Graphic Card advice and selling second hand CD's

[ABABAB]

Hi all!
can someone answer this question I have a 2.4 athlon XP, 1024 Ram and G force 4 TI 4200-128 MB Graphics card. I am happy with this set up but if I bought a sapphire Radeon 9600XT 256MB would I get rid of the slight jagged edges I sometimes think I see in far away bridges and buildings and also on the railway lines.
Just secondly I have 3 pay ware add-ons to sell, can I sell them on here or could you tell me where I could sell them.
May I say how good Mid East UK and CC4 and NWE2 are. Keep up the excellent work.

[lemberg]

That's interesting as I get that with 64mb Geforce 440 and thats pedestrian compared to yours I think that we will never get much more improvement until the sims graphic engine is updated , ie' a new sim.
Lemberg

[baldwin]

Jaggies can be removed by using anti aliasing, it smooths the edges out. If you are using one of the newer driver sets from Nvidia, this can be applied from the Nvidia settings icon which usually sits in the right hand part of the taskbar. The GF4 Ti4200 should be well able to handle a degree of Anti Aliasing without giving much up in the way of FPS.

You may also get a bit of mileage out if this on the GF440MX.

Mervyn

[Lad491]

I see no one has answered your second question on the point of selling software. Firstly you dont actually own the software usually, you just own a licence to use it. Some companies will allow you to transfer the licence, but others specifically forbid it. For instance almost all DVD and VHS movies specifically forbid their resale, the same applies to most games. Most of the freeware supplied here, whether on CD or by download is likewise usually forbidden for resale.

I, personally, always uninstall everything associated with the add on - including all stock and activities provided and then write to the manufacturer or supplier asking to unregister the software as it is no longer in use by me. Once I get a confirmation from them I then feel free to sell the add on as the new user can legally register the software as he is now the owner of the licence. If they dont reply - and some wont or will reply saying no - then legally you cant sell the software, but you probably could still take a chance since i doubt anyone would go to the expense of mounting a legal case if you wern't distributing copies without authority. However the new owner wont be able to register the copy or obtain any software support.

[JohnKendrick]

One of the major high street PC game outlets sells masses of second hand games. If you haven't registered the product it is OK to pass on the product to someone else - I expect there are thousands of games gifted on at Christmas!

While some freeware authors may disagree, the general thing about freeware products is that it is usually OK to pass copies on providing it is on a not for profit basis unless it is stipulated otherwise in the documentation which may be for a very good reason.

My own view is that by passing a copy on to someone else you are saving the author the expense of burning yet another CD and the postage costs which can mount up if many people ask the author directly for a copy!

However, a freeware CD might be an unfinshed version for testing and an author may be reluctant for that to be released generally in case it causes problems to others as the author would not know who to contact to put things right if he discovers a problem, or it may contain known problems that are yet to be fixed. Again, the documentation should clarify that - so read it!

John

[bigvern]

I've come across a couple of indie game stores dealing in second hand PC stuff, though the big names like Game and EB never have. Interestingly, Game have just discontinued their 10 day "no quibble" return policy on PC software. While most original game CD's these days have copy protection up to the ears and must be in the CD drive to play the game, no doubt some unscrupulous wretches get round this and have been taking the original back for a refund.

In the case of MSTS add ons (or indeed MSFS add ons) there is very little to stop people installing then returning for a refund but they still have the route or whatever on the hard drive (and easy to backup too).

Policy on my freeware CD's has been that they must never be sold on. If someone has a friend who wants to borrow my CD to install the routes that is okay. In practice I accept there is little that can be done to enforce that though.

[scefhwil]

I have a 2.2 Athlon XP, 512 Mb Ram and a ATI 9600 Pro (this was the predecessor to the 9600 XT). I went for the 9600 over an Nvidea card of equivalent price because all the reviews I read (online) clearly concluded that when using FSAA and AF the ATI cards are better (ie bother in image quality and lower fps hit) than the Nvidea cards. I read a review last week for the latest cards from these manufacturers and this concluded the same, ATI cards give better FSAA and AF performance than Nvidea ones.

In fact I have concluded that my 2.2 XP CPU isn't powerfull enough to get the full wack out of the 9600 Pro. At 1280x1024x32 I can crank my graphics up to 6xFSAA and 8xAF and not get a fps hit!