Technical data
#5 Manufacturer & Feature Set
O
nce you have found a model that suits you,
the time has come to choose the right card-
maker.As we mentioned earlier, NVIDIA, S3
and XGI don’t sell cards themselves, choosing
instead to focus their attention exclusively on the
design and production of their graphics processors.
While ATI sells cards, their scope of operation is
limited to Canada and the USA ("Built by ATI").
ATI-based cards produced by other companies usu-
ally say “Powered by ATI”.
Performance differences between cards using the
same chip are the exception, rather than the norm.
Cardmakers usually adhere quite strictly to the
clock speed specifications suggested by NVIDIA,
with a couple of exceptions. First, a few companies
offer special "OC" versions in the enthusiast seg-
ment which run at higher clock speeds, and even
most "normal" cards can be set to operate at higher
clock speeds manually.The difference is that in the
first case, the manufacturer guarantees that the card
will work at the higher speed without a problem.
Graphics cards in the lowest-price segment are
the second exception. Here, the competition is so
intense that every dollar counts, so manufacturers
may try to cut corners. Often enough, the result is
either low 3D performance or bad 2D quality, or
even both. Frequently, the memory bus is reduced
in size, for example from 128 bits to 64 bits (see
above).We can only warn you to stay away from
such products, since the 3D performance suffers
enormously when memory bandwidth is halved. If
detailed information is conspicuously absent from
the box or the salesperson can’t or won’t give you
any technical data for the card, the best course of
action is to keep looking, no matter how tempting
the offer may be.
Another variation on the game of “sales poker” is
the use of lures that sound good but may not nec-
essarily be of great value. For example, while
256MB of video memory obviously sounds better
than 128MB, the extra memory will only pay off in
modern games with large textures, played at high
resolutions and with FSAA and AF enabled.To be
able to handle the amount of data produced in such
a scenario, both the graphics processor and the
memory bus need to be sufficiently fast. In other
words, 256MB simply doesn’t make any sense out-
side of the enthusiast segment!
Image quality is a factor that is very hard to
judge before a purchase.To prevent nasty surprises,
you should always ask the staff about the store’s
return policy before you buy the card.Then test it
to see if it meets your needs, and return it if neces-
sary.
AGP or PCI Express
Without a doubt, the future belongs to the new
PCI Express interface. However, the technology is
still too new to judge when exactly this future will
be upon us; in other words, when PCI Express will
become a “must-have”. So far, only motherboards
using Intel chipsets offer PCI Express at all,
although the competition supporting AMD is set to
go.
A typical AGP 8x slot (top) and the new x16
PEG (PCI Express for Graphics) slot.
The different connectors.AGP on top, PCI
Express below.
Where 3D performance is concerned, PCI
Express offers at best minimal advantages over AGP
models. Buyers looking to upgrade their graphics
card won’t be making a mistake if they pick up an
AGP model, assuming that their system is reason-
ably powerful and up-to-date. However, if the
potential upgrade would also include a new moth-
erboard and a CPU, it’s worth taking a look at PCI
Express. Keep an eye on the price tag, though, as
PCI Express systems on the whole aren’t signifi-
cantly faster than their AGP counterparts at the
moment. In the end, it’s up to the individual to
decide how much an investment into the future is
worth to them.
We’ve compiled more information on PCI
Express in the following article:
http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graph-
ic/20040310/index.html.
SLI
When older gamers hear the term “SLI”, their eyes
tend to glaze over and they wax nostalgic.These
three letters bring back fond memories of the glo-
rious times when the now-defunct 3D chipmaker
3dfx was still around.The abbreviation SLI stood
for a technique that allowed two 3D cards to work
in tandem in one computer, splitting the work
between them.This led to a performance boost fac-
tor of somewhere between 1.5 and 2.
The AGP bus put an end to this type of solution,
but now, with the introduction of PCI Express, SLI
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