Which graphics card to buy?

[David Gobbi]

Hi Dimitri,

Just from the card specs available on the web, the nVidia Quadra beats
the beats the 3DLabs GVX210 by 20% for texture mapping and also has
superior geometry performance.  Plus, the GLoria II is about one third
the price of the Oxygen GVX210!

On the flip side, 3DLabs has a solid track record for professional
graphics.  The 3DLabs GVX210 can drive dual monitors and they have
promised that stereo will be available (is available?).  It is 
rumoured that the GLoria II will also support stereo eventually, but
'eventually' means several months hence.

Currently we have an Erazor X (nVidia GeForce) and an obsolete/retired 
GLoria XXL (3DLabs GMX2000).  The ErazorX gives amazing performance and
we haven't found any conformance or stability problems with it.  The 
GLoria XXL, though it was a 'professional' card, often crashed when
we used it for texture-mapped volume rendering.  Though professional
cards are supposed to have higher-quality drivers, the drivers for
consumer-level cards get much greater testing for stability because
they are aimed for such a huge market.  Professional cards 
provide better OpenGL conformance, or so I've heard trustworthy 
people say.  

My advice is to go for the the GLoria II unless you need dual-head
or stereo.

 - David

--
  David Gobbi, MSc                    dgobbi at irus.rri.on.ca
  Advanced Imaging Research Group
  Robarts Research Institute, University of Western Ontario

On Thu, 30 Mar 2000, Dimitris Agrafiotis wrote:

> Dear All
> 
> I am planning to buy a graphics card for my PC (Pentium III / 500MHz/ 
> Windows NT) and I have to decide between the following two:
> 3DLabs Oxygen GVX210 AGP 64 MB
> ELSA Gloria II AGP(with the NVIDIA Quadro chip &  64 MB)
> 
> Has anyone out there had any experience with any of the two cards? I 
> will mainly use it for volume (ray casting and/or texture mapping) and 
> surface rendering of medical images. 
> 
> I need some suggestions urgently!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
> 
> Thanks in advance 
> Dimitris
> 
> ----------------------
> Dimitris Agrafiotis
> University of Bristol
> Department of Electrical & Electronic Engineering
> Merchant Venturers Building 
> Woodland Road, Bristol BS8 1UB, UK
> Phone:  (+ 44 117) 9545194
> E-mail: d.agrafiotis at bristol.ac.uk
> 
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