• Zotac GTS250 Amp Edition [Review]

    Zotac GTS250 Amp Edition [Review]

    Roydon Cerejo, Mar 26, 2009 1630 hrs IST

    Nvidia's G92, back for round three!

    Very good bundle, silent operation, good performance, 5 year (extended) warranty, low power, PhysX support

    Dual slot cooler, price

    Expert Rating :
    Rating
    mail share

Expert Review

    next


We all have seen Nvidia's attempt to kill the hype behind HD4850, first by lowering the price of the 9800GTX, then releasing the same card with a smaller die size, fondly called the 9800GTX '+'. All these attempts proved useless and only went on to show that Nvidia was really desperate, and this only strengthened the ATI base.

Then, recently, we had the 9800GT, which was priced lower than the HD4850, but at the same time was slower (10%). Even though the HD4850 was priced in the 9-10K price bracket, it wasn't exactly 'cheap.' So the thought came up, why not re-release the 8800GT under a new name in the 7-8K range? It may be just two grand less, but for most Indian gamers, that's a huge saving considering most still game on 17" monitors, so the extra bit of performance that HD4850 offers didn't really matter. This strategy worked well, but it was short-lived as ATI quickly dropped their price further creating a dead end for Nvidia.

G92 : Back from the grave!

If we look at Nvidia's high-end line-up, the GTX285 and GTX295 are doing really well, thanks to the new 55nm GT200b core. Power consumption and heating is down, while performance is boosted, thanks to the higher core and memory speeds. These new cores were still restricted to high-end cards; I was waiting for the new mid-rangers to sport this core. When I heard about the GTS250, I was really excited, since finally we have a mid-range GT200b that was sure to spice things up. However, I was WRONG!


 


 


 



Turns out Nvidia pulled the baton switch on us, again! The GTS250 is essentially a repackaged and rebadged 9800GTX+ with better clock speeds (at least that's what appears from the specifications). What better way to get rid of your surplus inventory than by introducing it as a new product, right? It just frustrates me when Nvidia keeps doing this. From the GPUz screenshot, we quickly see the same number of shader units (128) with 1GB of GDDR3 running on a 256-bit memory bus. Of course, the clocks have been bumped up, but for the most part, the G92 hasn't changed much.

Anyways, I'm going to keep an open mind about this and not let it distract me. On a positive note, they have made a drastic change in pricing and pitted it very close to HD4850;so, at least there is some consolation. Today, we have the Zotac GTS250 Amp Edition on our chopping block; let's see what happens.


 

Follow Techtree on Twitter

    next

Do you agree with this Review?
YesNo

Up

13

Down

1

Related Links
Galaxy 9800GTX+ Xtreme Tuner Edition
Nvidia Details Specs of 2 New Graphics Cards
Introducing the 9800GTX+..what's next?
Tag keywords
Zotac GTS250 Amp Edition Nvidia G92 Zotac s Nitro software 9800GTX Nvidia GTX285 Nvidia GTX295



Discussion Board
(2) Comments
Mayank
,Mumbai, on Mar 28, 2009 05:07 AM
can I use this card with a intel dual core processor 3.4GHz, intel D945GIS motherboard and 2GB RAM...if yes then how much watts power supply will I need...I have currently 300W power supply...
Report abuse
JAVED USMANI
,BILASPUR ,CHHATTISGARH, on Mar 27, 2009 01:13 PM
The star say , keep it up , to make good luck.
Report abuse

Opinion Poll