Archive

GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 285 2GB OC Graphics Card | Posted on: 31/07/2009 @ 7:00

GeForce GTX 275 Versus Radeon HD 4890 Video Card Battle | Posted on: 30/07/2009 @ 15:30

What happens when you take the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 275 with Forceware 190.38 drivers and the ATI Radeon HD 4890 with CATALYST 9.7 drivers and see how they do on odd ball game titles like Velvet Assassin and Wall-E? That is what we tackle this time around between these two popular gaming graphics cards.

NVIDIA Issues 185.xx Stable Linux Driver Update | Posted on: 28/07/2009 @ 17:00

While NVIDIA's driver engineers are hard at work on the 190.xx driver series, which among other features does bring OpenGL 3.2 support, for those living by the stable releases there is a new driver that's out today. The NVIDIA 185.18.29 Linux driver was uploaded to NVIDIA's FTP server this morning and does bring a number of changes as listed in their official release highlights. There are a few ...

MSI N275GTX Twin Frozr OC Video Card | Posted on: 27/07/2009 @ 17:42

MSI N275GTX Twin Frozr OC Video Card The graphics card market is pretty much a two man slugfest at the moment. ATI and NVIDIA trade blows at irregular intervals in a brutal game of strategy. The GeForce GTX 275 was a punch that NVIDIA held in reserve, just waiting for ATI to release their HD4890 card. When launch day came for ATI, lo and behold, NVIDIA had the GTX 275 up their sleeve, ready ...

Inno3D (NVIDIA) GeForce GTX 295 Platinum single-PCB graphics card | Posted on: 27/07/2009 @ 9:00

Read on to find out if it's better than the incumbent two-PCB card.

A New Radeon Shader Compiler For Mesa | Posted on: 25/07/2009 @ 12:50

While Gallium3D is gaining a lot of momentum and has picked up a number of new state trackers (OpenVG, OpenGL ES, and OpenCL and OpenGL 3.1 is coming soon) and features (i.e. network debugging support) in recent months, there is still a lot of work left before this architecture will enter the limelight...

RadeonHD Driver Power Management Improves | Posted on: 24/07/2009 @ 20:40

While we just shared that there are now patches available that introduce HDMI audio support for the xf86-video-ati driver, the RadeonHD driver has picked up improvements for power management, an area where previously the xf86-video-ati driver was in a better position. Novell's Matthias Hopf added some power management support for an area of the AtomBIOS that he had reverse engineered, after AMD ...

NVIDIA Releases An OpenGL 3.2 Driver Update | Posted on: 24/07/2009 @ 15:50

Earlier this week NVIDIA had released their first beta driver in the NVIDIA 190.xx Linux series. The official change-log for the driver was pretty interesting as there were some new additions and other improvements, but unofficially, it delivered OpenGL 3.2 Linux support...

GPU video transcoding image quality - NVIDIA CUDA versus AMD Stream | Posted on: 23/07/2009 @ 10:32

After spending quite some time looking at performance when using various video editing and transcoding applications with GPU-based acceleration in recent weeks, we now turn our attention to the question of image quality, using Cyberlink`s MediaShow Espresso to investigate how the use of both NVIDIA`s CUDA and AMD`s Stream functionality compares to using good old-fashioned CPU processing in terms ...

NVIDIA 190.16 Driver Brings OpenGL 3.2 To Linux | Posted on: 22/07/2009 @ 19:30

Yesterday NVIDIA released their first 190.xx Linux beta driver for their GeForce and Quadro graphics cards. The NVIDIA 190.16 Beta driver brought a number of VDPAU fixes, PowerMizer control features, a number of new official and unofficial OpenGL extensions receiving GLX protocol support, and there were a number of other fixes and enhancements too. However, now that we have had a chance to ...

NVIDIA Makes Modest Update With 190.xx Linux Driver | Posted on: 22/07/2009 @ 1:10

Late last month there was a private beta driver from NVIDIA for the 190.xx Linux driver series that was leaked onto the Internet. There was no complete change-log with this leak, but we have a change-log now as NVIDIA this afternoon released its first public beta driver...

Packard Bell Imax Mini NVIDIA ION nettop PC. A little bundle of joy? | Posted on: 21/07/2009 @ 14:30

Not much bigger than a book and sporting ION graphics, we take a close look at this £250 nettop PC.

Discussion: Partial Open-Source GPU Drivers | Posted on: 21/07/2009 @ 2:10

Last week VIA re-released their Chrome 9 DRM in hopes of pushing it into the mainline Linux kernel. However, the only user of this DRM code at present is their Linux binary graphics driver and VIA Technologies has no intentions of providing an open-source Chrome 9 3D driver...

AMD have yet to Comment on nVidia Laptop Testing Fiasco | Posted on: 18/07/2009 @ 23:00

AMD, who are at the centre of the recent accusations that nVidia altered benchmarks in their Laptop GPU test, have yet to comment on the story despite being contacted by eTeknix. nVidia did however get in touch to set the record straight with an eTeknix World Exclusive which can be seen here: nVidia respond to [...]

Asus refuse to comment on nVidia/AMD laptop testing | Posted on: 18/07/2009 @ 23:00

Following our recent report on the nVidia laptop testing: nVidia alter benchmarks for Fastest Mobile GPU Crown, we made sure to get all sides of the story, including from Asus, who produce the 4870 mobile crossfire powered W90 that was used in the testing. Unfortunately they’ve declined to comment, wisely leaving it up to nVidia [...]

EVGA's GeForce GTX 285 Mac Edition: The Best for OS X? | Posted on: 18/07/2009 @ 0:00

It's EVGA's first Mac video card and it's good, but is it useful under OS X? And is this a trend we can expect to see from other manufacturers?...

Asus refuse to comment on nVidia/AMD laptop testing | Posted on: 17/07/2009 @ 12:30

Following our recent report on the nVidia laptop testing: nVidia alter benchmarks for Fastest Mobile GPU Crown, we made sure to get all sides of the story, including from Asus, who produce the 4870 mobile crossfire powered W90 that was used in the testing. Unfortunately they’ve declined to comment, wisely leaving it up to nVidia [...]

Sapphire Radeon HD 4730 512MB | Posted on: 16/07/2009 @ 10:01

With stocks of graphics boards based around AMD`s Radeon HD 4770 SKU all but non-existent due to yield issues with TSMC`s 40 nanometre manufacturing process, some AIB partners have looked elsewhere for ways to fill this gap in the market. One such partner is Sapphire, who have recently introduced the Radeon HD 4730 in an attempt to offer a similar board and specification without cannibalising the ...

AMD have yet to Comment on nVidia Laptop Testing Fiasco | Posted on: 15/07/2009 @ 23:40

AMD, who are at the centre of the recent accusations that nVidia altered benchmarks in their Laptop GPU test, have yet to comment on the story despite being contacted by eTeknix. nVidia did however get in touch to set the record straight with an eTeknix World Exclusive which can be seen here: nVidia respond to [...]

Inno3D iChill GeForce GTX 275 Review | Posted on: 15/07/2009 @ 0:10

Inno3D have taken Nvidia's GTX 275 and combined it with a huge 12" long custom cooler to create its latest iChill graphics card. Does the beast of a cooler lead to an equally beasty performance boost? We ease this footlong monster into our testing rig and find out.

ATI Radeon HD 4730 CrossFire | Posted on: 14/07/2009 @ 23:39

Position in which Radeon HD 4770 found itself, at one moment, has been little bit unpleasant. Lack of available GPUs combined with huge demand can be nightmare situation for any GPU manufacturer. Reason for this situation is newly adopted and implemented 40nm manufacturing process that wasn’t reliable enough at that moment. Situation got improved after price drops of some HD 4850 and HD ...

nVidia respond to benchmark claims | Posted on: 14/07/2009 @ 18:10

A previous article of ours “nVidia alter benchmarks for Fastest Mobile GPU Crown” claimed that nVidia had altered benchmarks to show that the Alienware M17x with dual GTX 280M SLi graphics was the world’s most powerful mobile GPU setup. The Asus W90 using AMD’s 4870 mobile crossfire setup was the contender with it’s supposed “one year [...]

NVIDIA Quadro line is now optimised for Autodesk AutoCAD 2010 | Posted on: 14/07/2009 @ 14:50

NVIDIA QUADRO PROCESSORS PROPEL 3D DESIGN TO NEW HEIGHTS FOR AUTOCAD 2010 USERS Coupled with Autodesk AutoCAD 2010, NVIDIA Quadro Professional Solutions Deliver Increased Performance and Real-time Interaction with Complex 3D Designs SANTA CLARA, CA—July 14, 2009—NVIDIA Corporation today announced that the NVIDIA® Quadro® line of professional solutions is now optimised for ...

nVidia alter benchmarks for Fastest Mobile GPU Crown | Posted on: 14/07/2009 @ 11:50

California based GPU and chipset manufacturer nVidia has been accused of altering benchmarks to show that their dual GTX 280M SLi powered laptop; the Alienware M17x has the world’s most powerful mobile GPU setup. The system nVidia pitted it against was the Asus W90, powered by AMDs 4870 mobile Crossfire setup. To prove their point nVidia [...]

ASUS Radeon HD EAH4890 HTDI/1GD5 Video Card | Posted on: 13/07/2009 @ 15:01

The ASUS EAH4890 HTDI/1GD5 has a Radeon HD 4890 GPU at the heart of the graphics card, but you couldn't tell by looking at it. The EAH4890 HTDI/1GD5 has been designed by ASUS and utilizes features like Super ML Caps, a six heat pipe cooling solution, and higher clock speeds to improve gaming performance. This is unlike any video card you might have bought a couple years ago.

MSI NGTX260 Lightning Black Edition | Posted on: 11/07/2009 @ 19:30

This is the best GTX260 graphics card on the market at this moment. Maybe this statement sounds too pompous, but it is pretty much real. MSI GTX260 Lightning is card that was created as result of MSI efforts and goal to create “perfect” graphics card. This model is, obviously, best suited for enthusiasts: for users that don’t ask for price when they want to have best piece of ...

MSI GTX 285 HydroGen OC Review | Posted on: 09/07/2009 @ 11:00

Sporting a Watercool Heatkiller GPU-X² full cover waterblock, MSI's GTX 285 HydroGen looks stunning. However we're more interested in whether it can keep Nvidia's fastest single core GPU cool.

NVIDIA CUDA video editing application round up | Posted on: 09/07/2009 @ 10:29

Over the past year or so, an entire ecosystem of video editing, playback and transcoding applications with support for NVIDIA\'s CUDA technology has sprung up, allowing for the processing burden of many tasks associated with working with video to be offloaded to a suitable graphics board, thus theoretically leaving the CPU free to handle other tasks while also improving performance thanks to the ...

Galaxy GeForce GTX 260+ OC Tri-Fan Graphics Card | Posted on: 09/07/2009 @ 5:40

Sapphire HD4770 | Posted on: 08/07/2009 @ 19:00

In addition to being a cost-effective solution for some sunday-gamers, this card is the first one to utilize the new RV740 chip, which is the only graphics chip at the moment which is produced with the new 40 nm process at TMSC.

Sapphire's Radeon HD 4730 512MB graphics card review. What is it? | Posted on: 08/07/2009 @ 7:40

A cross between Radeon HD 4870, 4850, and 4770, it seems. Read on to find out.

Sapphire HD 4770 512MB | Posted on: 07/07/2009 @ 20:38

The top end graphics cards from both Intel and ATI are becoming more and more expensive and with the current economic crisis, the two don’t exactly go hand-in-hand. As a result, ATI have come up with the 4770 with a price point of around £80 which should appeal to a much wider range of users. The card is also ATI’s first to be manufactured using a 40 nanometre manufacturing ...

Sapphire Radeon HD 4670 512MB GDDR4 Video Card Review | Posted on: 07/07/2009 @ 16:00

The Radeon HD 4670 is the mid-range offering from ATI, with lower performance than the Radeon HD 4770 & 4800 series but more performance than the Radeon HD 4300 and 4500 series. With so many new cards out there, the Radeon HD 4670 fits in nicely to the sub $75 market. Let's see how well it performs against its main competitor from the NVIDIA camp, the GeForce 9600GSO 384MB.

Will AMD's XvBA Beat Out NVIDIA's VDPAU? | Posted on: 07/07/2009 @ 0:30

Going back to last year we have exclusively been reporting on AMD's new HD video decoding interface, which is called XvBA. This interface for use with UVD2 GPUs is properly known as X-Video Bitstream Acceleration, which we have already described at length...

MSI N275GTX Twin Frozr OC: raising the bar for NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 275 | Posted on: 06/07/2009 @ 17:40

MSI's given NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 275 a Twin Frozr OC makeover. We take a look.

Sapphire Radeon HD 4890 ATOMIC Graphics Card | Posted on: 06/07/2009 @ 13:20

Review: Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 4890 Toxic | Posted on: 06/07/2009 @ 10:20

Acouple of months back, we pitched the latest mid-range graphics cards head-to-head to see which came out on top. Nvidia won the battle by a hair's breadth, with its GTX275 pipping ATI's HD4890 to the number one spot. But, as is often the way with graphics cards, manufacturers soon come up with cunning schemes to get them running that little bit faster, or differently. Sapphire has become ...

MSI N260GTX Lightning Review | Posted on: 06/07/2009 @ 10:20

Yes, we're reviewing a GeForce GTX 260, but this is no ordinary SKU. Armed with a custom cooler, front panel overclocking tool and redesigned power circuitry, this is one of the best GTX 260s on the market. We find out if the premium you pay for extra trimmings is a worthwhile one.

ECS Elitegroup Nvidia GeForce GTS 250 PCIE 1024MB DDR3 Video Card NGTS250-1GMU-F | Posted on: 05/07/2009 @ 22:00

It's been along time since I've been on the green side of things, or the Nvidia side, I've been with the red team, ATI, for a while now so it was nice to get this Nvidia GeForce GTS250 to play with. Video cards play a big role in our computers now, not just for video games, but for physics rendering, folding and even video processing or encoding with compatible programs, so they've become much ...

NVIDIA Issues An Open-Source Driver Update | Posted on: 02/07/2009 @ 22:10

NVIDIA's Aaron Plattner has just announced the release of the xf86-video-nv 2.1.14 driver, but does it have anything in store? Not really. The NVIDIA open-source X.Org driver update brings support for a couple of new ASICs, fixed mode-setting for some NVIDIA GPUs, and other fixes, but nothing too exciting.....

Sparkle GeForce GTX 275 Video Card Review | Posted on: 02/07/2009 @ 16:00

Sparkle may not be the first manufacturer that comes to mind if you're considering a new video card from Team Green, but the company is hoping its GeForce GTX 275 series can score it some mindshare in the sub-$250 segment. It's been a few months since the first wave of GTX 275 and ATI 4890 cards hit the market, and more mature drivers may shed a different light on relative performance.

Gainward GTX 295 Graphics Card with 1792MB Memory Preview | Posted on: 01/07/2009 @ 20:15

Gainward is getting ready to launch a GeForce GTX 295 with 1792MB memory on a single PCB. The graphics card is predicted to have a great interest with computer enthusiasts globally.

ASUS Radeon HD 4890 Voltage Tweak Graphics Card | Posted on: 01/07/2009 @ 8:30