by FastSite
12/19/2001 | 12:00 AM
The Leadtek Company has been present in the graphics cards market for a long time, and graphics cards from Leadtek based on NVIDIA chips have validly won the reputation of high-quality and reliable solutions. Leadtek produces gaming cards based on NVIDIA chips starting with the model WinFast 3D S320 based on the good old NVIDIA GeForce256. So, no wonder that shortly after the announcement of the new NVIDIA Titanium family of graphics chips on October 1, 2001 Leadtek launched its graphics cards based on them. <%BANNER[article]%>
This review is devoted to Leadtek WinFast Titanium 500 TD and WinFast Titanium 200 TDH cards based on NVIDIA GeForce3 Ti500 and GeForce3 Ti200 chips.
Leadtek WinFast Titanium 500 TD and WinFast Titanium 200 TDH are shipped in large, nicely styled boxes:
The supply package is the same for both cards: they come with a user's manual, a set of cables for work with videosignal, a CD with drivers and utilities and two CDs with games - Dronez and Gunlok:
The cards themselves, of course, are no absolute twins, and we are going to examine them one after another:
This graphics card is based on the reference design from NVIDIA and is equipped with an S-Video Out and DVI connector for digital monitors:
At first glance we could see a huge monolith heatsink, which covers both the core and the memory chips. A heatsink like that, due at least to its size, should perfectly dissipate the heat away from the core and protect the memory chips against EMI. It looks serious and stylish: the mere outlook of a cooling system like that can command our respect:
On the other hand, tolerances occurring during chips installation onto the card PCB could lead to the situation when a monolith heatsink like that won't get tightly pressed to every chip. By those cards that we got for testing the contact between the heatsink and the memory chips was perfect, but as for the core, it simply didn't touch the heatsink at all. The gap between the two surfaces was filled with the thermal paste.
Another problem may occur due to the large heatsink size: if the computer case is not of very high quality, the slot in the case rear panel for the graphics card may appear a bit incorrectly located in respect to the AGP slot on the mainboard. In this case, the graphics cards usually get slightly bent when screwed. Almost unnoticeable angling will make no harm to the card but in our case it may prevent the heatsink from pressing tightly to the chips.
We should pay tribute to the engineers, because the heatsink has a special "staple" that does not allow the card to get bent too greatly. However, the tests showed that even the slightest angling is more than enough for breaking the thermal contact between the heatsink and the graphics memory chips.
All this definitely influences the graphics card stability, but we would like to point out once again that if you have a good high-quality PC case there is no need to worry.
The Leadtek WinFast Titanium 500 TD is based on NVIDIA GeForce3 Ti500 chip:
The card is equipped with 64MB of DDR SDRAM graphics memory manufactured by ESMT with 3.8ns access time:
The working frequencies of the card are by default 240MHz for the core and 500MHz (250MHz DDR) for the graphics memory.
Leadtek WinFast Titanium 200 TDH card incorporates a proprietary design and is also equipped with an S-Video Out and DVI connector for digital monitors:
The difference between Leadtek WinFast Titanium 200 TDH and its analogues is the presence of hardware monitoring means.
First, the three LEDs located in the corner of the card provide information about the operation status and possible failures:
During normal operation the two LEDs are lit: "PWR" and "AGP4X".
Second, the card has a thermal sensor, which reads temperature of the surface of the core metal cover:
The heatsink has a special cavity for the thermal sensor on the reverse:
Third, the card is capable of monitoring the fan rotation speed and core and memory voltages.
The support of all these features is implemented via W83783S Winbond hardware monitoring chip, which is installed onto the card:
Leadtek WinFast Titanium 200 TDH is based on NVIDIA GeForce3 Ti200 chip:
The card has 64MB of DDR SDRAM graphics memory manufactured by EliteMT with 3.8ns access time:
This graphics card as well as Leadtek WinFast GeForce3 Titanium 500 TD is equipped with an external TMDS-transceiver and modern TV-chip from Conexant. Both were the subject of our attention in the Leadtek WinFast GeForce3 TD Review:
The working frequencies of Leadtek WinFast GeForce3 Titanium 200 TDH are 175MHz for the core and 400MHz (200MHz DDR) for the graphics memory.
The CD shipped with the card contains the drivers and the WinFox utility intended for convenient desktop and card settings management. We paid special attention to this utility and its peculiarities in our Leadtek WinFast GeForce3 TD Review.
Leadtek WinFast GeForce3 Titanium 200 TDH supports hardware monitoring features, therefore WinFox menu has a link to the Hardware Monitor page:
The Hardware Monitor page shows the chip surface temperature, the heatsink temperature, the fan rotation speed and the voltage of the core and the graphics memory.
Unfortunately, the hardware monitoring is supported only in Windows 9x, there's no support for it in Windows 2000/XP.
Our testbed system was configured as follows:
For a more illustrative comparison we also included the results obtained for VisionTek Xtasy 6964, VisionTek Xtasy 6564 (based on NVIDIA GeForce3Ti500/Ti200) and ATI RADEON 8500.
We used the following software:
We ran the tests only in 32bit color mode, because the high performance of our testing participants allows us to disregrad the 16bit modes at all.
First comes the 3D Mark 2001:
So, if we compare the performance of Leadtek graphics cards with that of VisionTek graphics cards we will hardly be able to comment on anything, as the results are equal, even bearing in mind the measuring error. Indeed, they can't be too much different, because the cards from Leadtek and VisionTek are based on the same chips and work at the same frequencies. If the cards are well-made and have high-quality components (and that is the case), then no surprises in performance and stability are expected.
ATI RADEON 8500 demonstrated excellent results in Windows XP that could be compared to the results for Windows 98 SE (see our ATI RADEON 8500 and RADEON 8500LE Graphics Cards Review).
Now let's take a look at Quake3 Arena:
Quake 3 Arena testing was carried out in 32-bit color modes with the maximum quality settings. Tri-linear filtering and texture compression were enabled. We tested with demo127.dem which ships with Quake3 1.27 Point Release Patch.
The graphics cards from Leadtek and VisionTek again showed almost equal results, which is not surprising.
ATI RADEON 8500 was slightly behind the cards based on NVIDIA GeForce3 Ti500 just the same way as it was in Windows 98. Taking into consideration the good results of RADEON 8500 in DirectX tests we could come to a conclusion that OpenGL driver for RADEON 8500 is not yet optimized enough even for Quake3 and thus does not allow the card potential to get revealed to the full extent. The insufficient OpenGL driver optimization shows itself in Windows 98 the same way as in Windows XP, as we can see from the results.
The Leadtek WinFast Titanium 500 TD and WinFast Titanium 200 TDH cards both show very high 2D image quality on the monitor, that is inherent to the best graphics cards based on NVIDIA GeForce3/Ti500/Ti200. The picture quality didn't arouse any complaints with our monitors: ViewSonic PF775 and Samsung SyncMaster 900 IFT in resolutions of up to 1280x1024.
Leadtek WinFast Titanium 500 TD graphics card worked stably at up to 260MHz core and 590MHz memory frequencies (the nominal values are 240MHz and 500MHz correspondingly), and though the core overclocking couldn't be found impressive, the graphics memory appeared highly overclockable due to the good cooling and screening with the huge heatsink. The low overclocking potential of the core could be explained with the fact that, first, it is already set to the frequency higher than that of GeForce3, and second, the contact between the heatsink and the core was bad for the piece tested.
Leadtek WinFast Titanium 200 TDH card worked stably at the maximum frequencies of 230MHz core and 580MHz memory (the nominal values are 174Mhz and 400MHz respectively). The overclocking potential of Leadtek WinFast Titanium 200 TDH core could be considered a high one, because GeForce3 Ti200 works at the lower frequency than GeForce3 and GeForce3 Ti500. However, the core of this card failed to overclock even to the frequency of GeForce3 Ti500, not to mention the overclocking result of Leadtek WinFast Titanium 500 TD equal to 260MHz. This means that NVIDIA started sorting out its chips taking into consideration their stability at various frequencies, and now the chips with different potentials are marked differently and used for different cards. Please, take a closer look at the chip pictures: at the lower edge of the metal cover there is a "T" letter on NVIDIA GeForce3 Ti500 chip, and a "V" letter on GeForce3 Ti200 chip. We discovered this tendency when we examined all the NVIDIA GeForce3/Ti500/Ti200 based graphics cards available at our disposal: NVIDIA GeForce3 chips did not have any mark on the cover, the GeForce3 Ti500 chips were marked with "T", and GeForce3 Ti200 were marked with "V" or "VP".
Of course, the results of this fluent cards inspection do not claim to truth, but the interesting tendency is undeniable.
However, let us return to Leadtek Titanium 200 TDH. This card boasts a great overclocking potential thanks to the fast 3.8ns graphics memory, though the engineers could easily do with slower 5ns memory chips. But, we shouldn't flatter ourselves, as the boxes with Leadtek WinFast Titanium 200 TDH do not show what memory is installed on those cards, thus in future supplies you can discover graphics cards with 5ns memory chips used, which will ruin the excellent overclocking potential of these graphics cards.
WinFast Titanium 500 TD and WinFast Titanium 200 TDH graphics cards both are a good choice for those who need a fast and reliable graphics solution.
We could recommend these cards to the overclocking fans. They are most unlikely to get overheated due to huge heatsinks installed. However, you will have to check firstly, that there is good thermal contact between the graphics card heatsink and the core, secondly, that there is good air circulation inside the case, and thirdly, that you've got a good quality PC case.
Highs:
Lows: