VisionTek Geforce 3 Review

Geforce3 by Visiontek

As you can see, we still get a slight boost in performance at lower resolutions with SMP mode, but not as much. With the frames per second still over 50 in 1280x1024 with detail settings maxed, it's obvious that none of today's games are going to present a challenge to this card. So, it's time to take a look at tomorrow's games.
With Doom 3 foremost in my mind (I can't wait!), I wanted to get some idea of how future OpenGL games would run on the Geforce3. A German company by the name of Vulpine has released the first, and only that I know of, benchmark to support Geforce3's new features. Vulpine GLMark, using their Vulpine Vision engine, consists of the camera flying through a few different scenes, from an outdoor jungle scene, to a cavern, and then a sort of underground bunker/laboratory area, and following a Lara Croft-esque heroine. At the end of the benchmark you're given a low, average, and high framerate, a chart of the framerate over time, and a histogram showing the frequencies of different framerates. Here are the framerates, using high detail, 32-bit textures, and texture compression:

Very nice. If I get framerates like that in upcoming games, I'll be a happy man.

And finally, the last of the tests: MadOnion's 3DMark2001. Since it utilizes new features of DirectX 8, Geforce3's usually see very good scores. I ran it with the default 1024x768, 32-bit color settings, since they are what's most commonly used for comparison among different cards and drivers. Running the test three times I got results of 4998, 4990, and 4982. Whipping out my calculator, I see that comes to an average of 4990. I've heard of overclocked GF3's getting higher, but it's a very impressive score none the less.

There's no doubt this is an amazing card. Pair it up with a VP6 and two decent processors, and you'll have one of the most fearsome gaming rigs in existance. However, there is that nagging $350 price tag to consider. All I can say is that if you do decide to get one, you won't be disappointed.

Comments? Questions?