Truform in JK2?

[B0MBER II]

My friend wanted me to ask this Q here.

 

What is TruForm (I wanna know) and Is it used in Jedi Knight II? (He wants to know)

[jedialphaknight]

Truform is something proprientary from ATI, it makes slants into curves I believe, should be in JK 2 it was in wolfenstein (yes I know raven didn't make wolfenstein)

[B0MBER II]

Oh it is for ATI... ATI cards suck IMHO

[jedialphaknight]

the radeons aren't that bad but geforce's still kick the major ass.

[Zek]

geForce3 Ti200 baby.. Love this card. Great performance for a reasonable price.

[B0MBER II]

ELSA GF3 920 baby

[Darth Lunatic]

Yeah your right jedialphaknight. Trueform just smooths out edges. Good for faces and bodies, not so good for things that are meant to be sharp, like guns.

 

Not sure if it's in JKO. Probably not i would think.

[Shark747]

Truform is actually pretty cool when implemented right. Wolfenstien had it but you couldnt see much of a difference. The newest patch is supposed to make good use of truform. Havent tried it yet though since it's not installed at the moment. Need the space for Outcast.

 

I own a Radeon 8500 and it's a great card to say the least. Truform is used in Half-life and Serious Sam also. In Half-life it has a pretty good effect on the models by giving them a more natural shape. The bald scientists now have a round dome instead of one that has a little point.

 

Here is a pretty good truform explaination . This should be better than any description I can give.

 

As for ATI cards sucking....I think their problems are greatly exaggerated. I've had the card since it came out in November and have had very few problems. There have been some driver issues but nvidia isnt perfect either. I have found a good driver set and it flies, I can play all games in their full glory, even with my 850mhz comp.

 

The geforce Ti200 is priced pretty good, but anything from Nvidia above the Ti200 is too expensive for the performance especially when ATI has a card that compares and sometimes beats the TI500 at a cheaper price.

 

Just wanted to add about the things being curved that arent supposed to be curved. From what I understand, the developers can determine what will be truformed and what wont be. Nobody has really taken to time to do it though.

[Krandell]

ATI just needs to write better drivers for their cards.

[digl]

For all the people that says that ATI sucks, I'll tell you something. I'v been doing a lot of research online because I had to decide which 3D card to get. Here are some of my conclusions

 

GF4 Ti --->Ridiculous price

GF4 MX-->GF4 name, no new tech

All GF3s-->lack technology for next gen games

Radeon 8500-->Just like the GF3 Ti500 in current games, kicks GF3s asses in Doom3 and Unreal2 engine, and has better image quality than the GF3

 

So as you guess I'll get a Radeon, It's even cheaper than the Ti500 and will perform better in future games.Most of the driver problems have been fixed, and the remaining ones are most with old games only.

[jedialphaknight]

digl, I know this is a JO forum but I am gunna have to disagree with you the Radeon 8500 doesn't beat GF3, check out the benchmarks at http://www.hothardware.com I mean the geforce 3 has the nFinite FX engine, its basically fine, I mean when doom 3 comes out you think the radeon will matter? or a geforce 3 or 4? doom 3 isn't come out till the EARLIEST the end of this year, and there will be even bigger and more badass cards now, Radeon vs Geforce 3 is a touchy subject but just check the benchmarks, they don't lie.

[SaberPro]

ATI Radeon 8500 is a nice card, but it doesnt "kick GF3's ass"

 

ATI Radeon 8500 has a slightly higher score comparing to GF3 Ti500 in 3DMark2001, but it falls to GF3 in FPS (Quake 3, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, and Serious Sam 2) and Aquanox performance...it doesn't support dual monitor, and it has a lower SmoothVision performance.....oh and it has a lower clock speed (250/250 Mhz)

 

Good things about Radeon 8500 is that you can overclock it quite a bit, and it has a 128MB RAM (most cards have only 64MB)

 

Thank you for reading SaberPro's lecture on Radeon 8500 vs. GF3

[Shark747]

Ok, to get back to the question....Doubtful that Truform will be supported by Outcast, it hasnt really caught on with game developers yet.

 

SaberPro....some things you posted were incorrect the 8500 does support dual monitor, not sure if the GF3 does though. It has a higher clock speed, my card is 275/550 mhz. The LE cards which are basically OEMs have 250/500 mhz.

 

When it comes down to it you can make a strong arguement for either card. I actually almost bought a GF3 Ti500, but I'm just not willing to shell out 50 bucks more just so I can have the 5-10 frames per second advantage. In my eyes its just not worth it.

 

I just think Nvidia cards are a little too overhyped, if the Ti500 was the same price as the 8500 i'd have one of those in my computer instead. Both cards will be able to run Doom 3 and Unreal 2. Even the creator of Doom, John Carmack(sp?) I think, has said that he is progamming the game using both cards.

 

Both cards are great but you get more bang for your buck with the 8500.

[SaberPro]

Radeons supports dual monitor? Hmm when me and my friends tried it, it won't work...

 

And I thought NVidia made the Radeon 8500 chip...NV25 or something? And it really depends which GF3 Ti500 you are getting from...Hercules is nice (very expensive)...Elsa is nice....dont try VisionTek (cheap)...nor LeadTek (cheap)...Asus is nice...

[Shark747]

Well, I'm taking the box's word about the dual monitor support. Don't have a spare monitor to test it at the moment.

 

ATI makes anything Radeon, and the chip is called the R200. The newest chip is going to be called the R250 and that will be for the Radeon 8700 and 8800.

[digl]

I know the GF3 beats by a few FPS the radeon in the current games, but a difference of 115 against 110 frames doesn't matter.

 

I still say that the R8500 will beat the GF3 in the future games, of course there will be better cards but that time, but they will cost about US 500, and the cheap Radeon 8500 will still be able to perform well in those future games, and the GF3 won't. So if you buy a GF3 you'll need to upgrade earlier.

[RichyBoy]

Originally posted by SaberPro

 

Radeons supports dual monitor? Hmm when me and my friends tried it, it won't work...

 

Funny that. It seems to work fine on my computer . And my brother's. Also, while you state that Smoothvision has lower performance, from everything I've seen, Smoothvision looks better than the GF3 alternative.

 

Anyway, just to straighten out some facts - the GF3 IS a bit more stable and can run some current/old games faster. BUT the 8500 has more features, has more potential in terms of hardware than the GF3 (ie better for future games), and is cheaper. And as digl said, when it's that much cheaper - who gives a damn about 5 FPS in old games, when the 8500 is going to own the GF3 in the next-gen engines?

 

The particular gripe I have against nVidia is the amount they are charging for their latest cash cow - the GF4. Yes, it is faster and has more features, but is it really worth the extra cash when compared to other cards like the 8500? As someone who actually has to take price into account when buying hardware, I would say no.

 

On the other hand, I'll be the first to admit that the 8500 has driver problems, as Krandell mentioned. However, nVidia have had their problems in this regard too. For example, the GF2 range had massive problems with texture compression - Q3 sky/transparent textures being a prime example.

 

Ultimately though, we should all stop arguing. Despite their position as industry leaders (in raw speed only IMHO) do we all want nVidia to become the next Microsoft - with such a stranglehold (or Force Grip ) on the industry so that we all have to buy their products, whatever their faults. It's just as well that ATI are starting to challenge them - to encourage innovation. Even if the 8500 has problems, who can deny that the Truform engine on the cards has huge potential? Although I own an 8500, I don't favour either company - I bought the 8500 because of it's price/performance ratio. The fact that it has already succesfully challenged the GF3 and compares well with even the mighty GF4 made it an even wiser choice.

[Menace2001]

hi.. I am the guy that had bomber post that because I wasn't registered with these forums. I would like to say thanks to every one for the reply's.

 

I have owned several 3d cards over the years iv owned cards from Trident, 3dfx, ati, and nvidia. my 3d card for the last year was a ati radeon 64 meg ddr vivo. I had absolutely no problems with it what so ever, and recently I just upgraded to the 8500 for 160 dollars. So far I like the card and have no problems with it in the games that I currently have, also I would like to say that dual monitor support works, smooth vision works (although I don't use it very much never really used FSAA before anyway's..), and the aniso filtering performance is very nice. I really think I got a good deal for the card considering how many features, low price, and the performance is has.

 

I was really hoping for truform support in JK2. ooh well should be a good game even with out it.

[digl]

welcome to the forums Menace2001

Each moment I'm more convinced I should get a Radeon

[RichyBoy]

Yes, welcome Menace2001 .

 

It's nice to see another ATI owner here. Perhaps we should all start a Radeon 8500 MP clan to fight against all those nVidia users and teach them the error of their ways !

[B0MBER II]

Welcome to the forums my Clanmate

 

You ain't taking Menace from JRA

[RichyBoy]

Oh well, I guess I'll just have to take you all on myself

 

*RichyBoy cowers under a Gonk droid*

[-ReSiStAnCe-]

i don't know why you keep saying stuff like "the ti500 won't run well in newer games, but the 8500 will"

 

why don't you take a look at this link:

 

http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=1580&p=9

 

you'll see that using the unreal2 engine, the most advanced fps game engine there is, that the radeon 8500 and gf3 ti500 are virtually tied, sure the radeon is ahead by 1 or 2fps in some places (ati conveniently "forgot" to program fog rendering into the drivers, what a convenient mistake that boosts the cards fps!)

 

but in the last 2 resolutions, even though the ati cards had no fog rendering enabled, you see the ti500 close the gap, and in the final resolution, 1600x1200, you see the ti500 finally overtakes the radeon 8500.

 

this sort of completely negates your argument saying that the 8500 outperforms the ti500 when it comes to new and upcoming games, because the ti500 outperforms the 8500 on the highest possible resolution in the most graphic-intensive game there is.

 

gg.

[B0MBER II]

*Force pushes the gonk droid to the wall exploding it*

 

*Flips the trademark Orange and Red saber in the air and craches it, igniting it*

[Menace2001]

ReSiStAnC..

They are both good cards. They both have there ups and downs. For example the 8500 takes less of a hit when aniso filtering is turned on. I am not trying to put down the geforce 3 ti500. I am just saying they both have there ups and downs and the are both good cards. I didn't really want this thread to turn into a geforce 3 vs 8500 debate.