SUMMARY: With the release of the GeForce4 Ti series video boards, the world has had some very good graphics adapters. But not everyone can afford the US$400 entry fee for the Ti4600. Come join Mike "Darthtanion" Wright as he takes a look at the X-Micro Impact T4200 Video Card. It features the Ti4200 GPU and is available on the streets for half the cost of its big brother. Can this be the "Sweet-Spot" of price -vs- performance? Let's find out!
Now to the nuts and bolts of this video card. While the specs aren’t exactly exciting, they are necessary to see what we really have and how it compares to others in its class.
Graphics Engine: nVidia GeForce4 Ti4200 GPU GPU Clock: 250MHz Memory: 64MB DDR (8GB/sec Bandwidth) Memory Speed: 500MHz (250MHz DDR) Fill Rate: 900 Mpixels/sec RAMDAC: 350MHz Maximum Resolution: 2048x1536 Bus Standard: AGP 2x/4x TV-Out: 1024x768 Special Features: - nfiniteFX II - nView Display Technology - Lightspeed Memory Architecture II - Advanced AccuView Antialiasing - TV-Out
There are a few features listed above that may be a little confusing to the novice, so let me see if I can help you understand a little better. Here are the meanings of some of the nVidia lingo above:
nfiniteFX II – This is the name given to the dual vertex shaders used in the GeForce4 Ti series cards. The fact that it incorporates two vertex shaders allows for the near realistic output, and also helps define things such as hair and facial features within games.
nView – All GeForce4 based cards support dual monitor support. nView is nothing more than the name that nVidia has given this ability. One nice feature of this, though, is that it adds a tab into your video card’s display properties. This makes it very easy to set up a dual monitor system.
Lightspeed Memory Architecture II (LMAII) – With memory being one of the biggest bottlenecks to modern video cards, something had to be done to enhance the bandwidth. LMAII does just that by using things like Z-occlusion culling, fast Z-clear, and auto pre-charge. These allow for better movement of data, and nVidia claims that it enhances the memory effectiveness by upwards of 300%!
AccuView Antialiasing – FSAA (Full Screen Anti Aliasing) has been a buzzword for some time now. The ability to get rid of the jagged edges in games has been a high point to many of the past generations of graphics adapters. On the low end of this technology, however, is the fact that it creates a tremendous frame rate loss when used. Smooth edges in games is a great thing, but is useless when it drops you down to 15 frames/sec. AccuView takes a new version of antialiasing and uses the extra horsepower of the Ti series card to make your gaming much more enjoyable.
