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Old 7th May, 2005, 12:09 AM
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dsio dsio is offline
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The GF3 classic is no different to the TI200 or the TI500. They are all the exact same card, only with different clock speeds. The TI series was launched because the original card was priced out of the range of joe average, so they revised the manufacturing process, then picked the fast chips and made them TI500s, and took the slower chips and made them TI200s.

Now one thing that might be different is the cooling. For the most part, the GF3 TIs had really special looking coolers, that were actually quite effective. So, the TI might be able to overclock better because of the better cooling, but it is just as likely that it would do worse. Here are the clock speeds of the three chips, just for your benefit

TI200: 175Mhz core
GF3: 200Mhz core
TI500: 240Mhz core

memory speed varies depending on the manufacturer. As you can see, the GF3 is considerably faster than the TI200 at stock, but yea, the cooling on the TI200 could average it out a bit.

That said, I would stick to the GF3 all day long.


If you want the story behind the TI, what happened was ATI was releasing the 8500, which was meant to be the GF3 killer. And then Nvidia released the TI series of GF2 and 3, which they claimed to be much better. It was actually a trick. What happened was the TI series, despite being technically identical, shipped with the next generation of GF3 driver, which made them alot faster. The thing is, the new driver could be downloaded on an old GF3, and it would be even BETTER than the TI200, and close to the TI500. So it was really just a marketing trick. It worked though, as the 8500 flopped.

So yea, bottom line, the ASUS is much better. ASUS cards are better designed, so the TI cooling wouldnt give it an advantage, and ASUS is just a quality product for video cards. Much better than MSI.

Also, for both of these cards, I must recommend that you go to AOAFiles.com and download the Omega modified 44.03 drivers. They are the fastest drivers for GF3/4 generation cards by far.

Best of luck!
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