enable me to properly calibrate the display with

a

product like the BasICColor Squid?
Right now the ‘puter has an Intel 82865G graphics controller. Any recommendations?
Thanks all,
Mark

I second that opinion. Starting with whatever their 450 series is now to the Parhalia. Multi-monitor support, even if you are not using it now, is a big plus with PS. I still have an older 450G 64MB Matrox that is functioning beautifully at 1280×1024 on two 21" screens in PS CS. It will actually push the main beyond that, but then the toolbox gets too small for my working distance. The newer cards are faster via processor and offer more VRAM, but that is less important in 2-D. Beyond Matrox, most of the current crop of nVidia cards will work, but most of the $ in them is for 3-D apps, and gaming. Not a bottleneck for PS, just relatively useless.

Hunt

On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 12:23:03 -0500, "Mark" wrote:

I just bought a new monitor and I was wondering what benefit if any there would be in getting a better Video card. Right now if I create a black to white gradient across the display I see significant banding, for instance. Would this be an issue of the screen or the card delivering the signal to it? Would a better card enable me to properly calibrate the display with a product like the BasICColor Squid?
Right now the ‘puter has an Intel 82865G graphics controller. Any recommendations?
Thanks all,
Mark

Matrox or ATi Radeon.

—

Hecate – The Real One

veni, vidi, reliqui

Hunt wrote:

In article <91rmd.3537$ says…

Matrox

"Mark" wrote in message

I just bought a new monitor and I was wondering what benefit if any there would be in getting a better Video card. Right now if I create a black to white gradient across the display I see significant banding, for

instance.

Would this be an issue of the screen or the card delivering the signal to it? Would a better card enable me to properly calibrate the display with

a

product like the BasICColor Squid?
Right now the ‘puter has an Intel 82865G graphics controller. Any recommendations?
Thanks all,
Mark

I second that opinion. Starting with whatever their 450 series is now to the Parhalia. Multi-monitor support, even if you are not using it now, is a big plus with PS. I still have an older 450G 64MB Matrox that is functioning beautifully at 1280×1024 on two 21" screens in PS CS. It will actually push the main beyond that, but then the toolbox gets too small for my working distance. The newer cards are faster via processor and offer more VRAM, but that is less important in 2-D. Beyond Matrox, most of the current crop of nVidia cards will work, but most of the $ in them is for 3-D apps, and gaming. Not a bottleneck for PS, just relatively useless.

Hunt

How much vram do you need for 2D only? Do you really need 64MB?

In article , says…

Hunt wrote:

In article <91rmd.3537$ says…

Matrox

"Mark" wrote in message

I just bought a new monitor and I was wondering what benefit if any

there

would be in getting a better Video card. Right now if I create a black

to

white gradient across the display I see significant banding, for

instance.

Would this be an issue of the screen or the card delivering the signal

to

it? Would a better card enable me to properly calibrate the display with

a

product like the BasICColor Squid?
Right now the ‘puter has an Intel 82865G graphics controller. Any recommendations?
Thanks all,
Mark

I second that opinion. Starting with whatever their 450 series is now to

the

Parhalia. Multi-monitor support, even if you are not using it now, is a big plus with PS. I still have an older 450G 64MB Matrox that is functioning beautifully at 1280×1024 on two 21" screens in PS CS. It will actually push the main beyond that, but then the toolbox gets too small for my working distance. The newer cards are faster via processor and offer more VRAM, but that is less important in 2-D. Beyond Matrox, most of the current crop of nVidia cards will work, but most of the $ in them is for 3-D apps, and

gaming.

Not a bottleneck for PS, just relatively useless.

Hunt

How much vram do you need for 2D only? Do you really need 64MB?

Probably not, but that was the "gold standard" when I bought that card. I also do some light 3-D stuff with it, so I went with the "best" that Matrox offered then. I have two 128 cards on other machines and don’t see a whit of difference with PS, and I’m pushing *about* the same rez on single monitors with them. I would be interested in seeing some emperical tests of vid-cards and vid-RAM with PS, as this is a much discussed issue, and all I have seen are the, "this worked for me" comments, just like my own.

OTOH, it might be difficult to find a vid-card with less than 64MB, except at a swap meet, or e-bay.

Hunt

Mark wrote:

I just bought a new monitor and I was wondering what benefit if any there would be in getting a better Video card. Right now if I create a black to white gradient across the display I see significant banding, for instance. Would this be an issue of the screen or the card delivering the signal to it? Would a better card enable me to properly calibrate the display with a product like the BasICColor Squid?
Right now the ‘puter has an Intel 82865G graphics controller. Any recommendations?
Thanks all,
Mark

Where do you live? I’ve a Matrox G550 for sale (AGP)…

Waldo

On 17 Nov 2004 16:33:29 GMT, (Hunt) wrote:

OTOH, it might be difficult to find a vid-card with less than 64MB, except at a swap meet, or e-bay.

VRAM is totally unimportant ass far as 2D is concerned because VRAM is almost only concerned with 3D processing.

—

Hecate – The Real One

veni, vidi, reliqui

Hecate wrote:

On 17 Nov 2004 16:33:29 GMT, (Hunt) wrote:

OTOH, it might be difficult to find a vid-card with less than 64MB, except at a swap meet, or e-bay.

VRAM is totally unimportant ass far as 2D is concerned because VRAM is almost only concerned with 3D processing.

Would a 32MB card support dual monitors (19" or 21") in PS?

In article , says…

Hecate wrote:

On 17 Nov 2004 16:33:29 GMT, (Hunt) wrote:

OTOH, it might be difficult to find a vid-card with less than 64MB, except

at

a swap meet, or e-bay.

VRAM is totally unimportant ass far as 2D is concerned because VRAM is almost only concerned with 3D processing.

Would a 32MB card support dual monitors (19" or 21") in PS?

That I cannot say. The first dual-head Matrox card, that I got was 64MB. I don’t see many cards of less than 64 these days, and have not read the specs to see if any are dual-head. Might want to try a Google for "dual-head" in all possible variations, plus dual monitor, dual display, etc. and see who makes what. Another thought would be to use 2 32MB cards, but you have to have the slots and the right card, i.e. 1-AGP, 1-PCI, etc.

Hunt

On Thu, 18 Nov 2004 15:01:57 GMT, wrote:

Hecate wrote:

On 17 Nov 2004 16:33:29 GMT, (Hunt) wrote:

OTOH, it might be difficult to find a vid-card with less than 64MB, except at a swap meet, or e-bay.

VRAM is totally unimportant ass far as 2D is concerned because VRAM is almost only concerned with 3D processing.

Would a 32MB card support dual monitors (19" or 21") in PS?

I doubt that you could find a 32Mb RAM with dual monitor support. However, if you want to install two of those cards, one for each monitor..

—

Hecate – The Real One

veni, vidi, reliqui

Matrox Millennium G550 is a 32meg dual monitor card. I’m using one as I write this.

Hope this helps,
Dave

Matrox or 3DLabs

"Mark" wrote in message

I just bought a new monitor and I was wondering what benefit if any there would be in getting a better Video card. Right now if I create a black to white gradient across the display I see significant banding, for instance. Would this be an issue of the screen or the card delivering the signal to it? Would a better card enable me to properly calibrate the display with a product like the BasICColor Squid?
Right now the ‘puter has an Intel 82865G graphics controller. Any recommendations?
Thanks all,
Mark

On Sat, 20 Nov 2004 02:08:39 GMT, "DSphotog"
wrote:

Matrox Millennium G550 is a 32meg dual monitor card. I’m using one as I write this.

It used to be. I bought one with a new computer and you couldn’t get one that didn’t have 128Mb.

—

Hecate – The Real One

veni, vidi, reliqui

Thanks to all for the advice. In the meantime I’ve replaced my Intel video controller with my old computer’s nVidia 128 mb video card and can’t say it has made a bit of difference to my PS CS experience. Does anyone have experience using a digital video card? What has helped is using a BasICColor Squid monitor calibration package. There is quite a noticeable difference when at startup the new monitor profile at D65 is loaded. I am still finding the monitor, LG Flatron L1710b, way contrasty (set to 45), bright (dialed down to 50 on monitor), and generally hard to look at for a long time. At work we have Apple 23" Cinema Displays so admittedly I’m spoiled. The LG costs less than a quarter of the Apple!

As a sidebar I admit I do spend some time playing my flight simulator game and the nVidia card has made a huge improvement.

Mark

"Mark" wrote in message

I just bought a new monitor and I was wondering what benefit if any there would be in getting a better Video card. Right now if I create a black to white gradient across the display I see significant banding, for instance. Would this be an issue of the screen or the card delivering the signal to it? Would a better card enable me to properly calibrate the display with a product like the BasICColor Squid?
Right now the ‘puter has an Intel 82865G graphics controller. Any recommendations?
Thanks all,
Mark

Hecate,

This is copied from the Matrox site:

Millennium G550 – Exceptional stability

With millions of installed units worldwide, these are stable and reliable entry-level graphics boards for graphic designers and digital photographers that feature DualHead

On Sun, 21 Nov 2004 22:29:06 GMT, "DSphotog"
wrote:

Hecate,

This is copied from the Matrox site:

Millennium G550 – Exceptional stability

<g> Now actually try and *buy* one with only 32Mb 😉

—

Hecate – The Real One

veni, vidi, reliqui

On Sun, 21 Nov 2004 09:53:25 -0500, "Mark" wrote:

Thanks to all for the advice. In the meantime I’ve replaced my Intel video controller with my old computer’s nVidia 128 mb video card and can’t say it has made a bit of difference to my PS CS experience. Does anyone have experience using a digital video card? What has helped is using a BasICColor Squid monitor calibration package. There is quite a noticeable difference when at startup the new monitor profile at D65 is loaded. I am still finding the monitor, LG Flatron L1710b, way contrasty (set to 45), bright (dialed down to 50 on monitor), and generally hard to look at for a long time. At work we have Apple 23" Cinema Displays so admittedly I’m spoiled. The LG costs less than a quarter of the Apple!

As a sidebar I admit I do spend some time playing my flight simulator game and the nVidia card has made a huge improvement.

The NVidia cards are the worst at 2D in all the tests I’ve seen. Radeons and Matrox do 2D much better (i.e. faster, better optimised).

—

Hecate – The Real One

veni, vidi, reliqui

Hecate wrote:

On Sun, 21 Nov 2004 22:29:06 GMT, "DSphotog"
wrote:

Hecate,

This is copied from the Matrox site:

Millennium G550 – Exceptional stability

<g> Now actually try and *buy* one with only 32Mb 😉
—

Hecate – The Real One

veni, vidi, reliqui

I see a few on ebay for $10