After an absence of over eight months, NVIDIA has finally returned to the high-end segment with the GeForce FX 5900 Ultra. In fact, they’re not only back in the game, NVIDIA’s 256MB GeForce FX 5900 Ultra is the fastest graphics accelerator on the market, albeit with slightly lesser image quality than ATI’s RADEON 9800 PRO.
Lets look at the results, in real world game testing the GeForce FX 5900 Ultra finished on top in every benchmark except Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell. This title in particular is clearly highly dependant on the graphics card’s fill-rate as evidenced by the older GeForce FX 5800 Ultra. With its 500MHz core clock, the GeForce FX 5800 Ultra finished ahead of all other graphics cards in our testing with Splinter Cell.
The addition of the 256-bit memory interface in particular really allows the GeForce FX 5900 Ultra to shine in high-resolution environments with antialiasing and anisotropic filtering, one of GeForce FX 5800 Ultra’s weaknesses in comparison to the offerings from ATI.
NVIDIA also addressed the noise issue with GeForce FX 5800 Ultra. Rather than incorporating heat pipe technology similar to that found on the original FX Flow cooling system, NVIDIA opted to go instead with a traditional heatsink/fan combination. Describing the GeForce FX 5900 Ultra’s heatsink as “traditional” however is probably a bit conservative, as the heatsink is so large it physically consumes the PCI slot adjacent to your AGP slot! Fortunately the cooling fan NVIDIA has utilized is much quieter than its predecessor, so you won’t have to crank up the volume while you’re gaming.
The question now facing NVIDIA is availability. After their track record with GeForce FX 5800 Ultra, many will be skeptical of the June availability date. In talking with NVIDIA however, they sound very confident that they’ll be able to hit their June target. In a remarkable achievement, NVIDIA went to full production from NV35’s first silicon. As a result, NV35 has been in production since February and they claim to have shipped tens of thousands of NV35 cores to their launch partners by the time you’ve read this. For now though, we’re going to take a wait and see approach. After all, GeForce FX 5600 Ultra and 5200 Ultra’s are still hard to come by at retail, with the latter being built on TSMC’s proven 0.15-micron manufacturing process.
If everything we’re seeing today holds true, the 256MB GeForce FX 5900 Ultra will be a worthy competitor to ATI’s RADEON 9800 PRO, but at $500, its asking price will be too steep for many to afford. That’s why we really want to see what NVIDIA’s 128MB variants of the GeForce FX 5900 will be capable of. Unfortunately, we’re going to have to wait a little longer to get that answer, but in the meantime start saving your pennies because all of these cards come with pretty hefty price tags.
Batman: Arkham City PC Review Batman: Arkham City is the sequel to 2009’s smash-hit action game Batman: Arkham Asylum. As the name suggests, you will be reprising your role as the Caped Crusader and going against an even larger 'prison' filled with Gotham's criminals and villains. A textbook example on how to do a proper sequel, Arkham City takes what worked in the original, excised or improved upon what didn’t, and elevated everything to an even greater scope. The PC version suffered from a few months of delay, but in that time, Rocksteady worked closely to NVIDIA to implement some familiar technologies from the last game, such as PhysX and 3D Vision, along with new DirectX 11 optimizations. But how well was the whole package executed? Read on to find out!
Saints Row: The Third PC Review Saints Row is one of most unique series of games to build upon the open-world action template forged by Grand Theft Auto, and has met with plenty of critical and commercial success since it began on consoles back in 2006. This latest iteration, titled Saints Row: The Third promises the most outlandish fun and freedom of customization of them all, and in a much more PC-friendly package than its predecessor. Does it live up to those expectations and, more importantly, is it worth the price of admission? Find out in Will's latest review!
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim PC Review The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is Bethesda Softworks’ latest offering in their series of epic fantasy RPGs, as well as one of the most highly-anticipated PC titles of 2011. As the Dovahkiin, or Dragonborn, prepare to take the fight to the mythical beasts that have returned to the realm after centuries of slumber, all the while exploring a huge and highly-detailed open world.
The PC version of the game promises enhanced graphical fidelity, standard RPG trimmings such as hotkeys and quick-save, as well as unbridled mod support, something we’ll all be thankful for once they release that SDK. Skyrim has already sold millions of copies and set records for play-time on Steam... Find out why in today's review, which happens to be one of the biggest and most in-depth articles on the subject out there!
L.A. Noire Complete Edition PC Review L.A. Noire, as the name clearly states, is a video game built on the tropes of one of the greatest periods of American cinema: film noir. Developed by the now defunct Australian developer Team Bondi and published by Rockstar Games, this title has been out on consoles for a full six months before finally making its way to the PC. This “Complete Edition” of the game features improved graphics, keyboard/mouse controls, and every bit of previously-released DLC for free. But was it truly worth the wait? Read on and find out!
Intel Core i7-3960X Sandy Bridge-E Performance Review
Today marks the launch date for Intel’s Sandy Bridge-E line of processors, a new family of high-end Core i7 products based on the LGA 2011 platform. This new socket is poised to replace the existing LGA 1366 specification used by the more powerful Nehalem and Westmere parts from the past couple years, specifically Bloomfield and Gulftown, the Core i7-9xx+ line of CPUs.
With 6 cores, 15MB of cache, and support for quad-channel DDR3-1600 memory, the Core i7-3960X sounds like quite a catch. Want to know more about it and how it performs? Read on!
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Xbox 360 Review
The self-appointed "most anticipated game in history" launched worldwide this past Tuesday. Why, it's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, of course (of course), what else? Unsurprisingly, the military FPS debate between this and Battlefield 3 rages on, but now that both have been released, surely we can take a look and objectively evaluate them both? Luke's taken the Xbox version of MW3 for a spin this week, so to find out what he thinks of it in today's review!
Stronghold 3 Review
The latest sequel in the long-running real-time strategy franchise from FireFly Studios, Stronghold 3 is all about building your dream castle and defending it against sieging enemies. Almost exactly one decade after the first game was released, this new title promises a return to the classic and well-received gameplay that has been strayed so far from in more recent iterations. Does it live up to those expectations? Will (AKA Synchronous Failure) tells us all about it in his first official FiringSquad review, so read on!
Battlefield 3 PC Review - Single-player Impressions
One of the most highly-anticipated PC games of the year is upon us; Battlefield 3 is now available in North America! EA/DICE have finally delivered a sequel to the core Battlefield franchise, a proper follow-up to BF2. Having played through the game's single-player campaign already, ahead of the multiplayer festivities kicking off around midnight, I figured I'd share my impressions ASAP. Is it really a worthy addition to the core Battlefield series, or just another bullet point on the back of the box? Read on and find out!
Wrecked: Revenge Revisited Supersonic Software Interview
Following up on our hands-on preview from earlier this month, here's an interview with Supersonic Software, creators of Wrecked: Revenge Revisited. The game's coming out on XBLA and PSN in a matter of weeks, but for now, Luke chats with the developer about its predecessors Mashed and Micro Machines, how difficult it can be to get an indie game published, the closure of Codemasters' Guildford branch, and more!
Orcs Must Die! PC Review Orcs Must Die! is the first release from an independent developer named Robot Entertainment. Fans of classic real-time strategy games may have heard that name before, as the outfit is comprised of many veterans from Ensemble Studios, creators of the Age of Empires series.
Equal parts action and strategy, this is a tower defense game that not only puts you in command, but on the front lines of combat, as well. Slaughter thousands of orcs, ogres and other vile creatures of fantasy that invade your fortresses through 24 levels of the story-based campaign. With high levels of replayability thanks to its scoring and leaderboard functionality, multiple difficulty levels, and various styles of play, it sounds a steal at only $15. Does it deliver on all that’s promised, though? Read on and find out!
Q3 w/ 4xAA and 8x Aniso
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