Building a PC can be a game of tough choices. Thankfully none of them contribute to increasing/lowering your karma level, but when it comes to the option of Nvida or AMD graphics cards, it’s certainly a toughie. The same problem isn’t had by id Software’s John Carmack though. The father of the FPS is always seen using Nvidia graphics chipsets. But why? “Nvidia drivers are consistently superior” he claims.
The revelation came via the Twittersphere, where a fan tweeted at the Doom creator: “You praise everything except Nvidia and Windows. And yet you use Windows os and Nvidia hardware only,” to which Carmack replied “You are right. I cheer progress everywhere, but Visual Studio, Nvidia GPUs, and Intel CPUs are my weapons of choice.”
Furthering the debate, a third party chipped in, asking what Carmack thought of AMD’s range of hardware. “On a hardware level, AMD is often as good as or better than Nvidia, but Nvidia drivers are consistently superior.” explained Carmack.
AMD are rocking some especially good incentives at the moment with their ‘Never Settle’ campaign. My recent AMD purchase bagged me Bioshock Infinite, Crysis 3 and Fry Cry 3: Blood Dragon, which is certainly something you can’t ignore. They also have this phenomenal advert. But in the long-run, would it have been better to have opted for an Nvida, if their drivers always come out on top? Will this decision haunt me for the rest of this card’s life? Only time will tell if I should have opted for a ‘Carmack Approved’ GPU instead.