there seems to be some animosity in the air on this forum. it\'s like being in middle school again. people aren\'t that way in the game at all...
regardless, I\'ll defend my statement.

What is he smoking and can I get some? Oh wait this is comming from a guy who buys a geforcemx440 in year 2003.
coincidentally, I also have a pallet of 9700 pros. I\'m just not a gamer myself...
ATI has always intended on being the best doesn\'t every company? ATI has owned Nvida for almost a full year just with the 9700pro if your trying to tell me Nvida had anything that coould even challange that card your just plain retarded the card was the Best for gaming the best visial quality and the fastest card on on the highest AA settings.
ATi\'s primary concern has always been achieving the highest market share, where nVidia\'s concern has been a little more towards achieving recognition. ATi has always been the leader in business solutions. In fact, their entry into 3D gaming, the 3D Rage II was still basically used as a DVD player. ATi made a serious effort to enter 3D gaming with its Rage 128, which it claimed to be the fastest 3D chip. I don\'t believe that to be true, since Tom\'s Hardware Guide tested its prototype, and the TNT was found to be faster.
Here\'s Tom\'s comparison of the Rage 128 versus the nVidia TNT:
http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/19990105/Other Tom\'s VGA Charts show that nVidia has held the lead in quality, performance, and price for 3D GPUs until, as you said, about a year ago.
Of course, nobody debates that nVidia has had the lead until only very recently. ATi, who I am in fact praising, never really tried to hold the 3D market. When Matrox beat ATi in video editing, it seems as though ATi didn\'t make any more major attempts to keep that position and instead focused on the very quickly growing 3D gaming market. Needless to say, the juggernaut was turned towards widening their technology again and 3D processing was one of the side effects.
Just imagine what would happen if ATi actually focused on 3D like nVidia does. (Well, of course for clarity, nVidia also makes chipsets, so it\'s not like they\'re completely devoted to 3D.)
On the topic of nVidia, though, they stand to make major gains, too. All in one motherboard now include nForce chipsets and GF4MX440 GPUs (as opposed to the truly worthless Trident Blade 3D which had been the onboard 3D chip of choice immediately prior). Where ATi has the most powerful cards, in slightly older cards from all companies, nVidia had the lead in power, quality, and price, so naturally they still hold the value market.
(And please watch the language. This board has rules on that.)