This Card Rocks
Written: Mar 14 '02
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great Graphics and easy install.
Cons: None
The Bottom Line: This card is the best I have ever used.
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| garethvk's Full Review: VisionTek GeForce3, (64 MB) AGP Video Card |
With today’s games becoming more and more graphically intensive, the question I am asked most by readers and listeners is “What video card do you suggest?” For the past three years, I have always suggested cards based upon the Nvidia chipsets, not only due to their outstanding performance, but also for the company’s constant standards for quality and frequent driver updates. This attention to details constantly enhance and extend the value of video cards beyond the lifespan of their chipset. When ATI introduced their Radeon line, a hot debate ensued in gaming circles regarding if Nvidia’s reign as king of the cards.
With this in mind, I took an in-depth look at the Geforce 3 Xtasy 6564 card from Visiontek (www.visiontek.com). The Geforce 3 is regarded as the top gaming card on the market, (at least until the 128 MB Geforce 4 cards ship), Visiontek has done a fantastic job on the card as installation to the AGP port was painless, and the driver install was smooth as glass. I wish to note that I used the drivers from Nvidia for use in my testing. The card features shadow buffers that allow characters to cast shadows upon themselves, and this lends and extra sense of eeriness to Half Life when it was running on the card. The vertex and pixel shaders are combined with high-resolution antialiasing which enabled characters in the games to have a very high level of facial features while objects were rendered in a seamless and realistic pattern. The Xtasy 6564 is also capable of running over 700 million pixels per second and this all adds up to the best gaming experiences I have ever had. The card was far superior to even the 64 MB Geforce 2 Ultra cards in dynamic lighting effects, smoothness of animation, and speed at higher resolutions. Testing the card on the Beta version of Earth and Beyond, from the ion trails of the ships drives to the dazzling light show that is warp drive the game has it all. Ships hulls are smooth and seamless, and the detail level is amazing. Compared to the Radeon cards, the Geforce 3 blew them away as the framerates were higher, the detail level was greater and the gameplay was smoother. The games tested were Half Life, Earth and Beyond Beta, Tribes 2, Warcraft 3 Beta, Nascar 4, and Aliens VS Predator 2. I used the Beta versions of two pending games as a basis to judge how the card would perform on the new generation that will require a minimum of 16 MB video memory the results were amazing. The Radeon often had issues with the drivers not offering some function in certain games, such as dashboard needless on Nascar 4, the Geforce 3 however had zero problems and allowed me to concentrate on gaming alone and that is what a good card is supposed to do. I have tested many cards in my day, and I must say that this card impressed me as no other card has. I could find no fault with it, nor compatibility issues with any program while running it. Final Verdict, the Xtasy 6564 Geforce 3 card is a fantastic piece of hardware that is a must for any gamer looking for top performance on a budget while looking to avoid any complications or compatibility issues that can arise on other cards in the price range.
Further technical information on the Xtasy 6564 by Visiontek is available at.
http://www.visiontek.com/6564.shtml
Gareth Von Kallenbach
gareth@nwlink.com
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 140.00
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Epinions.com ID:
garethvk
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Member: Gareth Von Kallenbach
Location: Seattle, WA
Reviews written: 438
Trusted by: 30 members
About Me:
International syndicated Film Critic from Seattle.
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