Gizmodo
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giz explains
Giz Explains: How to Choose the Right Graphics Card
There are plenty of great graphics cards out there, no matter what you're looking for. Thing is, the odds are seemingly stacked against you ever finding the right one. It doesn't have to be that hard. More » -
notebooks
Nvidia GeForce 200M Graphics Cards Just Made Your Notebook Old and Busted
A year after Nvidia's monstrous GeForce 200 series graphics cards first stomped onto the scene (literally the biggest GPUs ever), Nvidia's finished making them mobile, delivering double the performance of current 9M series using half the power. More » -
nerd history
The Glorious, Hulking History of 3D Graphics
From the Voodoo1 in 1996 to the wallet-and-pixel crushing Nvidia GeForce GTX 285, Maximum PC recounts the entire history of 3D graphics in ultra-gory detail. A fantastically nerdy way to kill 30 minutes. [Maximum PC]
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Comment by dsh: My Voodoo2 would play the hell out of some Quake2, all the way up to 1020x768. The glory days, to... 9 Responses | Other threads
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giz explains
Giz Explains: GPGPU Computing, and Why It'll Melt Your Face Off
No, I didn't stutter: GPGPU—general-purpose computing on graphics processor units—is what's going to bring hot screaming gaming GPUs to the mainstream, with Windows 7 and Snow Leopard. Finally, everbody's face melts! Here's how. More » -
nvidia
Nvidia Says They Won't Screw Up Windows 7 Launch Like They Did Vista
Remember how badly Nvidia's drivers screwed up the Vista launch? They're so confident they won't mess up Microsoft's Windows 7 launch, they're issuing press releases NOW touting how ready they are. [Yahoo via ZDNet]
13,882
By Jason ChenComment by ripfire: Why would they screw up? It's the same drivers from Vista. 5 Responses | Other threads
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macbook pro
Are the New 17-Inch MacBook Pros Plagued by Faulty Graphics Cards?
This is all too familiar. The Apple support forums are lit up by complaints that the new 17-inch MacBook Pros are plagued by faulty Nvidia GeForce 9600 graphics cards. More »
17,683
Comment by Kaiser-Machead: And all of the fanbois and Macheads, waist deep in all their image distortions and overheating boards, will look up... 15 Responses | Other threads
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windows 7
Windows 7 Performance Meter Goes Up To 7.9, Still Not Fantastic For Gaming Measurements
Vista's Windows Experience Index was an easy way to see, in number form, which parts of your computer was responsible for your sluggish performance. Windows 7 does the same, but now it's better by two. More »
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By Jason ChenComment by artistpavel: Vista rated my processor and memory at 5.9, Windows 7 gave both 7.2. Exact same OCed hardware. 8 Responses | Other threads
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gtx 295
Nvidia GeForce GTX 295 Graphics Card Is Insane: Two GTX 260s Bolted Together
Tired of ATI ruling the uberidiculous end of the graphics card space, Nvidia is apparently striking back with its own super-stacked GTX295—it's basically two GTX 200 GPUs hot-glued together. -
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nvidia
Get Ready for Cheap Nvidia Graphics Cards
ATI has been hitting Nvidia hard with its 4000-series big guns like the Radeon HD 4870 X2, and they're starting to feel it, with ATI successfully clawing away marketshare from Nvidia. Which has Nvidia skurred. So, sources say, Nvidia's readying a barrage of price cuts to keep the territory loss to a minimum. More »
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Comment by Lite: is on a boat.: How has nVidia been doing for their drivers as of late? I've been a long-time nV fan, but am... 6 Responses | Other threads
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nvidia
Nvidia Quadro FX 5800 Claims Most Powerful Graphics Card Ever, Probably Handles Crysis OK
Nvidia has released what it describes as "the most powerful professional graphics card in graphics history"—the Quadro FX 5800, which packs up to 240 of Nvidia's CUDA independent graphics cores for shouldering some of the load normally handled by the main processor as well as 4GB of graphics memory, another claimed first. The 5800 is intended mostly for scientific and medical visualizations, as well as crazy complex 3D rendering. One might imagine it would also play most of your video games at a decent FPS. Price? $3500. More »
13,375
By John MahoneyComment by Vroomtrap: Mac Version? I'm sure this would be awesome for Motion/After Effects and things of that nature. 5 Responses | Other threads
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nvidia
Defective Nvidia Graphics Cards Confirmed in Desktops
Really Nvidia, what the hell? After steadfastly arguing that its defective graphics cards were limited to notebooks only—they've even sent me a lovely email or two reiterating that claim—HP has just confirmed that 38 different desktop models are plagued with faulty Nvidia graphics cards. More »
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Comment by SewerShark: Oh great, I hope that my GF 8800 does not explode. 2 Responses | Other threads
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nvidia
Dell Extends Warranties for Laptops With Failing Nvidia Chips While Nvidia Stays Mum
A major cause of frustration in the Nvidia notebook GPU fiasco—where "significant quantities" of notebook graphics cards are packaged with "weak" materials leading them to overheat and fail at a "higher-than-normal rate"—is that Nvidia is declining to identify exactly which chips are bad, as the WSJ notes today. So you've gotta find out from your notebook maker if you're possibly stuck with a time bomb. Dell is extending its limited warranties by a year to deal with the issue in the following notebooks: More »
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Comment by PR_Flak: @SunandiniLubrano: You seem to be on my "Step 1" - replace motherboard. "Step 2" was another complete system failure with another... more » | Other threads
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nvidia
Proof Nvidia Desktop G86 Graphics Cards Affected by Materials Defects?
The extent of the problems plaguing Nvidia's graphics cards is still controversial, though the company has confirmed that "weak" materials have caused "higher-than-normal" fail rates in certain mobile GPUs, which appear to be the G84 and G86-based graphics cards. The Inquirer said those issues extended to the desktop as well, which Nvidia denied. Interestingly, VR-Zone is reporting that Nvidia has issued a product change notification to customers that they're changing the underfill material for their desktop G86 chips from Namics 8439-1 to Hitachi 3730. Could mean nothing, but since their original problems stemmed from "weak" materials, it stands out. Is there a non-conspiratorial reason they would do this? Update: Nvidia wrote us to respond to the rumors: More »
8,588
Comment by piginabox: @AndyMac: @jkr's bold comment: i liked "jkr's bold comment"'s joke. he knows the difference between the Inquirer and the Enquirer. that's... more » | Other threads
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nvidia
PhysX and CUDA Apps for GeForce 8, 9 and 200 Series Graphics Cards Are Live
Rumors of imminent high fail rates notwithstanding, today's a pretty good day to own any GeForce 8 series or higher desktop graphics card, since they all get PhysX support with a free download (three PhysX-juiced UT3 maps are free too). Also tapping the CUDA goodness is badaboom, an insanely fast video transcoder, Folding@Home and a couple of tech demos—Nvidia showed me the Fluids demo on a GTX 280, and it was pretty neat. I'm snagging this stuff right now, actually. [Nvidia]
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Comment by OMG! Ponies!: Evidentally, NVidia has 64-bit driver support too. Perfect for retards like me who installed a 64-bit version of Vista. 1 Responses | Other threads
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nvidia
Inquirer: Pretty Much Every Nvidia GeForce 8800, 9600 and 9800 Graphics Card Is Defective
Last month, the Inquirer made the shocking accusation that every Nvidia graphics card with the G84 and G86 chipsets were bad (every 8-series card up to the 8800 basically). Nvidia said that's crap, but the Inquirer said it was all a big cover up. Now the Inquirer is reporting that "four board partners are seeing G92 and G94 chips going bad in the field at high rates." That would mean all of the GeForce 8800 GT, GTS and GS desktop cards, the mobile 8800s, and most of the 9600 and 9800 series graphics cards are defective.
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Comment by jmazzy: My 8800 GTS just crapped the best this week I think, and when I mentioned it to a friend this... more » | Other threads
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ati
Fastest Graphics Card Alive ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 Gets Official Tomorrow
ATI's Nvidia-slaying Radeon HD 4870 X2, previewed last month, will get official tomorrow at SIGGRAPH says the WSJ, who notes that some reviewers are calling it the most powerful card around. It's an interesting test of ATI's graphics card strategy: Cheaper, less power-hungry GPUs that can be easily strapped together (like the dual-GPU 4870 X2) versus Nvidia's penchant for obscenely powerful single GPUs. The best part? Whoever you go with, you can't really go wrong anymore. Update: The reviews are rolling, and yes, the $549 HD 4870 X2 destroys everything else. [WSJ]
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Comment by parad0x360: wow the tension of this topic is great! i remember when i used to nvidia all the love but... more » | Other threads
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directx
Microsoft: DirectX 11 To Use GPU For Parallel Processing
DirectX 11 is coming, and it looks pretty awesome. Sure, you get advancements in shading and better support for multi-core machines, but what's really got our heads turning is the concept of letting programmers use the GPU in your video card to do some of the heavy lifting, meaning your graphics chip becomes a second, parallel processor. While the idea itself isn't new, this is the first we've heard of DirectX using such technology and we're sure it'll have PC gaming fanboys drooling when it rolls out, whenever that happens to be. [Joystique]
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By Matt HickeyComment by ibenx: So, should I wait on buying a new vista computer, or wait till Direct X 11 comes out to make... 1 Responses | Other threads
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hosed
Email Reveals Nvidia and ATI May Have Colluded to Inflate Prices
A graphics card can cost you almost as much as a bona fide Batman gadget, especially when you get up to ridiculous amounts of power and performance, but that ludicrous price is actually less ludicrous than it could be, because of the cutthroat competition between ATI and Nvidia, right? Not so fast. An email Nvidia sent by Nvidia senior VP of marketing, Dan Vivoli, to ATI's president and COO, Dave Orton made public by the judge in an ongoing anti-trust suit against the two companies reveals that they both see eye-to-eye on prices. Namely, that they should be higher:
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Comment by Bearded Rapper: Hey, who cares. I've got my trusty 8800GTX. As long as Peggle works, I'm fine. more » | Other threads
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nvidia
Nvidia Denies Imminent Epidemic of Graphics Chip Combustion
Took a little longer than I expected, but Nvidia has come around to denying that basically every GeForce 8400-8700 graphics card powered by the G84 and G86 chipset is a flawed, ticking timebomb, waiting to die from overheating issues. They say that the problem affects "only a very small percentage of the notebook chips that have shipped" and that "the problem depends on a combination of environmental conditions, configuration, and usage model." More » -
nvidia
Top-End Nvidia GeForce GTX 280, 260 Graphics Cards Get Huge Price Cut
Nvidia's top end GeForce GTX 260 and 280 graphics cards—whose power borders on sorcery—launched for $399 and $650, respectively, less than a month ago. But pressure from ATI has driven Nvidia to already cut the price, hard. The GTX 280 is now only $399, while the GTX 260 is $299, the same price as ATI's HD 4870. Good to see ATI back in the fight. Anyone already buy this and feel hosed though? Competition is a lovely thing. [CNET] -
nvidia
Inquirer: Every Nvidia Graphics Card With G84 or G86 Chipset Is Ready to Die
Those overheating Nvidia laptop graphics cards that are dying en masse? The Inquirer is reporting that "all the G84 and G86 parts are bad. Period. No exceptions," on mobile and desktop. Those chipsets are in pretty much every GeForce 8-series graphics card below the 8800s (here's a complete list of cards and chipsets). Notably, that means every MacBook Pro since the Santa Rosa update has the bad cards, which fail at a "higher-than-normal" rate. More » -
nvidia
Nvidia Helping Modders Port PhysX Engine to ATI Radeon
Remember those modders from NGOHQ who were swolling out ATI's Radeon graphics cards with Nvidia's PhysX physics engine? Surprise, Nvidia loves the idea of their physics engine running on rival ATI's graphics cards, so they're giving Eran Badit and his crew total support, with access to documentation, SDKs, hardware and actual engineers. AMD, on the other hand, isn't being so cooperative. More »
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Comment by HaydenCanace: i have ATI radeon HD3450 before for playing "second life"" , it give me 34fps. ... more » | Other threads
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graphics cards
M-Series Is Industry First Quad-Display GPU, Says Matrox
Matrox keeps updating its multi-display thingamajigs, this time with the first Quad-Head GPU in the industry, according to the company. The M-Series M9140 LP PCIe x16 can drive up to four 1920 x 1200 screens with 512MB of RAM. Matrox says its for business time, so hedge fund managers and fans of the Conchords will be able to get their graphic information overdose for $599. [Matrox via The Inquirer via Crunch Gear]
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By Elaine ChowComment by stan_i_am: @emergeoriginal Yeah, I was wondering about that... they already released a 4 output card a long time ago. To late to... more » | Other threads
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ati
ATI Radeon Graphics Cards Running Nvidia PhysX Are Faster, Stronger, Awesomer
After Nvidia picked up PhysX, it was obvious ATI would probably get left out of Nvidia's efforts to spread the love to graphics cards and x86 CPUs (hence ATI hooking up with Havok). (Physics engines, for the uninitiated, are what make your body bounce around with aplomb after getting stuck with a grenade in Halo 3.) But some modders have fixed that and ported PhysX to ATI's Radeon 3800 cards, instantly improving benchmarks. More » -
nvidia
Mid-Range Graphics Card Showdown: Nvidia 9800 GTX+ Slides Past ATI Radeon HD 4850
Poised and waiting for ATI's latest graphics card to hit, Nvidia immediately fired off the 9800 GTX+, a nimbler version of its behemoth 9800 GTX, aggressively priced at $229 to put serious pressure on the $199 HD 4850. Benchmarks comparing the two weren't available yesterday, but PC Perspective has 'em up now. In short, while the HD 4850 can mostly keep up with Nvidia's older, regular 9800 GTX, the steroid-injected 9800 GTX+ has enough juice to edge it out in almost every single benchmark. The Radeon HD 4850 has about a month on the shelf to itself before the 9800 GTX+ hits though. Check out PC Perspective for more graphs and numbers than your brain wants to deal with on a Friday. [PC Perspective via Engadget]
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Comment by bobide: @Absent Blue: 8800GTS is avaliable with the G92. The 200 series is still using a similar layout as the G92, just scaled... more » | Other threads
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snow leopard
Steve Jobs Explains OS X Snow Leopard in Three Easy Steps
The NY Times has a good interview with Steve Jobs in which Apple's CEO lets fly with very quotable, very understandable quotes about OS X 10.6. We already heard the details, but it was still hard to wrap our head around why Apple would make an operating system without many visible features and just go and change architecture around. He explains that they're doing it because programmers don't know WTF is going on with parallel processing.
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By Jason ChenComment by JosephineElephenor: Also QuickTime X will be apart of Snow Leopard. more » | Other threads
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nvidia
Nvidia GeForce 9M GPUs 40 Percent Faster Than Last Gen, Bring Hybrid SLI to Notebooks
And now for the real Nvidia meat this week: The GeForce 9M series. Besides promising 40 percent faster performance than its last gen of notebook graphics cards (8M if you're keeping score), the 9M series brings Hybrid SLI to notebooks for the first time—the high performance GPU kicks in when needed, or it drops to the low-power one when things are chill. They go from the budget 9100M G to the top o' the line 9650M GT (which delivers 132 gigaflops), though they all support Blu-ray 2.0 spec (with 1080p output and PureVideo HD processing), PhysX, HDMI 1.3, DisplayPort 1.1 and mo'. You'll be seeing these puppies in "over a hundred notebook models beginning this summer." More » -
photoshop
Photoshop CS 4 Will Use Your Graphics Card to Run at Light Speed, Do Fancy 3D Tricks
The next version of Photoshop (CS 4) will be juicing up performance by taking advantage of hardware it hasn't tapped before: graphics cards and physics processors. How much faster is the new 64-bit, GPU-injected Photoshop? At a demo at Nvidia's HQ, TG Daily watched "the presenter playing with a 2 GB, 442 megapixel image like it was a 5 megapixel image on an 8-core Skulltrail system. Changes made through image zoom and through a new rotate canvas tool were applied almost instantly." Update: John Nack from Adobe is calling bogus on some of TGDaily's info, namely the Oct. release date and says the demoed tech is not "promised to go into any particular version of Photoshop." So take it for what you will. More »
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Comment by timbuckto: I guess now that this is official, the Ole Nay Sayers will have to go back into their disbelieving caves.... more » | Other threads
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laptops
Fujitsu's AMILO GraphicBooster External Graphics Card For Easy Laptop Upgrades
Fujitsu is set to launch an external graphics card solution dubbed the "AMILO GraphicBooster" sometime in the "next few weeks." Unfortunately, this information was leaked from a presentation, so there isn't a whole lot in the way of details—but we do know that the GraphicBooster is based on ATI XGP technology, it will allow users to connect up to three external displays to their notebook, DVI-D and HDMI connections are included, and it can reportedly deliver a 4.7X performance improvement over the graphics of a small form factor AMILO notebook. More » -
pcs
Your Computer Sucks, Get a New Graphics Card
Your PC? It sucks, it doesn't have enough cores. Sure, you could get a new multi-core processor like a Phenom or Core 2 Quad, adding like 2 or 3 cores to your rig. Or! You could get a new graphics card instead and get over one hundred extra cores. And more cores = more better, right? More » -
nvidia
NVIDIA 9600 GT Reviewed: Best Low-Cost Gaming Card With Anti-Aliasing
NVIDIA's first GeForce 9 series card officially launched today, the budget 9600 GT, which is based on a shrunken version of the G92 graphics processor in their mid-range 8800 GT and the newer GTS cards. More »
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Comment by Angus: 8800 gts are only $230 so unless this is about $150 what is the point? more » | Other threads
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graphics cards
ATI Breaks Teraflop Barrier with Radeon HD 3870 X2 GPU
Remember that honkin' ATI graphics card we showed you at CES? The one that was 1,000 times as fast as a Cray-1? Well, it's official, making its debut today as the $450 ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2. It's the first GPU to break the teraflop barrier, and is nearly double the performance of the HD 3870 you spent all your money on back in November. Press release with technical details after jump. [Product Page] More »
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Comment by Wwhat: Hah, 1,000 times as fast as a Cray-1 and only does 66 FPS in crysis, weird huh. Of course graphics... more » | Other threads
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graphics cards
NVIDIA's Three-Way SLI Graphics Cards Cost More Than Actual Three-Ways
If tying two video cards together in an SLI configuration doesn't quite get you the frames-per-second you need, NVIDIA's just intrduced three-way SLI, which does exactly what it sounds like. Now you can use their nForce 680i SLI motherboard to tie together tres GeForce 8800 GTX or 8800 Ultras to give a 2.8X boost over just using a single card—so you will be able to play Crysis at something more than the "slideshow" configuration. More »
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By Jason ChenComment by akmarksman: @SomeAudioGuy: and dont forget..you can use your PC for microsoft office,photoshop,etc.. more » | Other threads
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gaming
ASUS Upgrades EN8800GT Cards With 1GB of Memory
Today Asus rolled out the world's first EN8800GT graphics card with 1GB of Qimonda memory. The card is designed to provide optimum DirectX 10 gaming and multimedia playback performance even at the highest resolutions and quality settings. The unit also utilizes an integrated SmartDoctor feature, allowing users to overclock the Shader Clock for performance gains that they claim can exceed 10%. More »
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By Sean FallonComment by highfloydelity: @logruszed: Since when does the 360 only output 1080i? Mine is outputting in 1080p and has been for a... more » | Other threads
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gaming
Nvidia to Launch GeForce 9 in February?
According to DigiTimes sources, Nvidia is planning on rolling out GeForce 9 this February. They also noted that the first chip in the family will be the 65nm D9E —complete with support for DirectX 10.1 and Shader Model 4.1. As with all rumors, this should be taken with a grain of salt, so I wouldn't put your holiday plans for the 8800GTs on the backburner just yet. [DigiTimes via RegHardware via Gearfuse]
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By Sean FallonComment by rainfever: regardless, i'm stoked, not that I can afford one, but i'll at least be able to upgrade my fantasy... more » | Other threads
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gaming
NVIDIA Launches GeForce 8800M GTX and GTS Notebook GPUs
NVIDIA got official today with its GeForce 8800M GTX and GTS notebook GPUs, which you might remember from the fresh-out-the-door Alienware beast from a few hours ago. Mark Rein, Epic Games' VP is "ordering one" exclamation point, if that makes you more blisteringly excited. [Nvidia] -
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By Mark WilsonComment by novacthall: AnandTech loved it: [www.anandtech.com] more » | Other threads
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imac
ATI Graphics May Be at the Root of iMac Freezing Issues
Apple's new iMac has been plagued by random—but reproducible for some—freezing issues, and it appears that the ATI Radeon HD graphics card and its drivers could be to blame. According to users participating in official Apple support discussions (here and here), the iMac continues to run during the freeze, but users are unable to control the programs with mouse clicks or keyboard commands without rebooting. Apple is apparently aware of the issue, but at this point, no official fix has been released. Some users have even reported that the latest round of video driver updates have made the problem worse, although there is no evidence to suggest that the problem is widespread. [Appleinsider and Tech.co.uk]
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By Sean FallonComment by fletrik: Interesting - I have a windows xp machine which exibited almost the same issues after upgrading my ATI drivers to... more » | Other threads
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gpu wars
Nvidia's New 8400 GS Will Hit 65nm and Support PCIe 2.0
Now that ATI has finished rolling out their new graphics cards, the boys in green are attempting to take back the spotlight with the new 8400 GS, Nvidia's first GPU to rely on 65nm architecture. What's all the fuss about? 65nm GPUs will be cooler, faster and cheaper to manufacture. The new card will also support the faster PCIe 2.0 standard. The 8400 GS is expected this fall with more 65nm cards due in Q4. More »
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Comment by uberstumpy: @JomeyQ I think the reason the number 4 doesn't sit well with you is the fact that 4 rounds down. 5... more » | Other threads
graphics cards
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