GeForce FXGo 5200 vs. ATI Radeon Mobility 9200

[Daveman Deluxe]

I have an offer to trade my Rev. B 12" PowerBook (1 GHz) to a G4 iBook of one of the more recent revisions. However, I do light gaming and am concerned about how the ATI Mobility 9200 (32 MB RAM) stacks up to the GeForce FX5200 Go (32 MB). I'm not interested in knowing how the rest of the computers stack up to each other (I know enough to figure that out myself), but I'd like to know how the graphics cards perform. For your information, the most GPU-intensive games I play are Neverwinter Nights and SimCity 4. I play both at medium specs and am pleased with the results. I get about 25 FPS on NWN and the lag in SC4 doesn't bother me at those graphic levels.

 

[Converted2Truth]

I would recommend the ATI card. It's more compliant with openGL than the 5200 series cards. Both their websites fail to mention the performance specifications, but that's normal for mobile chipsets that are midrange. However, i'm pretty sure that the 5200 pushes more triangles. Other than that, they both have programmable shading capability, etc etc

Edit: The ATI 9200 isn't supported in OSX.4 for CoreImage. That's not a good thing. Stick with the nvidia card. Sorry to be so bouncy... I guess the programmable shader capability of the 9200 is restricted to the point of not being supported.

 

[Daveman Deluxe]

I'm really not concerned about CoreImage. Given that, do you recommend the 9200?

 

[Jigglelicious]

Both chips have similar performance. However, even if one was WAY faster than the other, you'd still by heavily limited by the slow CPU so you'd never get to see the benefit of the faster chip. Overall, i'd say that the 32mb of VRAM in the Radeon is going to really hold you back if you are considering gaming. Stay with the Powerbook.

 

[Daveman Deluxe]

Jigglelicious: I'm not buying a new computer. I'm thinking of trading my PowerBook for an iBook. My current PB doesn't have more VRAM than the iBook--my PB is a Rev. B, which only has 32 MB of VRAM.

 

[Jigglelicious]

Just curious, but what is your reasoning for wanting the iBook over your powerbook? Even if you were trading your PB for the latest model iBook, there would be relatively little difference in performance, and your PB is capable of more and looks a lot better. I assume you'd be getting an iBook + $$$ out of the trade, but unless you really need that extra cash, i'd just keep your Powerbook.

 

[jadam]

I would think the 9200 would run faster then the fx5200 especially since both of them have the same amount of vram. Plus going from the 1ghz processor to a 1.2ghz will have its own performance improvment. And the improved battery life will be another good thing.