Ssnake, what I meant by typical is that ati has had some AA problems in some games in the past and recently as well.The 4850 I have is very quick and quiet as well (aftermarket cooling) and I am very happy with it. I have been an Ati fan since the 9700 days, so its not like I am an nvidia fanboy. The 4870 is faster and only somewhat hotter running than the 4850.The 1 gig version seem to be outstanding for the money but have a good power supply, particularly if overclocking. To quote(loosely) John Carmack of doom and quake fame" when I have a problem coding with nvidia it is my fault; with with anyone else's card it is theirs.In other words he likes nvidia drivers.When it is all said and done ,some game will always work better with one card or the other Also the problem I am having appears to be a problem with ati AND vista.Perhaps mostly vista. the main reason I have for using vista is the better support for dual core proc. and some multimedia apps i use work a bit better in vista. overall win 7 seems to be a much better solution when it does come out. thanks for the work on SB; on my end I am still trying to learn from it and trying to get the AA working. cheers