[::maroma::]

(posted this in Mac Games earlier, but I don't think that was the right forum, so I'll try here)

I'm in the market for an upgrade to my video card. Here are my current specs:

G4/500 Sawtooth AGP
GeForce3 64MB (flashed)
1G RAM
10.2.4

The GF3 I currently have is not too bad. The main problem with it is it has this really annoying faint flicker in the OS. Certain things make it flicker like selecting text, moving windows, scrolling, etc. I've almost gotten used to it, but I think my eyes are worse for it. I am also going to be getting a Sonnet 1GHz upgrade card and a faster hard drive. Additionally, I want to play WC3 in OS X as well as I play it in OS 9 now. I've heard rumors that the nVidia cards don't work as well with WC3 as do the ATi cards.

So at any rate, I am wondering what ATi card would be best for my system? I definitely don't want to go down in performance from the GF3, but I wouldn't mind a straight across trade in performance if only to get rid of that damned flicker. I've been trying to research the Radeon 8500 and 9000, but didn't find any good info. xlr8yourmac.com shows the 8500 to be slightly slower in most every task than the GF3.

So I thought I'd ask you kind folks if you've had any experience similar (or not) to mine, and could offer some advice. Would it be worth upgrading my GF3 card, or is the GF3 as fast as my 2x AGP can handle? Is there an ATi card that would do me better? And if anyone could chime in with their experiences with any of these cards and WC3, I would appreciate it.

[DrBoar]

I have a ATI 8500 in a G4/400 and things like Qake 3 stays rock solid at 50+ FPS at any resolution from 320x240 up to 1600x1200. So unless you ar running games above 1600x1200 resolution the CPU not the card is the limitation.

With a dual 1.42 and and the larges cinema display I am sure that the 9700 or top of the line nVIDIA will beat a Radeon 9000 but with a single CPU below the GHz it will make no difference what so ever. Get the 9000 or 8500 that is cheapest and be happy!

I run my games most of the time at 1024x768 and while the ATI 128 pro was to weak for that the 8500 was a large overkill. Could I have bought a 2mX card that would had been enough with a G4/400.

With a dual 1 GHz computer xlr8yourmac get about 120 fps at 11024x768 in Q3 for dual 533 ( the closest I could find to your computer with a GF3 card)with GF3 they get about 60 fps at all resolutions. But note that even the old Radeon keeps up with the GF3 up to 1024x768 and then dropping of rapidly above that!!! So as long as you steer clear of the Radeon 7000 card you will be in good shape even if you upgrade the CPU. The Radeon 9000 seem to work well in the current dual 1.25 . I will soon find that out for myself
So either the 8500 or 9000 will give you plenty of room to grow.

[::maroma::]

Excellent! Thanks for all of the info, this really helps clear things up. I was worried that the 8500 might be a downgrade from my GF3. The speed of my GF3 is OK, but that damn flicker is driving me nuts. I also get some weird artifacts and drawing issues with WC3.

I wouldn't run games above 1024x768 most likely. I've been an 640x480 player for years, so 1024x768 will be a nice upgrade.

Again, thanks for the info!