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In the Forums... |
Posted: June 13, 2000 Written by: Tuan "Solace" Nguyen Introduction Today we'll be showcasing Leadtek's GeForce 2 based card -- the WinFast GeForce 2 GTS. Leadtek has entered the graphics arena with a lot of power. Originally known for motherboards and other devices, Leadtek is now becoming one of the big boys -- or on the way to being one. It really made itself noticeable with the WinFast GeForce 256, an affordable solution with quite a bit of power. And now it's shooting high once more with the GeForce 2 GTS. As like all our other reviews, we're standardizing on supporting all levels of users. So we'll be covering the most important things that are related to the card. Will the WinFast be able to compete with the likes of the Gladiac, the 3D Prophet II GTS and the V7700? We're going to find out. Let's take a look at the card physically. The Card The front side (click on the image to view an actual size snapshot): 
Leadtek has included the VIVO (Video In, Video Out) module on our card. This doesn't come standard and costs a mere $10 for the extra module. That's a very good price for the module. One other thing you notice is that the heatsink on this card is massive. It's really large and this is definitely a good thing for overclocking. But will it help? We'll see. We should note that the GeForce 2 GTS is fabricated using a 0.18u (micron) process. The GeForce 256 was created using a 0.25u process. Since reducing the transistor sizes reduces heat and power usage, the GeForce 2 GTS can run faster and cooler than the GeForce 256. So would this large size fan really help the WinFast overclock higher? Or do you think Leadtek should have used a regular size active heatsink to save costs and pass the savings on to the end user? We'll let you decide for yourself. Let's take a look at the back of the card. The back side (click on the image to view an actual size snapshot): 
Let's take a look at the specs for the WinFast. The Specs - NVIDIA GeForce 2 GTS GPU - 256-bit graphics engine - 200MHz core/166MHz memory clock (effectively 333MHz) - 25 million triangles/sec - 800 Mpixels/s fill rate - 1.6GTexels/sec fill rate - 5.3GB/sec Memory bandwidth - Hardware Anti-Aliasing - 32-bit colors, Z/stencil buffer - 350MHz RAMDAC - Max Resolution 2048x1536 - 32MB DDR RAM - AGP 2X/4X including fast writes and execute mode - VIVO Module - DirectX texture compression - S3TC support - Windows 9x/NT/2000 compatible The specs are the same for the rest of the GeForce 2 GTS cards, nothing really innovative (man, I'm turning into Bill Gates). Like I said above, here is the heads-up on the GeForce 2 GTS: GTS: Gigatexel Shader GTS stands for "GigaTexel Shader". As the name suggests, some new features have been added to the GeForce 256, but we'll get to that later... What is a GigaTexel? It is one billion filtered textured pixels. But the GeForce 2 GTS's powerhouse doesn't stop there -- it delivers up to a full 1.6 billion texels/sec; more than three times that of the GeForce 256. But the speed increase isn't the only upgrade that the GeForce 256 received. The term "shader" should have indicated a new lighting feature as part of the T&L system. The shading engine enables per-pixel shading and lighting. |
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