September'2001 3Digest
NVIDIA GeForce2 MX 32 MBytes DDR
By Andrew
Worobyew
This chip is presented by Creative 3D Blaster
GeForce2 MX 32 MBytes DDR AGP.
Features:
- NVIDIA GeForce2 MX chip, 175 MHz clock rate;
- 32 MBytes DDR SDRAM memory in four Hyundai 7ns microchips,
143 (286) MHz clock rate , 64-bit bus;
- Peak speed of scene drawing in multitexturing mode is 350
megapixels/sec and 700 megatexels/sec.
Wasn't tweaked.
After the release of GeForce256 cards, NVIDIA representatives
have began to understand that following releases wouldn't replace
previous cards due to the short period between the new releases.
Therefore it has been decided to build a so-called 'ladder' of the
market niches, so that every accelerator would have belonged to
one of them according its price and perfomance. The release of GeForce2
GTS has been marked by a much higher price for them than for any
other of the previous cards. It has been meant that a cheap solution
named GeForce2 MX would follow the release of more expensive variants
to occupy a low cost niche and to replace more expensive and less
faster GeForce256 cards. So, the Summer'2000 has brought us GeForce2
MX that is very popular today. And though this exact GPU is the
lowest, its speed and perfomance features very well correspond to
the low price for such cards. But due to some unclear reasons NVIDIA
has decided to release a standalone card on this chip, and I must
say it's the slowest of all 32 MBytes GeForce2 MX due to 143 MHz
memory installed. The memory type isn't even important, as the 64-bit
bus reduces all DDR memory features to zero. In addition the company
has stopped manufacturing this card and soon this ridiculous product
will disappear from the market. This card was tested with new drivers
for the last time in 3Digest.
For the 20th of July'2001 the latest drivers from
NVIDIA are 8.03, 12.90 and 14.10. As the drivers differences are
equal for all MX200 cards, there's no sense in comparing drivers
separately for each of these cards. See NVIDIA GeForce2 MX200 32
MBytes section for more information about drivers.
I advise you to read about S3TC influence on speed
and perfomance, because S3TC realization in OpenGL is important
nowadays, and it shows good results.
You can compare screenshots taken on this card
with reference ones taken on NVIDIA GeForce3.
| Games / Cards |
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
| NVIDIA GeForce2 MX |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| NVIDIA GeForce3 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Games / Cards |
7 |
8 |
9 |
10 |
11 |
12 |
| NVIDIA GeForce2 MX |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| NVIDIA GeForce3 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Games / Cards |
13 |
14 |
15 |
16 |
17 |
18 |
| NVIDIA GeForce2 MX |
|
|
|
|
|
-
|
| NVIDIA GeForce3 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Games / Cards |
19 |
20 |
21 |
22 |
23 |
24 |
| NVIDIA GeForce2 MX |
|
|
|
-
|
|
|
| NVIDIA GeForce3 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Games / Cards |
25 |
| NVIDIA GeForce 2 MX |
|
| NVIDIA GeForce3 |
|
Game list:
- 1. Quake3
- 2. Unreal
- 3. Unreal Tournament
- 4. No One Lives Forever
- 5. Serious Sam
- 6. Colin McRAE Rally2
- 7. American McGee's Alice
- 8. Mercedes Benz Truck Racing
- 9. Sacrifice
- 10. F.A.K.K. 2
- 11. Need For Speed V (Porshe 2000)
- 12. Real MYST
- 13. Blade of Darkness
- 14. Giants
- 15. 3DMark2001: Game1
- 16. 3DMark2001: Game2
- 17. 3DMark2001: Game3
- 18. 3DMark2001: Game4
- 19. 3DMark2001: Dot3
- 20. 3DMark2001: EMBM
- 21. 3DMark2001: Vertex Shaders
- 22. 3DMark2001: Pixel Shaders
- 23. Black & White
- 24. Undying
- 25. Anachronox
I shall mark that these cards sometimes have Z-buffer
working incorrectly in 32-bit mode when Z-buffer itself is 16-bit,
what causes artefacts. Such problems were noticed on some games
with Unreal Tournament engine. Thus I recommend you to use utilities
like Riva Tuner for fine tuning, and pay attention to Direct3D settings
of such games.
2D quality is outstanding. Soaping effects can
be seen only on some low-quality monitors in 1600x1200. But there
are some low-quality cards present that give soaping effect on good
monitors. And I shall mark that 6.* version drivers are not compatible
with the software for sound cards based on Yamaha processor, as
well as with SoftXG100 software synthesizer. Start or Close Window
buttons can be spoiled by some "garbage" in 2D mode.
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