GeForce4 MX440

[vee_ess]

I am thinking about getting a GeForce4 MX440, and I was wonderin what everyone thought of it.

it is relatively cheap; $109 for Leadtek!!!, performs on par with GF3 and is better anything else on low-res gaming (including GF4 titanium4600 on good number of games), it has VIVO (S-video, RCA jacks, supporting 1280X768 for tv-out), has great frame rates (around 60 on Unreal and other toughies even at max res of 2048 X 1500 somethin), makes DVD's actually look better than what is recorded with the new Video Processing Engine (VPE) which is avail only on GF4 MX's not TI's, and has support for DX8.1.

Did you get it yet???

I put one in my system the other day, it's pretty nice. But, I cannot find or figure out the whole tv-out thing. It included no cable and I can't find one anywhere, any ideas??
thanks

[vee_ess]

no i did not get it yet, but did you get the leadtek? maybe you might want to consult with your reseller and ask them what it includes before telling them you have one and see if it includes a cable cuz that is what it is suppose to have i think.

Hmm, it depends on what you want to use the card for.  I bought one but returned it today.  It ran fairly well but as I learned more about it it became unappealing to me.  If you play a lot of games consider this:  

The card does not support Direct X 8 (I think the highest it does is 7)

Now on the other hand the GF3 Ti series supports DX 8.1 fully.  This means a huge performance increase in games that use DX 8.1, which most of the newer games do and will.  Overall, even the GeForce 3 Ti 200 is about 30 % better and in games that use DX 8 calls the Ti 200 shows about a 50-60% improvement over the GF4 MX440 card.  Just something to think about

I returned mine and I'm gonna grab a Gainward GF3 Ti 200 128 DDR Ram card from http://www.nutrend.com in a few days for $162 with shipping.  I could grab a 64 meg version of the card for 135 or so but I'd rather have the extra 64 for the future. ;D

Btw, if you're wondering where I'm getting my stats go to http://www.madonion.com and download the 3dMark2001 benchmark tests.  You can compare your results to others and it lists the top cards overall.  Good luck with your cards.

Also if you haven't heard, which I'm sure you have, check out http://www.pricewatch.com    Great site for prices.

[vee_ess]

with the whole directx 8.1 thing, it supports it partially, but the decoder and stuff costs Nvidia about $50 bucks more just to put the full support in, and many of the games that are going to come out that were going to use DX 8.1, and pay the royalties, realized that only 5-8 percent of their customers will be able to support it. plus those games costs too much for me. I am probably not going to get the card for a while though. but i will keep watching pricewatch, and yes i agree it is a good site, as i use it to watch the industry, but i haven't bought from any of those sites as i am not sure how trustworthy they are.

If the card doesn't have the vivo chip you won't have tv out. I have the visiontek ti 4600 and it comes w/ the vivo chip. However the pny  ti 4600 doesn't. If the card didn't come with the cable chances are you don't have tv out.

I have a Creative Labs GeForce 2 GTS.  I am contemplating whether or not to buy a Geforce 4 MX440/460.  I have never been a fan of graphics cards bearing the letters MX, simply because their performance has never impressed me.  However, it would appear that the GeForce 4 counterpart is unlike it's predecessors.

Would you recommend that I upgrade, or should I rather save and get a non-MX card?

[Omega]

It's all a matter of how much performance you demand. The GeForce 4 MX cards are going to preform worse, or around the same as GeForce 3 cards, and you probably won't notice a huge performance increase from your current GeForce 2 GTS. The GeForce 4 MX, however, will support more features and has more hardware-based rendering engines and whatnot.

I personally would go with a GeForce 4 Ti 4400 rather than the MX, unless you're just in a hurry to get something, fast.

[vee_ess]

deathhead: you're wrong about the VIVO thing, as the GF4's have VIVO built-in to the core, i can post pics if anyone likes of the layout of the architecture

and about the TI4400's, they outperform the MX460's only on full DX8.1 games, otherwise it heats up your sys more and gets less frame rates at exact same quality, so why pay for a card that has payed 50 -80 bucks in royalties, and only get better perf on some games and worse on others?

Wrong, TI serries is better, it has more futures, even GF3 *the first one* has more futures then GF4 MX and will support more games then the GF4MX in the future. The MX460 doesnt even come close to TI4200 not talking about 4400... so sorry buddy... to dissapoint yah, go for the TI or die... lol