There are a number of vendors that are beginning to have the G400 OEM 32mb Single Head version of the card available. I was at a local computer show this past weekend and was fortunate enough to pick one up. After some testing, playing, etc., I wanted to take the liberty and provide some initial impressions. The OEM's come with the card (duh!) and the driver CD which includes drivers for Win9*, WinNT, OS/2, the DVD software, tech demo and utilities.
The G400 replaced an ATi Rage Magnum. I decided to replace the Magnum for several reasons. Overall colors were dull; ATi drivers for OpenGL and some D3D games were very buggy and in some cases, wouldn't run certain games at all. In 16bit mode, D3D games showed a large amount of dithering.
Installation
The only initial problem I encountered was that the AGP Apeture of my (Phoenix) BIOS needed to be set to 256. Haig @ Matrox advised that this was a known problem and that he had notified Phoenix Tech. Low and behold, on my computer manufacturer's site today appears an updated BIOS which fixed the problem (AGP Apeture now set to 64).
Beyond that, no hitches in the installation.
PowerDesk 5.*
PowerDesk 5.* is now integrated with Display Properties. It provides the ability to tweak the monitor settings. This the ability to adjust the refresh rate to something other than either the Matrox monitor recommended settings.
2D Image Quality and Speed
Text is extremely sharp and clear. Matox has long been know for excellent color rendering. The card provides excellent color saturation and visual accuity. Applications and menus load very fast. The card appears to be faster than the ATi Magnum in 2D mode. As best as I can describe it, the card appears to have eliminated any "bottlenecks". It should be noted that the G400 is CPU dependent. That is, the faster the CPU the better the card scales.
3D/OpenGL Image Quality
I don't know about you, but I'm about ready to puke if I read another comparison of benchmarks. The G400 isn't as fast as a TNT2 Ultra, but it's D3D/OpenGL speed is respectable. At 1024x768 in 32bit mode, Quake2 Timedemo ran at 48fps. FPS speed is fine for me. What has impressed me the most is the image quality. I'm looking through Q2 and saying, "never saw that before". Can't wait to see what Q3 will look like.
DVD
ATi has the upper hand in DVD playback. The Matrox DVD player is fine, but I have noticed a couple of frame drops, but, on par for Matrox, image quality is excellent. DVD playback quality (i.e. no frame drops) improves @ 800x600 (I'm running at 1024x768).
Summation
I opted for the OEM version for several reasons. First, I didn't have a need for the dual monitor output (excellent feature, especially for businesses). Additionally, the OEM verison doesn't support the Rainbow Runner G series. Again, no need for that either. I can also live w/o the game software. I have been doing more and more DTP and photo rendering work, and the ATi Magnum just wasn't cutting it.
This card isn't for everyone. Those with CPU's @ less than 300mz may not benefit from it. Also, those that are primarily concerned with the fastest frame rate benchmarks won't be happy. However, if you have an Intel P2 or P3 - 350mz or above, I would strongly recommend the G400. Image quality is tops...period. D3D/OpenGL speed is very respectable. The initial release of the drivers also appear to be very stable. Matrox is known for updating their drivers on a regular basis.
The only downside I've found is that the card won't run Apple QuickTime 16bit. This is used by a number of older multimedia programs. Seems that newer cards (the G200's ver. 4.51 drivers, TNT, and TNT2) dont run this program either.
Aside from that, I am extremely pleased.
The G400 replaced an ATi Rage Magnum. I decided to replace the Magnum for several reasons. Overall colors were dull; ATi drivers for OpenGL and some D3D games were very buggy and in some cases, wouldn't run certain games at all. In 16bit mode, D3D games showed a large amount of dithering.
Installation
The only initial problem I encountered was that the AGP Apeture of my (Phoenix) BIOS needed to be set to 256. Haig @ Matrox advised that this was a known problem and that he had notified Phoenix Tech. Low and behold, on my computer manufacturer's site today appears an updated BIOS which fixed the problem (AGP Apeture now set to 64).
Beyond that, no hitches in the installation.
PowerDesk 5.*
PowerDesk 5.* is now integrated with Display Properties. It provides the ability to tweak the monitor settings. This the ability to adjust the refresh rate to something other than either the Matrox monitor recommended settings.
2D Image Quality and Speed
Text is extremely sharp and clear. Matox has long been know for excellent color rendering. The card provides excellent color saturation and visual accuity. Applications and menus load very fast. The card appears to be faster than the ATi Magnum in 2D mode. As best as I can describe it, the card appears to have eliminated any "bottlenecks". It should be noted that the G400 is CPU dependent. That is, the faster the CPU the better the card scales.
3D/OpenGL Image Quality
I don't know about you, but I'm about ready to puke if I read another comparison of benchmarks. The G400 isn't as fast as a TNT2 Ultra, but it's D3D/OpenGL speed is respectable. At 1024x768 in 32bit mode, Quake2 Timedemo ran at 48fps. FPS speed is fine for me. What has impressed me the most is the image quality. I'm looking through Q2 and saying, "never saw that before". Can't wait to see what Q3 will look like.
DVD
ATi has the upper hand in DVD playback. The Matrox DVD player is fine, but I have noticed a couple of frame drops, but, on par for Matrox, image quality is excellent. DVD playback quality (i.e. no frame drops) improves @ 800x600 (I'm running at 1024x768).
Summation
I opted for the OEM version for several reasons. First, I didn't have a need for the dual monitor output (excellent feature, especially for businesses). Additionally, the OEM verison doesn't support the Rainbow Runner G series. Again, no need for that either. I can also live w/o the game software. I have been doing more and more DTP and photo rendering work, and the ATi Magnum just wasn't cutting it.
This card isn't for everyone. Those with CPU's @ less than 300mz may not benefit from it. Also, those that are primarily concerned with the fastest frame rate benchmarks won't be happy. However, if you have an Intel P2 or P3 - 350mz or above, I would strongly recommend the G400. Image quality is tops...period. D3D/OpenGL speed is very respectable. The initial release of the drivers also appear to be very stable. Matrox is known for updating their drivers on a regular basis.
The only downside I've found is that the card won't run Apple QuickTime 16bit. This is used by a number of older multimedia programs. Seems that newer cards (the G200's ver. 4.51 drivers, TNT, and TNT2) dont run this program either.
Aside from that, I am extremely pleased.
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