ATI color problem

Published on September 20, 2006 By tippytoenail In Video Cards

We have 2 computers that we use for graphics. One is 128MB DDR ATI Radeon 9800 . The other is a NVIDIA GeForce MX/MX 400 . The color on the ATI is driving me nuts. It makes it hard to pass files in-between computers because the color has such an impact of change from the ATI going to the NVIDIA . If I get the colors to look alike on both then on the ATI machine it will bite me with another problem. For an example if I open her Bryce program (after I have adjusted her color) I can barely see the tool buttons because of the brightness or gamma what ever it's doing. ATI won't let me have my cake and eat it too or this task is over my head one. We do our graphics together as much as the graphic cards allow.We know not to fix it if it isn't broke BUT !!! at this rate the ATI is not going to be with us very much longer. We were wondering if the driver has to match the card and if doesn't have to would it help to change drivers. Or should we consider buying a new card for hers. Mine is 5 years old and hers is almost 2 years. But the ATI makes us feel like we are living in the dark. Any advice at all would help.

Comments

seldomseen

on Sep 22, 2006

Don't really have any advice, but checked out this post as I just got a notice from PC Mag to check my drivers on my system. I ran an app the magazine's pushing to sell. The app has a "free trial" that I ran. It checked my system and said my ATI X700PRO needed two drivers, a primary and a secondary. I was just about to DL the drivers and try them when I saw your post. Hope you get it squared away asap.

[edit: so, about an hour later and ATI is maybe going to respond to my "ticket" request for help on driver updates. Nothing new for my card yet. ever... ? ]

tjesterb

on Sep 22, 2006

Your monitors will have a bigger effect on your color rendition than your graphics cards in most cases. Unless you are using identical, or nearly identical monitors, you are going to have a difficult time getting identical color reproduction. If you've ever walked through the TV section of your local big box store, I'm sure you've noticed how differently TV screens from different manufacturers look from one another when viewing the same scene. Having two different brands of video cards only aggravates the problem.
High-end calibrated color proofing monitors can cost over $10,000 USD. The average home or office monitor is manufactured with a lot more "lenient" standards.
If you can, going with two monitors from the same vendor, and two of the same graphics cards.
If you have some version of Photoshop you can use the Adobe Gamma tool to adjust your two monitors to view as closely as possible.

tippytoenail

on Sep 27, 2006

We checked on the updates. We will check out the app that you spoke of seldomseen . Who knows !

I have not thought about the ( Hall of TV Screen H_ll ) side of it but, that may be a big part of it. They are both Dells 8200 and 4600 with 5 years difference in the age. So the monitors are similar but not the same. We do have Photoshop and I will try to see what I can do using that. Will post in a few days the results of Photoshop. This may just work tjesterb.

Thank you both for the help !!!

seldomseen

on Sep 27, 2006

...update: still no word from ATI. Very uninformative and unresponsive. *sigh* Will limp along 'til I get affluent enough (read "disposable income") to build another system with all the bells and whistles...and nVidia graphics perhaps

tippytoenail

on Oct 09, 2006

I finally had some time to work with it again and I have it fairly close now. I did learn a little something with Photoshop. I haven't heard anything on the driver updates yet but maybe soon. I can deal with it better now then before. Thanks for the help again.

Dicamillo

on Nov 26, 2006

I had a problem like that on my ATI card, tried for ages to sort it, the problem i had was when i was in a game i would have like a almost pitch black screen couldn't really see much or watching a video on my computer, sent them 4 report thingys asking for help on what to do and all they sent me was the same automated ticket which really annoyed me, so i played about with the settings again and again still no luck, in the end i went out and got my self a nvdia card and had a little fun with teh ati card and a golf club in my back garden

Welcome Guest! Please take the time to register with us.
There are many great features available to you once you register, including:

Richer content, access to many features that are disabled for guests like commenting on the forums.
Access to a great community, with a massive database of many, many areas of interest.
Access to contests & subscription offers like exclusive emails.
It's simple, and FREE!