For overall stability, NVIDIA or ATI

[Lou3]

If you've used both NVIDIA and ATI video cards, which seemed more stable to you?

I've had a few NVIDIA cards and, most recently, an ATI card (X1300PRO). A few weeks ago, DVDs started playing without video in my PowerDVD screen until I went to the ATI Command Center and clicked the video playback setting, which I guess reset it. Each time, I had to do it more times before the DVD's video would appear. I finally got sick of it and put my FX 5700 LE back in, and now DVDs start playing like they should. Also, the ATI Command Center screen was always slow to load during startup; the NVIDIA settings icon in my system tray is the first the load. Overall, NVIDIA just seems more stable (I understand the 5700 LE is slower than the X1300PRO, but I'm talking about stability). What has your experience been?

 

[Acclamator]

I've used cards from a Radeon 9200 to a GeForce 8800 GT and I can say it really depends on the drivers you use. ATM I'd say stability goes to NVIDIA (Although I've had a few driver crashes recently caused by NVIDIA). ATi is coming back though, their drivers don't suck huge /-\ss-c0ck anymore.

 

[nickc]

although it has been a long time since I have used an ATI video card I will say the NVIDIA is by far a more stable card to me. I am useing the 8800GT now and have been proud of it.

 

[EXCellR8]

I have heard some pretty bad things about 8 series nvidia cards and the 700 series chipsets though, something about AVI artifacts or something. I've been looking at the P5N-D board, which has the nvidia 750i SLI chipset but I'm not sure that the problem has even been fixed. As for the graphics cards themselves, can't go wrong with a GeForce although, yes, ATi has put out some pretty impressive hardware as well. I've been using nvidia-based parts for years and I've been pretty happy with each setup. Nvidia ftw!

 

[TBolt]

Prior to this year I was predominantly an ATI user...to me, the rendering just seemed to be better. To take that further, as I have had Radeon 9200, 9800, X1950, and 3870, I must say all were a tad...a tad bit more stable then the 6800GS, 8600GT, and 8800GT I have owned. I don't really attribute that all to the respective cards, but more over to the driver(s). ATI seems to have more stable / better drivers (to me, anyway). But ultimately, for shear performance, the NVidia cards I have owned hands down have beaten the ATI cards I have owned (when compared to like cards and across the board). So, at this point, although I still believe AMD/ATI renders better (personal taste), I would choose NVidia for the "horsepower". Although I have not checked out the latest and greatest of both vendors, I suspect it hasn't changed much and again would likely choose performance over slight stability differences.

However, when comparing Crossfire to SLI, I may change my tune considering most of the papers I've read claiming Crossfire scaling better than SLI. I am very pleased with my current SLI config, but will likely check out/build a Crossfire rig in the near future to answer for myself the age old question; "red and Crossfire or green and SLI?"

 

[Rage_3K_Moiz]

Stability is a non-existant issue IMO. Both companies have excellent products and each is equally stable as the next. I have used NVIDIA and ATI cards equally and like both companies, although I prefer ATI's Vista drivers to NVIDIA's. They're far more reliable. But otherwise, I've had nothing but good experiences with both companies. It just comes down to the individual third-party manufacturers, among whom there are plenty of excellent and crappy ones that produce individual cards with differing build quality, which affects the stability and reliability of the final product.