VisionTek GeForce3 Video Card

Company: VisionTek
Products: GeForce3 Video Card
Street Price: ~$280
Date Reviewed: September 23, 2001
Reviewed By: Jason

Testing & Benchmarks:

The base system consisted of the following:

• ABIT KT7A-RAID w/Latest Beta Bios
• AMD Athlon 1.4GHz
• 256MB RAM @ CAS2
• 3Com EtherLink III NIC
• Western Digital 20GB HD
• Windows 98SE w/Latest Patches Applied
• VIA 4-in-1 v4.32
• NVIDIA WHQL Detonator Drivers v12.41

3DMark 2001:

For testing in 3DMark 2001 I ran 4 sets of tests to try and see how much overclocking the CPU vs overclocking the video card affected overall 3DMark performance. The CPU was run at 1.4 GHz (stock speed) and then overclocked to 1.6GHz. The VisionTek GF3 was ran at stock speeds (200MHz Core / 460MHz Memory), then overclocked to 230MHz Core & 500MHz Memory. The Creative Labs GeForce2 GTS was ran at stock speed too (200MHz Core / 333MHz Memory), then overclocked to 240MHz core and 385MHz Memory. Hopefully all this won't confuse anyone, this is the only test where all these variations are performed, if I did it for all of them it would just be way too much information and only confuse and distort what is trying to be demonstrated.

VisionTek GF3 1.4GHz Stock	VisionTek GF3 1.6GHz Stock	VisionTek GF3 1.4GHz OCed	VisionTek GF3 1.6GHz OCed
GF2GTS 1.4GHz Stock	GF2GTS 1.6GHz Stock	GF2GTS 1.4GHz OCed	GF2GTS 1.6GHz OCed

The increase in CPU speed really didn't make as much of a difference as I was hoping, which can be taken as good or bad news. The good part is that a slower CPU can still take full advantage of the video card, so you can hold off upgrading your CPU till you have some extra money. As you can see overclocking the video card really gives some leaps in the numbers. The GeForce3 is a definite champion when it comes to cranking out those graphics, however it still seems like memory is still a bottleneck on the GF3 (like it has been since the original Geforce256), even with the memory pumping at 460MHz (DDR) stock, if you can overclock it you will definitely see a noticeable difference in performance. In the future I am thinking of replacing the default ramsinks with the Tweakmonster copper ramsinks, they are very nice and can definitely keep the RAM cooler than the stock heat sinks.

Vulpine GLMark:

Vulpine GLMark is another great benchmarking program, which instead of testing by overclocking the CPU & video cards, I decided to run the tests at 1.4GHz (stock CPU speed), and run the video cards at their stock speeds. GLMark does give the option to run the tests with GeForce3 features (if you have a GF3), Advanced Features, or Standard OpenGL 1.2. I ran the GeForce3 twice, once selecting the GeForce3 Features, and a second time selecting just the Standard OpenGL 1.2. For the GeForce2 card I ran just Standard OpenGL 1.2 as to give an accurate comparison against the GeForce3.

GF3 - GF3 Features 800x600	GF3 - GF3 Features 1024x768	GF3 - GF3 Features 1280x1024	GF3 - GF3 Features 1600x1200
GF3 - Standard 800x600	GF3 - Standard 1024x768	GF3 - Standard 1280x1024	GF3 - Standard 1600x1200
GF2GTS - Standard 800x600	GF2GTS - Standard 1024x768	GF2GTS - Standard 1280x1024	GF2GTS - Standard 1600x1200

Even before running the tests I knew the GF3 would outpace the GF2GTS especially as the resolutions increased. The 64MB on the GF3 really helps out whereas the GF2GTS only has 32MB. Running the "GF3 Features" vs. the "Standard" features didn't really show much of a performance difference. The GF2GTS seemed to struggle above 1024x768, but the GF3 just kept going, even at 1600x1200 getting almost 30FPS is pretty darn good.

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