ATI's new Radeon 2000-series 3D graphics cards (code-named R600) were at one point supposed to ship this January. After a few more months of fine-tuning (and plenty of Internet rumors), today brought the official launch of the 512MB Radeon HD 2900 XT. This $399 card is designed to compete directly with Nvidia's 640MB GeForce 8800 GTS, which at press time you can find for as low as $330 with rebates.
Both CNET and GameSpot will have full reviews of this card up shortly, but for now, you can check out the hard-core coverage over at HardOCP, HotHardware, and TechReport.
The takeaway from the reviews around the Web is that the Radeon HD 2900 XT is loud, requires a lot of power, and stays competitive with Nvidia as far as performance and image quality, depending on the game. We found a similar conclusion in our soon-to-be-posted review of a dual Radeon HD 2900 XT-equipped Velocity Micro desktop PC (which we rate and test differently then we would a standalone graphics card).
With no next-generation DirectX 10 games out yet and both cards' driver software still works in progress, we expect that the performance story will evolve over the next few months. We should also add that ATI has announced its mainstream Radeon HD 2400 and Radeon HD 2600 cards, to be released in June, as well as its complete line of Mobility Radeon 2000-series graphics chips. Since all of these cards and chips can decode HD video, even if Nvidia becomes the eventual 3D performance winner, there's still another battlefield on which ATI and AMD can come out on top.
We know that some of you won't balk at the $829 price tag of Nvidia's new highest-end GeForce 8800 Ultra 3D card, as long as it's the fastest thing around. With ATI's next-gen Radeon cards right around the corner, though, we'd definitely wait and take a few more laps around the money bin before springing for any high-end 3D cards today. The 8800 Ultra doesn't hit the street until May 15th, so you have a few days to think it over. But even if the Ultra card beats its soon-to-be-released competition, we have to ask if it's worth paying $125 or so more for only a 10% to 15% performance gain (according to Nvidia itself) over Nvidia's former king card, the GeForce 8800 GTX.
Nvidia's latest high-end 3D card, the Geforce 8800 Ultra
(Credit: Nvidia)Basically an overclocked 8800 GTX, the 8800 Ultra gets its performance gains from faster core, memory, and shader clock speeds. Whereas the GTX has a 575MHz core, a 1.8GHz memory clock, and 1,350MHz for the shaders, the 8800 Ultra has 612MHz for the core, 2.16GHz memory, and a 1.5MHz shader clock. Both cards have 768MB of DDR3 SDRAM, currently the most memory we've seen on any consumer 3D card.
Nvidia didn't send a standalone 8800 Ultra for us to test, so we'll send you to the fine folks at Anandtech and PC Perspective for the full run-down of benchmark results. Their opinions from their testing mirror our own nonscientific conclusions based on the card's on-paper specs. The GeForce 8800 Ultra is indeed faster than the 8800 GTX (the former single fastest GPU), but even if you possess the financial wherewithal to shop for a near-$1,000 gaming card, we don't think it's worth the high price for what seems to be a nominal boost to 3D performance.
First Dell grabbed Alienware. Then HP picked up Voodoo PC. Today, we learn that Velocity Micro has acquired superfast PC maker Overdrive PC.
While neither Velocity Micro nor Overdrive PC may have the same name recognition as the companies involved in other recent acquisitions, this deal definitely makes the competitive landscape more interesting. The founder of Voodoo PC said earlier this spring that it's working on a game performance-oriented retail brand. That's a direct shot at Velocity Micro and its already considerable retail shelf presence.
By scooping up Overdrive PC, Velocity Micro has made a move to protect its retail standing. The reason is because it now has access to Overdrive's "Hyperclocking" technology. That term might sound like marketing language at its worst, but Overdrive's closely guarded tweaking has a history of winning Editor's Choice awards. If Velocity Micro was able to Hyperclock its retail systems, that could considerably improve the performance of its gaming systems, which retail for $2,000 to $3,000. Good for them, but more important, good for anyone in the market for such a PC.
For Overdrive PC's part, it will maintain its brand identity, but it now has access to part of Velocity Micro's production facilities. What that means for Velocity Micro's own efforts at making elite PCs remains to be seen. We expect that, for the short term, we'll continue to see its highest end Raptor Signature Edition PCs for sale. Down the road, we can't say.
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