Yeah, that's what I thought. I've had that happen before with my previous PSU and a 6600GT. The computer would just shutdown whenever I started a game. I guess I'll just have to give it a try. I don't think LFS will require the card's maximum performance, though. If it proves to be a problem I'll just have to buy a new PSU
It appears my friend can't find his Y-cable so I have to look for one myself. All this hassle for a new graphics card... it had better be worth it!
Yeah, I went to look for one of those but they seem hard to find Luckily a friend of mine probably has got one of those things left so I can use that. In the little booklet that came with the card it says that I shouldn't use those things, though, but only PSU's specifically designed to support those cards. But yeah... I'm not worried too much about that
Like I said I ordered a 9800GT 512MB Tuesday afternoon. The website of the store I ordered it from said there were plenty of these cards in store and so mine should be available for pickup in the shop within 2 days. Today is friday and they still didn't have it in. Now, when it comes to this kind of stuff I have absolutely no patience. So I said "f*ck it" and went to search for the same card elsewhere.
I found a 9800GTX Plus 512MB for € 169 (only € 8 more than the 9800GT I ordered initally). So I bought that, went home, unpacked it.... Jesus, this is one big card At less than half the size my 8400GS looks like a scrawny little thing. It only just fits in my case. There's only one problem: it requires two power connectors (those 6-pin kind), and I've only got one left on my psu It runs with just the one, but obviously not at full power. When Windows boots I get this message telling me that the power supply to the graphics card isn't sufficient and the card has lowered its clock rates to ensure safe operation (smart card!).
So now I'm a bit bummed as I will probably have to buy a new PSU to be able to use this card, even though this one could handle it just fine if it just had one more connector. It's a 550W so that should be enough, I think. I'm even more bummed because I have to work tomorrow, which means that I can't go out shopping for a new PSU, and on Sundays all the stores are closed here so I have no chance of testing this card until next week.
I'll probably be buying a bigger case in the near future because I don't like the way the card is cramped up in there.
I got my license only a couple of months before you did, and I would not feel one bit cheated if they decided to stop developing LFS. I don't think I've played any other game for as long as I have LFS, so it was well worth the £24, even if it's not entirely finished yet.
I guess it all comes down to what you expect when you buy a license. Personally, I didn't expect anything other than access to all tracks and cars in the game at that time. I think the problem is that many people these days buy a license with expectations regarding future content and features. They dream of things that might one day be implemented, rather than just enjoying the game for what it is.
Currently not really possible, and has been suggested many times before.
One way you could do this is to ask drivers to send their setup to an admin after the race is done, before they go to pits or spectate, and check every setup individually.
So, while it says that "improvements, fixes and/or changes (...) are to be expected", there is no mention of a time frame. For me, this basically means "you pay for the game as it is now, but we can make changes to it as we see fit and you shouldn't come whining to us when we make a change you don't like".
I don't see any way this could be interpreted as "You pay for the game now and we promise you that we will continue to update it and add extra content in a reasonable amount of time, and please, if you find it takes too long feel free to start a thread on the forum asking when we will finally release an update with your desired feature/content in it."
Seriously, the devs owe us f*ckall, development wise. The only thing you could argue that they owe us is to keep the master server running so that we can keep playing the game we payed for. That's it, IMO.
I have no idea what the prices in other countries are. I ordered it from a store whose prices are usually quite a bit lower than other popular computer stores around here, so I thought I was getting a good deal. Guess not then eh
Yeah, they are highmounted open exhausts. The stock exhausts on the SV are fugly, it must be said. That, and they are way too silent. I seriously couldn't hear the engine when I was riding. Can't have that on a V-Twin I still have the stock exhausts, obviously.
I don't think the SV and the VTR look much alike, except for the fact that they are both big V-Twins The VTR is an awesome bike, I wouldn't mind riding an SP2. It's in a different class than the SV, though. The SV is usually classified as a "sport cruiser", whereas the VTR is a much sportier bike and is classed in the "racing" category or whatever.
Yeah, the originals on the SV are positioned similar to yours, though I don't think they point upwards as much as yours. It's not their position I didn't like, just the overall look, shape and sound of them that really bothered me.
Very true. I haven't taken mine to a trackday (yet?), but I'm on a SV forum where a lot of people go to trackdays regularly, and they always say the same thing. On the long straights the R1's and the Gixxxers come flying past you, but in the twistier sections they all bite the dust.
I didn't even know GDDR4 existed I'll keep an eye out for it. All the cards I've looked at have GDDR3, though.
Hmm, like I said earlier, the 9800GT is a little over my budget. To be honest, the AA isn't really a "must have" for me. I've never had it enabled in LFS before and I'm perfectly happy with the way it runs. Yes, when I look at some of the screenshots that get posted here I'm like "damn, those screens look great!". But... I don't even think I would notice it when I'm racing. And that's really all I do in LFS. I don't use it to make screenshots or videos or anything. If my fps remain above 60 at all times with large grids, then I'm happy.
Thanks for the comment, though, I'll keep it in mind and maybe look for some good deals on the 9800GT.
Thanks, interesting charts. Unfortunately I can't seem to find results for the 9600GT anywhere in them. Or am I just missing them?
Chrisuu01 said he has the same card and he doesn't have that issue. See post #8 in this thread
I do leave my pc running several hours a day, but to be honest I haven't once looked at the power consumption figures. I do turn the monitor off whenever I leave the pc, and when I'm sure I won't be using the pc for a while I usually turn it off.
I don't want to start a "Nvidia vs ATI" debate here, but I'd rather get an Nvidia card. I know ATI have some really good cards as well but... I don't know, I guess I'm just kind of an Nvidia guy I've always had Nvidia cards and never had problems with them so...
As for noise, I always wear headphones as I don't have any speakers ever since I moved my computer into the living room. So it's not an issue when I'm playing, but it can become annoying when we're just watching tv while the computer is running. The fact that the computer is practically right next to the tv doesn't help much in that regard, and then I haven't even mentioned that my girlfriend's pc is right next to mine and she leaves her pc running too. So we often have 2 computers running when we're watching tv We've gotten used to it, though, we hardly notice it anymore. Besides, this is all just a temporary situation until the renovations on our house are done and I can move my computer back into a seperate room, which will make the noise issue irrelevant.
Right, so far I'm inclined to order the 9600GT 512MB card. I'll do some more research and look for reviews that compare it to similar cards, but I think I've pretty much made up my mind
Thanks to everyone for the input. Don't let this stop you from commenting, though, I haven't ordered yet!
My monitor's maximum resolution is 1680*1050 so that's what I'm running.
The 512mb version from the same manufacturer is cheaper than the 1GB so if what you say is true then I would go with the 512MB. ASUS cards seem to be a bit more expensive than MSI cards. I have no clue why, I've only really been looking at MSI cards since those are the ones that seem to be more readily available at stores here.
Hmm, interesting. Thanks for the input. Any second opinions on this by other people?
I suppose the 512mb version would be just as good for LFS. I just thought the 1GB would give me a little extra in case I want to play some of the newer games. I don't want to buy a 9800GT because that one costs slightly more than I would like to spend. But now I'm worried that I'll have the same issue that JasonJ has with LFS. If I buy a new card I want LFS to look as crisp as possible, and not have any weird bugs or anything.
Argh... I really hate having to buy new graphics cards. So many different cards to choose from, and if you're not up to date with all the latest technologies like me, then it can drive you nuts
Alright, after some more comparing I think I'm gonna go with the MSI N9600GT Zilent 1G for € 146. Seems to be a pretty good card (although I actually don't know a lot about cards ) and the price is decent. I don't want to spend much more than that. I could go for the 512MB version for a little less than that, but I figure with this card I'll be a bit more "future proof".
Any valid reasons why I should not buy that card? Clock rate is 700mhz, memory clockrate is 1900mhz, as opposed to the 650mhz/800mhz of the 512MB version.
Only thing I'm wondering about is if my CPU is maybe not powerfull enough to get the most out of this card. In other words: will my cpu bottleneck this card? Like I said, I've got a Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 (@ 2.4ghz I believe it runs) and 2 gb of ram. PSU is powerful enough, no worries there.
It seems my graphics card broke down yesterday (at least I assume that's what the problem is) so now I'm on the lookout for a replacement. As I'm not really a gamer and the only thing I play is LFS it doesn't need to be a cutting edge graphics card. It needs to be decent enough to run LFS on 1680*1050 with AA on (I used to have it off 'cause my now fried card couldn't handle it).
So after a bit of looking and reading on the internet, I think the Geforce 9600 GT would be a good card for me. Only thing is... I'm utterly confused as to what differences there are between the different versions/manufacturers. These are the cards I'm looking at:
MSI VGA N9600GT-ZILENT 1G-PCI-e 1GB DDRIII 2DVI TVO Game € 146
Asus EN9600GT/HTDI/1GB PCI-E DVI-I € 153
Asus EN9600GT SILENT/HTDI/512M PCI-E DVI-I € 151
Asus EN9600GT Matrix/HTDI/512MB PCI-E DVI-I € 174
The first 2 have got 1GB of memory, the last 2 have got 512MB. What I don't get is why the ones with less memory cost about the same or even more. I've looked at their individual features but they all seem to be the same. Granted, I've not compared every single little detail, just the general product specifications. Does it have something to do with them havind different coolers? Eg. the ones with the "SILENT/ZILENT" specification will probably run quieter than the other ones. But is that really the only difference? Noise isn't that much of a point for me, I just want a card that will perform well and will allow me to play some of the more recent games if there should ever come one that interests me enough to play it Also, I have no idea what the "HTDI" stands for.
So I'm inclined to go with the 1GB version as my layman mind tells me "more memory = better performance". I know this isn't always the case, though, so if someone would be so kind as to educate me a bit on what sets these cards apart from one another and which one would be my best option for the things that I need, I would be very very grateful.
EDIT: oh, my cpu is a Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 and I've got 2GB of RAM.
Last edited by obsolum, .
Reason : added cpu and memory info
If you're gonna list a BMW X-series, take the X6. Definitely sportier than the X5. Although I can see some people might argue if that qualifies as an SUV
As for whether there should be off road kind of cars in LFS or not, I'm not sure... My first thought would be "no", as they're obviously not cars designed to be raced on asphalt tracks. However, iRacing has got the whatyamacallit... Chevy Impala? Or something similar, a heavy pickup. Basically, if it drives you can race it. So why not? However, those kind of cars should only be added when S2 is final, IMO.