Need for Speed Racing Games

After waiting 2 weeks to oder my Gtx295 Nvidia graphics card I hope I can play today, and throw out my Radeon 4890HD in the bin, as the Radeon makes all funny colors in the sky in the games Terminator,Sims3 and NFS Shift.
The 30 or so other games some old like Baldurs Gate all the way too Left4dead Fallout3 Wolfenstine Crysis on max all work fine. My PC was a custom build from Umart @ southport on the goldcoast,aus they said the Radeon was just as good as the Nvidia and $200 less even though I wanted a Nvidia from the start. They are very intimidating when asking for help, almost like its too much of a problem from them to help you, this will be the last purchase I make from them. I have seen pictures on the net of people playing Shift with a Gtx295, but Shift only uses 1 of the muti cores inside, but I have read on the patch discussion that the patch will make shift take use of muti core video/graphic cards.
The only reason I should not be playing today is if I have to wait another week before I can pick it up due to it not been in store yet.
wish me luck
regards
Philo

i7
Vista64 (only because I am not sure if some software I am using will work with Win7)
Nvidia Gtx295 (soon I hope)

I bought an xfx 4870 shortly before I bought Shift. I was experiencing the 'black screen' crashes when starting the test lap, or within 10 minutes of playing the game. (Same issue with COD MW2 also) After playing around with settings I found I could run the game at 1280x800 with high detail ok, but any higher and it crashed. After a lot of troubleshooting and trying workarounds from the forums with no success, I finally upgraded my case (had very cheap atx case) to a cooler master with four 120mm fans in it.

Now the game runs fine (grass in track/black sky/bouncing suspension occasionally) at a smooth framerate @1650x1080 full detail, even with 15 cars on the track. I have had the framerate drop considerably on rare occasions midway through a race but restarting usually sorts it.

Hope this helps, if anyone has a pedestal fan try running that facing directly into your case and see if shift runs ok, that's how I found it was temperature problems for me...

Other than that, I found driving from behind the car view was hard to contol (with wheel) and the sliding at every corner very annoying, but driving from cockpit view (my preferred) it is the best driving game to date and handles beautifully. I think when people are commenting on the handling physics of the game, they should mention whether they are using the external view or cockpit view because IMO the experience between the two is completely different.

Sorry for the long post!

Specs:
Logitech Driving Force Pro
C2D E8500 @3.16
4Gb Corsair Dominator DDR2 @1033
Asus P5QSE/R
450W p/s (works fine surprisingly)
Win 7 x64

Can Shift be played using an ATI HD3800 series card? I've seen a few posts by people saying that they've tried to play the game with those cards and are not able to. But according to the OCP documentation I'd have thought it wasn't possible.

I am using the Coolmaster SNIPER case, is very good. Heaps of room and I am a Noob and even I can put in hard drives (5tb so far) 1 blue ray player and 2 dvdr, I have only 6 ram but for extra $300 bucks might take it to 12 ram, I heard in USA you can go to 24 ram? with the Gtx295 my Pc cost me $4000 to build (just tower) and I just purchased the Panasonic P50G10 plasma $2500 as my monitor.
I was going to get Modern Warfare2 on PC but I have heard that with no dedicated servers there are hackers on Pc so I will just get on PS3 as its free online (but due to so many people it crashes heaps)
I have xbox360 but at moment its just gathering dust, but would like to get Fable2 and Gears of war 2 in the future.

Shift 100% with the Nvidia GTX295!
the game feels a bit arcade like, but it works 100%
it only cost me $600 to play this game,
but hey it works lol
tx for your help guys,
sorry for been a troll
Philo.

ps as yet I do not see any grass on track lol, but I was playing world at war online on PS3 and these African Americans they sure were talking that they were smoking it lol see ya around lol

cem_ea_id.Philofish wrote:Shift 100% with the Nvidia GTX295!
the game feels a bit arcade like, but it works 100%
it only cost me $600 to play this game,
but hey it works lol
tx for your help guys,
sorry for been a troll
Philo.

ps as yet I do not see any grass on track lol, but I was playing world at war online on PS3 and these African Americans they sure were talking that they were smoking it lol see ya around lol

not to be a jerk, but... why the the hell would you invest that much money with directx 11 cards on the horizon? that card is excessive now and will be obsolete then.

cool thanks for your reply,
I guess I am impatient as I had Sims3, Terminator, and Shift all not working with the Radeon.
I did ask the guys a Umart if there was a new card coming out and they said they did not know lol
trust me where I got my pc the guys are not good at all.
but having said that,
money is not really a problem for me (no ressecission in aus as yet lol because we are selling our resources to china lol),
so if in 6mths or a year I need to upgrade, then so be it.
but thanks for your help and if you can post me a link to where and when these new cards are that would be fantastic.
I am loving the new card and the games,
keep in touch
Philo.

Are you using the 4890 for anything ?

I just put the Radeon back in its box for safe keeping, I guess I will just keep if ever the Nvidia crashes and dies lol so I have a back up graphic card.
I must say after playing Shift for a few hours now, its like the best looking racing game I have ever played.
The London stage looks amazing, and the colors on paint work on the Lotus really make you look twice it looks that good.
I have a Samsung 1080p Lcd and Panasonic Plasma 1080p with both Xbox360 and PS3 and I'm telling ya the game on PC has amazing graphics, the best I have seen in a racing game yet.
(so far no bugs/crashes or anything, its a fun (on easy lol) arcade racer) have not played on hard settings as I'm not that good, but on normal/easy its fun and looks fantastic, thats all I really want in a racer)
no need for the PC patch as yet.

there are so many games to get I cant keep up,
so want to get Modern Warfare 2 on PC and PS3
MAG on PS3 as I hope with 256 players I will not suck so much lol
and Aliens Vs Predator game, as I do love Aliens (the second movie) and part 1 and 2 of predator,
I feel the other Aliens and Predator movies did not live up to there predecessors lol
Philo

(sorry for blogging out of topic just making conversation is all)

just played a few races online, is fun, everyone nice

cem_ea_id.UberSil wrote:Can Shift be played using an ATI HD3800 series card? I've seen a few posts by people saying that they've tried to play the game with those cards and are not able to. But according to the OCP documentation I'd have thought it wasn't possible.

i play on an antique P4 3.0, saffire 3850 agp, 3 gig ram. All at stock clocks. 1440x900 shadows aat medium, all else is high. quite playable after I am in the lead. Kinda bad with a full field in front of me. I hope the new ati drivers + patch= happy gamers.
cheers
ndmrpwr

Ok, i've just bought this game and honestly, worse experience ever, it just wont work.
My pc configs are fine: Intel Core 2 Quad Q8400 @ 2.66GHz, 3GB RAM, video card is NVIDIA GeForce 9500GT.
I've tried it all, reinstalled, closed all background programs, and i keep having the same problems:
-The game runs terribly slow, after starting the initial race, when it doesnt crash;
-It gets stuck in the career starting movie, it keeps playing over and over;
I changed the video settings, updated my video card, installed the dX in the game dvd folder, it just wont work.
Any help would be appreciated, because i have no idea what else to do ;/

Shift 100% with the Nvidia GTX295!

Works just fine on my old 9600GT setup as well...and I got it for $89.95.

Edited to add: The 9500 is NOT in the same league with the 6 & 8 models of the series. It just isn't. At any rate, whatever you do, DO NOT turn DOWN the shadow settings in the game. That will ruin the performance and cause it to crash. Normally, when you are going to the grid and it's showing the scenes of your car.

@ Nikolas159

There's a patch coming in 5 days which should fix all the issues, and adds DLC cars:

http://forum.needforspeed.com/eaforum/posts/list/333357.page

Try it with the patch and then see how you go. I'm waiting for the pc patch, but I have the PS3 version too and it works much better after the patch.

<Shift 100% with the Nvidia GTX295! >

Yes I agree 100%
no need for patch at all.