Why not PNY?

[Ambush]

I just got the PNY XLR8 8800GT 2.0 and from what i recently found out its not that great of a card. People are saying why not get the Evga or BFG or XFX. i had the money for the bfg version but that extra money was needed else where so i went with what i could get at the time.

Im not to big on computers, just wondering why PNY isnt a choice to buy .....

[airborne5par7an]

I just got the PNY XLR8 8800GT 2.0 and from what i recently found out its not that great of a card. People are saying why not get the Evga or BFG or XFX. i had the money for the bfg version but that extra money was needed else where so i went with what i could get at the time.

Im not to big on computers, just wondering why PNY isnt a choice to buy .....

It is a good choice. Its just that people prefer those three. Your card is a great card.

[cel4145]

I just got the PNY XLR8 8800GT 2.0 and from what i recently found out its not that great of a card. People are saying why not get the Evga or BFG or XFX. i had the money for the bfg version but that extra money was needed else where so i went with what i could get at the time.

Im not to big on computers, just wondering why PNY isnt a choice to buy .....

Most graphics cards are all built off of the same reference card design, even many of the factory overclocked ones. So in design, there is little difference, and there will typically be no performance advantage as long as the specs are the same. Advantages over different companies mostly seem to be in terms of price, service (support/warranty), and long term reliability (slightly better quality hardware and construction).

So if it is working good for you now, it's just as good as the others as long as it continues to do so

[Mr Songwriter]

Most graphics cards are all built off of the same reference card design, even many of the factory overclocked ones. So in design, there is little difference, and there will typically be no performance advantage as long as the specs are the same.

That much I knew, but I thought that all the cards were tested/speedbinned for overclocking potential at the factory and the faster cards were sold at a slightly higher price to people like Gainward/BFG etc, plus those brands tend to put better fans on so they can guarantee the higher clock speeds. Or is that all just marketing hype?

[Chromatik]

Warranty and Support. Period.

BFG owns with support and I've heard EVGA does as well. not sure about XFX. PNY fails in my experience. I still haven't forgiven them for a GeForce 4 Ti 4800 I had.

[iknowjohnny]

PNY is a budget brand and i've bought several items from them in the past. The key word here is "past". Too many problems, no help from the company. so i never buy PNY anything anymore.

[smogsy]

xfx is the worst my 6600gt blew around a year ago sent to ocuk who found it was fault (wouldnt even shoe screen) they sent to xfx who said it was fine pcuk retested it then sent them a bill for a 7600GT OC from BFG lol


never buy xfx

[shatavaar]

for the new 8800GT's I've looked at a few at various electronic stores. regardless if its the 600 mhz or 650 or higher regardless of manufacturer... they appear to all have the same stock fans in them...

i could be wrong though.

[Ambush]

Ok thanks for all the replies. My last card was a 6800 GT from bfg and to this day it still works like brand new. I feel more comfortable now with my PNY.
Hopefully ill have no problems with it when i install it.

[Syberdoor]

for the new 8800GT's I've looked at a few at various electronic stores. regardless if its the 600 mhz or 650 or higher regardless of manufacturer... they appear to all have the same stock fans in them...

i could be wrong though.

actually afaik all the models announced at the launch day have those, but in the meantime several manufacturers have announced versions with zalman fans. (e.g MSI and Leadtek)

[Apathy]

The last card I had from PNY was a 6600GT AGP. I ran out to every store available, and they only had the PCI-E version of it.. I finally said to hell with it and ordered the PNY 6600GT AGP version on CompUSA's site.. I finally get the thing and put it in as fast as I humanly could without breaking it.. I load up I think BloodRayne 2 and it locks up in the menu.. I reboot and try it again, but get into the game.. I then lock up in the game. I load up Doom 3: RoE. Not too far into the game I lock up..

I've finally had it enough of it, so I go online for trouble shooting. While I'm online, I go to look at some of the online retailer customer reviews of it. 90% of the PNY 6600GT AGP customers were doing nothing but whining about how bad the card sucked and what a pos it was. While I'm looking at the reviews, little black dots decide to fill my screen. I end up having to highlight the whole page and click in random spots to kill the highlight for the black dots to go away.

I ended up having to pull the heatsink off the card and put some Arctic Silver heatsink grease on the GPU and memory. That solved the problem for a tiny bit. A couple weeks down the road, it starts screwing up again. I pull the heatsink back off and the heatsink grease that I put on there is now soldered onto it. I made an attempt to get the stuff off, but gave up after a while from being un-successful. I put the card back into my tower and it's worse than before.. I can no longer play UT2004 without 10 to 15 second complete freezes, or any other games for that matter..

After another week of dealing with it, I said to hell with it and got I think a 55 dollar PCI-E motherboard and a leadtek 6800GS card.

I will NEVER buy a PNY product EVER again.

[Mr Songwriter]

The customer reviews on Newegg usually have quite a good cross section of opinion for just about any given product, so you can see which brands to avoid.

[-VT-]

I had PNY brand Geforce card a while back (i think it was a Ti4200) and the thing burnt itself out...literally, after only having it for like 3 months or so. Have not and will not buy another PNY product ever again.

[cel4145]

This is the first EVGA use for me. I normally buy MSI or Asus. I've been using them for years and have used their mobos, too. They've been very reliable. I would have bought one of them this time, but neither have a 256MB 8600GT. Figured might as well give EVGA a try.

XFX I always avoided since that is Pine Technology. They were originally a very cheap manufacturer. PNY always seemed to be inexpensive store brand for memory, so I stayed away from them, too.

[Ambush]

man i come home from work only to find more bad reviews about PNY. Im almost about to take it back but like no 1 in my area has anymore 8800 GT's

I run huge fans across my computer and i dont usually have my comp closed up i usually take the case off of it and let my big fans blow in the direction of it. I never have any overheating problems, so hopefully when i do this with this PNY i dont experience the problems you guys have had with your PNY cards.