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PNY Verto Geforce 4 Ti 4600
 

Written By:
Date Posted: August 24, 2002

may not be a familiar name to most users, but they've been active in the memory market for quite some time. From regular ram modules, to CF cards, it was strange to me how they jumped into the video card market. Like Visiontek, PNY was one of the first to announce GeForce 4 products, and have them released to retail before most others.

We covered the GeForce 4 Ti4600 technology previously, so if you haven't read it yet, we encourage you to check it out. I have been sitting on this review for some time now, but let's face it, every Ti4600 review is pretty much the same. We're going to cut right to the chase, as by now, I'm sure you've read more GeForce 4 reviews than Jenna Jameson has done movies. If you don't know what I'm talking about, just forget it...

The Card

Like all GeForce 4s (MX and Titanium), nVidia have added nView capability to all their GeForce 4s. PNY has added this support to their product, so dual-monitor gimps no longer have to choose between dual action, or fast 3D gaming, but now they have an all-in-one solution.

A rather unspectacular box encases the Verto Ti4600. I'm not too sure about the box image. It doesn't really scream "POWER!!!!" to me, but rather, it just plain creeps me out. I think the designers have been watching too many Star Trek: The Next Generation (Borg) reruns.

You don't get a whole lot, which isn't surprising given the price of this card is among the cheapest of GeForce 4 Ti4600s. You get the manual, a driver CD, and a copy of Star Wars: Starfighter. I don't really know why that game was included, since the true power of the Ti4600 isn't exploited with it, but for those of you into console shooters, have fun.

There have been reports of the PCB being purple. Um, ours was not. In fact, the card is about as "reference" design as they come. Nothing wrong with that, as this usally means lower prices, but don't expect much in the way of hardware freebies.

Speaking of reference, you got the standard nVidia designed fan. Because of it's design, heatsinks aren't needed on the ram. The GPU heatsink actually blows air over the ram. Personally, I think it looks cool, plus it gets the job done. The core is not overclocked, and speeds along at 300MHz.

Despite manufacturing ram, PNY doesn't do so with the Ti4600. Like most Ti4600 cards, they stuck with the Samsung BGA DDR SDRAM. Rated at 350MHz (700MHz DDR), our card's ram was clocked at the nVidia recommended 650MHz.

Unlike the Visiontek Xtasy Ti4600 we looked at, the Verto Ti4600 does not include the Philips video encoder/decoder (pictured top right). What does this mean? Well, to begin with, the S-Video port will only function as TV-out. You will be unable to capture video, let alone do any editing. Like we said, the Verto is one of the lowest priced Titaniums available, and you have to trim hardware somewhere.

Like all Ti4600s, the capacitors on the Verto Ti4600 may cause issues with some motherboards. The reference Ti4600 design does indeed follow AGP 2.0 specifications, so you're going to want to check your motherboard manufacturer to see where you stand.

Rounding things out are the I/O connections. nView is supported, but you'll need to grab a DVI-to-VGA connection if you want to drive two CRT monitors, as no such cable was included.

Next Page - Overclocking and Benchmarks

 

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