AMD Radeon R7 200 Series Video Card - AVOID

[Devildog73]

All,
I posted this on the Newshawks thread also....

If you are ever tempted to go out and buy an AMD Radeon R7 200 Series vid card with 2GB of video RAM,

DON'T BOTHER! Get that thought out of your head.

I did and regret it. I am switching back to my nVidia GeForce 9800GT with only 1GB of vid RAM.

Here is my experience:
When I installed it, it needed new drivers. Okay-typical.
Twice. Okay, not so typical.

It has 2 cooling fans on the card. They are noisy beyond belief.

Then, in CFS2 it will not render 2D cockpits properly, so there is no manually starting engines.

At any point in flight the screen will go black and there is no recovery key to bring the screen back on.
I have turned OFF every screen/power saving setting. My display should remain on continually forever with the settings I have.

I have a massive power supply unit that more than meets the specs for the video card. I have all the proper connections plugged in and cooling fans work just fine except for the noise.

I contacted AMD. They answered me back right away and they do not provide service for "their" AMD Radeon R7s because they are sub-contracted out to some nefarious Communist Chinese company on mainland China. When I tried to contact the sub-contractor, twice, no reply back. It has been about a month now. (I am fairly certain they are not out celebrating Christmas or western New Years).

Bottom Line: Avoid AMD video cards like you avoid Ebola.

(Climbing down off my soapbox).

[misson]

I contacted AMD. They answered me back right away and they do not provide service for "their" AMD Radeon R7s because they are sub-contracted out to some nefarious Communist Chinese company on mainland China. When I tried to contact the sub-contractor, twice, no reply back. It has been about a month now. (I am fairly certain they are not out celebrating Christmas or western New Years).

Bottom Line: Avoid AMD video cards like you avoid Ebola.

(Climbing down off my soapbox).They cover all the world (chinesse products), not easy to avoid! LOL
Thanks for advice any way! i use envidia 9500 GT 1G
Cheers
Mario

[Shadow Wolf 07]

Sorry to read of your troubles. My laptop has an Nvidia GeForce GT 740M series. Not sure what my desktop has 'cause I hardly ever use it. :wiggle:

[Blood_Hawk23]

I've had 4 Nvidia cards on 3 different computers. I loved all of them. I've had one AMD and hate it. So yeah stay with the Nvidias.

My advice, when upgrading, is only get what you need. Anything else is kind of a waste. Unless you want the biggest and baddest thing on the market. Then by all means, have at it.

[Shessi]

It's not an issue of who makes the card, it's an issue of a modern card being fitted to older systems and trying to use it for a very old game/sim.

I've used nothing but ATi/AMD cards, have had no problems at all, and my current Ati card runs CFS1,2,3,FS9, FSX and Rise of Flight very well.

People seem to think that latest technology will work just as the older stuff but give much better frame rates, resolution etc, but unfortunately the OS and the actual sim are the bad boys here. CFS2 is a major problem, it needs so little in terms of CPU/GPU/RAM/HDD power/speed etc that when modern OS's, GPU's or memory et al are chucked at it, it may not work, or at least it will not work any faster, produce any more FR's or have higher resolutions.

DD, why did you upgrade your graphics card? The 9800GT is an old but a very good card, and perfect for CFS2. Did it go wrong, were you trying to get more out of CFS2, or was is that you wanted to run other sim's/games?

If you have this older card then you are probably running a 32 bit version of XP or Vista (just maybe Win7), your 'new' card is only a year or so old and designed for the latest/greatest and certainly 64 bit systems.

If you read the CFS2 forums you will see that people with modern OS's and hardware have to run CFS2 in windowed mode, not use 2D cockpit screens and other issues. Unfortunately, and I understand why, it's all because people think they can use the latest technology straight out of the box for old OS's and such an old sim. And although on the odd occasion it may work, most of the time there are issues such as your's, as frustrating as that is.

Cheers

Shessi

[Devildog73]

Shessi,
Thanks.
I have grandsons who come over and try to play their newest high end video games on my pc. They needed more vid RAM.

I upgraded to give them more and figured it would boost all of my flight sims as well. WRONG.

As you have pointed out, newer is not always better. The Radeon would also not properly render graphics on other older games I have on the machine for the boys.

You are right on the nVidia GeForce 9800GT being a very good graphics card. With Talon's setting advice I get over 100fps in all CFS2 installs. The Radeon only gave me about 58fps even though it had twice the RAM.

I suppose at some point in time I will take my current PC off line and go back to XP 32 bit and 3 GB system RAM with the nVidia GeForce 9800GT card.
Then I will buy or build a new system once Micro$oft comes out with WIN9 instead of 8 and 8.1, which I view on the order of Win2K and Vista.

Right now, I am running dual boot, dual install WIN7x64 and WIN7x32 on two separate internal 500 GB 7200 RPM HDs. The 64 bit sees all 6 GB of RAM. The 32 bit sees only 3 GB of RAM.

I have taken the Radeon vid card out and reinstalled the nVidia GeForce. I don't have to run CFS2 in windowed mode yet on either WIN7 system. That is something I didn't try with the Radeon card.
I have the 32 bit HD partitioned with all my CFS2 installs on a dedicated partition and WIN7x32 on its own partition.

WIN7x64 is my day to day system for everything else. I have shortcuts to all CFS2 installs and MBs (10) in a folder on the 64 bit system desktop.

I have a huge virtual memory paging file (12 GB) on the 64 bit HD, the 6 GB of system RAM, and run CFS2 from the 64 bit WIN7 with no problems on the 1 GB nVidia card. Last night I got over 200fps while building and flying BPF missions.

The real problem, in my opinion, is we elder dinosaurs have yet to see any new combat flight sims come out that rivals or improves upon CFS2.

Micro$oft, also in my opinion, has really missed out in not bringing forth a new and improved combat flight sim, or releasing the CFS2 code so some of the really good computer guys and gals out here could work something up.

I know we have folks here in the basement and elsewhere who like CFS3. I have it, but view it as a impotent effort on M$'s part to advance on CFS2. It is not nearly the sim CFS2 is.

** And where are all of the folks building all of the new high demand graphics slash and kill, blood and guts, virtual nightmare games on building flight simulations?
Surely some of those corporations have the talent to build a decent combat flight sim.

[Shessi]

That is what I get with my ATi/AMD card it is the same vintage as yours, an ATi HD 4890. It is the way Ati/AMD cards render, it is different to Nvidia cards, and you won't get any more except in windowed mode. Anyway more than 30 fps is wasted, it's what a card will do when loaded, my card is stable at that figure with almost anything I throw at it.

TBH, I would run VM ware and have a virtual XP OS running and run CFS2 within that, none of this dual boot faffing around. It will run well, full screen mode, but whether you could run a new card and get all the things to work in CFS2, I doubt it.
Or why not get an old small-form-factor pc and have it just for CFS2, a monitor switch so you only have to have one screen, and use your home wi-fi system for transfering things to and from it. Then upgrade your main pc's card and everyone is happy!! (I've just looked on Ebay US and there are loads of the ideal SFF pc's for $50-$100)

As for other sims, well if you've not seen what's been done for CFS3 over the last year, they have reflections and shaddowing to die for, water looks as good as upgraded Fs9 water! AI is better than CFS2 (always has been), and yes still that semi-fish-eye look (which is not good), AND yes tis a b*gger to set up and seems to differ for everyones installations, but has come a long long way.

You've also got Rise of Flight, Cliffs of Dover(COD) and other IL2 sims, and the new DCS sims, graphics are stunning especially COD, and huge on-line play. Now with that new DirectX 12.0 or 13.0 card you would also be able to run all of these on your Win7 system as well..........the sky's the limit..ha ha!.;)

Cheers

Shessi

[Devildog73]

T
You've also got Rise of Flight, Cliffs of Dover(COD) and other IL2 sims, and the new DCS sims, graphics are stunning especially COD, and huge on-line play. Now with that new DirectX 12.0 or 13.0 card you would also be able to run all of these on your Win7 system as well..........the sky's the limit..ha ha!.;)

Cheers

Shessi

Shessi,

Happy New Year.

Are Rise of Flight, Cliffs of Dover, or DCS sims combat flight?

Ddog

[Shessi]

Hi DD,
Yes, I can even play Rise of Flight (WWI) on my XP 4890 system, but not the others, which are fine on 7,8 and 8.1 systems.
Have a look on YouTube to see some game play and the graphics, I think you'll be wowed.

And a Happy New Year to you as well!

Cheers

Shessi