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No sooner did the year of 2003 start than January flied away. However, the political situation involving two our grands, NVIDIA and ATI, doesn't change so quickly. NVIDIA hasn't released its new products yet, that is why it is now pulled to pieces and gossiped very much about; some even mention the "cruel fate of 3dfx" that has neared the Californian company the other day. You think ATI took the occasion and attacked the market with its RADEON 9500-9700? Nothing of the kind! When a rival is weak, ATI always catches political cold! So, while one of the companies can't be delivered of, though it was sent to the maternity hospital by its President that promised the GeForce FX yet by the Xmas sales, the other is still not able to supply the RADEON 9500 in bulk (moreover this product is still a bit too pricey). Well, the manufacturers have no choice but to keep on producing Ti 4200 and add all possible bells and whistles. The testers have no choice but to test such solutions. Although the chip is quite old, the cards are new on the market, and we are to show them to you to make simpler the choice among innumerable video cards on the Ti 4200 (with AGP 8x at that). Theoretical materials and reviews of video cards which concern functional
properties of the
Today we have probably the last summary review of the video cards based on the GeForce4 Ti 4200. Certainly, it deals with the new version - Ti 4200-8x. In our lab we tested 6 cards from well-known companies. Cards
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All cards have AGP x8/x4/x2 interface, 128 MB DDR SDRAM (except the Prolink's card carrying 64 MB) located in 8 chips on both PCB sides. | |
Albatron Medusa GeForce4 Ti 4680 Turbo | |
The memory chips are made by Samsung, in BGA package. The access time is 3.3ns, which corresponds to 300 (600) MHz, but the memory works at 275(550) MHz. The GPU runs at 250 MHz which is typical of the Ti 4200. We tested an identical card (but without AGP 8x) earlier (Albatron GeForce4 Ti 4200P Turbo). | ![]() |
Chaintech A-GX21 GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x SE | |
The memory chips are made by Samsung. The access time is 4ns, which corresponds to 250 (500) MHz, but the memory works at 256 (512) MHz. The GPU runs at 250 MHz. | ![]() |
Gainward GeForce4 Powerpack Ultra/650-8X XP Golden Sample | |
The memory chips are made by Samsung. The access time is 3.6ns, which corresponds to 275 (550) MHz but the memory works at 256 (512) MHz. The GPU runs at 250 MHz. As you know, the Golden Sample series has the Extremal mode as well where the frequencies are higher - 270/270 (540) MHz. | ![]() |
Inno3D Tornado GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
The memory chips are made by Samsung. The access time is 4ns, which corresponds to 250 (500) MHz, but the memory works at 256 (512) MHz. The GPU runs at 250 MHz. | ![]() |
Prolink PixelView GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
The memory chips are made by EtronTech. The access time is 3.3ns, which corresponds to 300 (600) MHz, but the memory works at 285 (570) MHz. The GPU runs at 250 MHz. Note that this card is equipped with 64 MB instead of 128 MB. | ![]() |
Sparkle GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
The memory chips are made by Samsung. The access time is 3.6ns, which corresponds to 275 (550) MHz but the memory works at 256 (512) MHz. The GPU runs at 250 MHz. | ![]() |
Albatron Medusa GeForce4 Ti 4680 Turbo | |
The box contains: User Guide, CD with drivers and utilities, S-Video-to-RCA adapter, TV-out extenders, and 2 CDs with old games. | ![]() |
Chaintech A-GX21 GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x SE | |
The box contains: User Guide, CD with drivers and utilities, Cyberlink PowerDVD and PowerDirector (for VIVO), AquaNox, MDK2, VIVO adapter/splitter, S-Video-to-RCA, adapter, TV-out extenders, DVI-to-d-Sub adapter. | ![]() |
Gainward GeForce4 Powerpack Ultra/650-8X XP Golden Sample | |
The box contains: User Guide, CD with drivers and utilities, WinDVD, WinCoder/WinProducer (VIVO), VIVO adapter/splitter, DVI-to-d-Sub adapter, sticker. | ![]() |
Inno3D Tornado GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
The box contains: User Guide, CD with drivers and utilities, other software shown on the photo on the right, VIVO adapter/splitter, DVI-to-d-Sub adapter, mouse pad. | ![]() |
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Prolink PixelView GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
The box contains: User Guide, CD with drivers and utilities, Venom, Ballistics games, WinDVD, S-video-to-RCA adapter, DVI-to-d-Sub adapter. | ![]() |
Sparkle GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
The box contains: User Guide, CD with drivers and utilities, CyberLink PowerDirector (VIVO), VIVO adapter/splitter, DVI-to-d-Sub adapter. | ![]() |
All the cards ship in retail packages.
Albatron Medusa GeForce4 Ti 4680 Turbo | |
A traditional mirror-like shining box from Albatron picturing the Medusa looking like a pretty girl. Remember once again that the card's name is a marketing trick, - Ti 4680 doesn't exist. | ![]() |
Chaintech A-GX21 GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x SE | |
A very stylish package for the whole Special Edition series of Chaintech! Through the cutout you can see the card. | ![]() |
Gainward GeForce4 Powerpack Ultra/650-8X XP Golden Sample | |
This Gainward's package is becoming boring as the design remains the same for several years already. Why don't they think of something more effective for the Golden Sample than just a sticker... | ![]() |
Inno3D Tornado GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
This is a standard package of InnoVision the developers do not want to part with, though it's high time they invent something new. | ![]() |
Prolink PixelView GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
This is a showy combination of the standard design, an interesting picture and a striking font of the writings. | ![]() |
Sparkle GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | |
The designers from Sparkle managed to find a cheap and effective solution. The design is unsophisticated but the holographic patterns shine and attract attention! | ![]() |
That's all about the peculiarities of the cards.
Albatron Medusa GeForce4 Ti 4680 Turbo | 250/550 -> 320/710 MHz, excellent overclocking! |
Chaintech A-GX21 GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x SE | 250/513 -> 320/640 MHz, quite good! |
Gainward GeForce4 Powerpack Ultra/650-8X XP Golden Sample | 270/540 -> 325/655 MHz, excellent result, Ti 4600 is almost dead for overclockers :-) |
Inno3D Tornado GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | 250/513 -> 310/650 MHz, not bad results of the chip and superb scores of the memory. |
Prolink PixelView GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | 250/570 -> 310/660 MHz, not bad results of the chip and superb scores of the memory.. |
Sparkle GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | 250/513 -> 320/650 MHz, good overclocking as well! |
Note that:
Testbeds:
The test system was coupled with
In the tests we used NVIDIA's drivers of v41.09. VSync was off, S3TC was off in the applications.
Unfortunately, the developers supply nothing interesting with the cards except the Gainward's utility ExperTool:
Before we start examining 2D quality I should say that there is no a complete technique of objective estimation of this parameter because:
As for the tested samples, together with the ViewSonic P817 monitor and BNC Bargo cable the cards showed excellent quality at the following resolutions and frequencies:
Albatron Medusa GeForce4 Ti 4680 Turbo | 1600x1200x85Hz, 1280x1024x120Hz, 1024x768x160Hz |
Chaintech A-GX21 GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x SE | 1600x1200x85Hz, 1280x1024x120Hz, 1024x768x120Hz |
Gainward GeForce4 Powerpack Ultra/650-8X XP Golden Sample | 1600x1200x85Hz, 1280x1024x100Hz, 1024x768x160Hz |
Inno3D Tornado GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | 1600x1200x75Hz, 1280x1024x120Hz, 1024x768x120Hz |
Prolink PixelView GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | 1600x1200x75Hz, 1280x1024x120Hz, 1024x768x160Hz |
Sparkle GeForce4 Ti 4200-8x | 1600x1200x85Hz, 1280x1024x120Hz, 1024x768x160Hz |
For the performance estimation we used:
The overclocked cards are marked with red color, the frequencies reached follow the sign o/c (overclocked).
For the summary diagrams we used drivers v.41.09 for the NVIDIA cards, v.6.218 for the ATI cards, v.3.07 for the SIS cards and v.1.01.02.090 for the Matrox cards.
In closing I must say that all the cards performed stably (each worked 24 hours) and have good build quality.
In our 3Digest you can find complete comparison characteristics of video cards of this and other classes.
Highs:
Lows:
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