Posted: November 6, 2000
Written by: Tuan "Solace" Nguyen

Summing Things Up

Performance:
[ 9.8/10 ]

This is the best performing GeForce2 card you can currently buy for your money, as far as we’ve seen at least. But, the performance isn’t that far ahead of other cards and if other cards were significantly lower in price, I would have to think twice about purchase.

Innovation:
[ 8.5/10 ]

Finally, no more memory bottlenecks. The bandwidth limitation has been eliminated by the inclusion of speedy 460MHz DDR RAM. And it can go even higher than that if you try. The core speed has been raised to 250MHz from 200MHz and should provide more polygons for your eyes. But there aren’t any architectural improvements; it’s basically a souped up GeForce2 GTS.

Installation and Setup:
[ 10/10 ]

Our favorite part was opening the box. We still have no idea what caused the wavy patterns we saw initially though.

Bundle:
[ 9.6/10 ]

Here’s what comes in the box:

The Gladiac Ultra and a sweet pair of wireless 3D Revelators. Now you can play all your Direct3D games in stereo 3D! Elsa also offers their Best Select program. You can select any three games (from a list of games) for only $20 and they are all full version games.

Price:
[ 8.2/10 ]

The Gladiac Ultra retails for a smooth $549USD. What a great deal! *sarcasm* Well, considering that Creative offers their Ultra card for $50 cheaper but with Elsa you get the wireless Revelators and Best Select deal, it’s not so bad. But overall, these are very high prices for just video cards. Choose your card carefully. And please, be happy with it if you buy it. I don’t want to hear anyone with a GeForce2 crying when the NV20 comes out.

Conclusion

There are no questions about it. The Gladiac Ultra is the fastest card out there right now. Faster than anything I’ve ever seen. The question really isn’t about whether it’s the fastest out there or not. It’s about whether $550 is worth a card when the next big thing is coming around the corner. We’re talking about NV20. But, to be realistic, even though NV20 is coming, it’s not going to make the Ultra any slower. It’s just going to be faster. And make no mistake; the Ultra is a very fast card. It’s up to you. If you have the money and the need then by all means, get it. We’re all speed freaks here anyway.

If you’re looking for price/performance ratio, you’re looking at the wrong card. For that, go for a GeForce2 MX based card like the Elsa Gladiac MX or any other ones offered from other companies. They have the best value for you dollar.

But if you’re in this game for the thrill of nose-bleed speeds, GeForce2 Ultra has plans to make your nose gush.

Overall: [ 9.2/10 ]

If you have any questions or comments, feel free to e-mail me here or visit me in channel #tweak3d on Undernet (IRC). Thanks for reading!

First Page