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NVIDIA vs. ATI
Strategy and execution
For 2000, NVIDIA's strategy was to fill out its product lineup. NVIDIA launched six products based upon two solid graphics cores, and was remarkably successful in taking a base chip design and developing both workstation and value editions of the chip.
The surprise of 2000 came from ATI and its Radeon chipset, which catapulted the company to the upper echelon of gaming performance, right along side NVIDIA. However, while the Radeon reestablished ATI as a major player in the high-end graphics, NVIDIA was still able to succeed by being the first to market and by making significant performance improvements through new drivers.
Furthermore, ATI has had much less success building upon its standard core. Although ATI offers the All-in-Wonder Radeon, which supplies improvements at the board level, ATI does not have an upmarket workstation edition of the Radeon, and the value Radeon VE has not yet shown up on store shelves.
The upcoming battle
NVIDIA's strategy is very straightforward. Develop a robust, high-performance 3D core. Then span it across multiple markets and performance levels.
2001 will be an interesting year. The NV20 is expected to be announced fairly soon, with rumors pointing to the end of February. After the initial release, one can expect a workstation and value edition of the chip. It is also very likely that a Mac version of the NV20 is also being readied. With 3dfx out of the picture, the only formidable competitor left in the graphics industry is ATI. Matrox may have a high-end part waiting in the wings, but the company's high-end product releases are few and far between. NVIDIA and ATI are the companies to watch. ATI's next generation technology is not expected to be unveiled until March, with the actual product to be shipped in summer.
This coming year, NVIDIA and ATI will essentially be competing in nearly every possible market. While set-top-boxes still remain a province of ATI, NVIDIA has planted seeds in the Macintosh and mobile markets and even has chipsets coming this year to go head to head against ATI's fledgling chipset business. It'll be very interesting to watch the two titans battle it out on the different fronts.
Phenom II Gets A New Revision: 125W AMD Phenom II X4 965 Performance Preview
Promising lower power consumption, lower temps, and most importantly for enthusiasts, more OC'ing, AMD is back with a new CPU revision for the Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition, which now boasts a 125W TDP. Is AMD able to deliver on their promises though? Find out in today's article!
Shattered Horizon Review
FutureMark, well known for their popular 3DMark benchmarks, is venturing into new territory with Shattered Horizon. This multiplayer shooter is perhaps best known for its system requirements -- the game supports DX10 only -- but there's more underneath the surface of this game than fancy visuals. Is it worth its $20 price tag though? Read Vandy's take inside!
Borderlands PC Review
Is it an RPG or is it an FPS? Borderlands blends the best elements of both in one entertaining package. Vandy has spent the past week playing the PC version of the game and came away rather impressed. Read his full thoughts on the game in today's review!
AMD Athlon II X3 435/Athlon II X2 240e Performance Preview
Today AMD is introducing 8 new Athlon II CPUs intended to service different segments of the budget CPU market. For HTPC users, new 45W dual, triple, and quad core offerings should deliver good performance along with low power, while performance junkies on a budget will want to look at AMD's new Athlon II X3 CPUs. See how the new chips stack up in terms of performance and OC'ing in this article!
EVGA P55 FTW Review
Looking for a good P55 motherboard to OC your CPU beyond 4GHz? If so, you may want to check out EVGA's P55 FTW. With its extra ATX12V connector, this motherboard can send up to 600W of juice to the CPU, and it's got more voltage settings in BIOS than 95% of the general public needs. But that's just barely scratching the surface of what this board can do. Check out today's review for the full details!
ATI Radeon HD 5770/5750 Performance Preview
With prices ranging from $109-$159, ATI's Radeon 5700 series of cards bring DX11 gaming to mainstream price points and usher in new levels of energy efficiency. But are they powerful enough to dethrone ATI's Radeon 4800 series cards? Yes and no. Read today's article for more info!
Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising Review
While it's not the true sequel to Operation Flashpoint, Dragon Rising is billed as a modern tactical sim just like its predecessor. Does it live up to these claims? Read Vandy's take in today's review!
Batman: Arkham Asylum PhysX Features and Performance
One eye candy feature PC users can enjoy over the console edition of Batman: AA is PhysX. Rocksteady's PhysX implementation is more than just tearing cloth and added objects too, although that's of course in there. Vandy goes over the features and performance of PhysX in Batman: AA in this article!
ATI Radeon 5850 Performance Preview
Not everyone's got $400 to spend on a shiny new Radeon 5870 card, which is why it can be argued that ATI's Radeon 5850 is the more relevant GPU for a lot of gamers and hardware enthusiasts. Based on the same DX11 RV870 architecture as the 5870, the 5850 delivers next-generation performance in a smaller, more efficient package, and most importantly it's priced for less than $300. ATI pitches it as their answer to the GeForce GTX 285...See how it compares in this article!
Overclocking the Radeon HD 5870
We weren't satisfied with the 900MHz core/1300MHz memory speeds we hit last week with our Radeon 5870 boards. We wanted to see how far ATI's latest flagship GPU could be pushed, and how well it could perform at those speeds. We also wanted to see which component delivered better performance results: OC'ing the memory, or OC'ing the GPU?
Fortunately thanks to AMD's GPU Clock Tool, we now have unlimited speeds on tap for OC'ing. Is 1GHz within reach? Find out in today's article!