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Often, when you look at
hardware ads in magazines, you will see somewhere in there
a benchmark score. A 3DMark score to be more
specific, will scream "16,348 out of the box", or list the
system components with a number at the bottom. While
these are prevalent, why aren't Winstones or other system
benchmarks shown as often? The reason is, no other
section of the computer hardware market is as hotly
contested and eagerly anticipated as the graphics
industry. New, more powerful graphics cards fuel the
games we play each day. Game companies seem to spend
more time producing better graphics (sometimes at the cost
of playability unfortunately), which leads to the need for
more powerful video cards. It's cyclic in nature.
While some users will invariably go out and purchase the
"best of the best", most of the video cards that are
purchased are within the $100-200 range. This range
is usually referred to as the "mainstream".
Tyan, a company more well
known for their stable motherboards, has been producing
their "Tachyon" line of cards based on ATi's R300 VPU.
Rather than simply branding their name on a popular
reference board and shipping it out, they have kept an eye
out for the hardware enthusiast. Their first
offering, the
Tachyon G9700 Pro, received pretty high marks from our
main man Marco, back in January. The Tachyon G9500
Pro we received, based on the Radeon 9500, has its VPU and
memory speeds clocked lower than the Radeon 9700s, and is
considered a mainstream offering with its lower price.
All indications however, point to a great performance to
price ratio.
Let's see if Tyan can keep us impressed...
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Specifications & Features of the Tyan Tachyon
G9500 Pro |
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Mainstream DX9 Part... |
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The Tyan
Tachyon G9500 Pro
CLICK ANY IMAGE ABOVE FOR
AN ENLARGED VIEW
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GRAPHICS TECHNOLOGY
R300 Visual Processing Unit (VPU)
MEMORY CONFIGURATION
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128MB of double data rate SDRAM
- 540 MHz DDR frequency
3D
GRAPHICS FEATURES
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Eight parallel rendering pipelines process up to 2.6
billion pixels per second
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Four parallel geometry engines process up to 325
million transformed and lit polygons per second
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High precision 10-bit per channel framebuffer
support
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128-bit DDR memory interface
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AGP 8X support
-SMARTSHADER? 2.0
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Full support for Microsoft® DirectX® 9.0
programmable pixel and vertex shaders in hardware
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2.0 Pixel Shaders support up to 16 textures per
rendering pass
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2.0 Vertex Shaders support vertex programs up to
1024 instructions with flow control
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New 128-bit per pixel floating point color formats
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Multiple Render Target (MRT) support
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Shadow volume rendering acceleration
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Complete feature set also supported in OpenGL via
extensions
-SMOOTHVISION? 2.0
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State-of-the-art full-scene anti-aliasing
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New technology processes up to 15.6 billion
anti-aliased samples per second for unprecedented
performance
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Supports 2x, 4x, and 6x modes with programmable
sample patterns
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Advanced anisotropic filtering
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Supports up to 16 bilinear samples (in performance
mode) or trilinear samples (in quality mode) per
pixel
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2x/4x/6x full scene anti-aliasing modes
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Adaptive algorithm with programmable sample patterns
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2x/4x/8x/16x anisotropic filtering modes
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Adaptive algorithm with bilinear (performance) and
trilinear (quality) options
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Bandwidth-saving algorithm enables this feature with
minimal performance cost
-HYPERZ? III
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Hierarchical Z-Buffer and Early Z Test reduce
overdraw by detecting and discarding hidden pixels
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Lossless Z-Buffer Compression and Fast Z-Buffer
Clear reduce memory bandwidth consumption by over
50%
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Fast Z-Buffer Clear
-TRUFORM? 2.0
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2nd generation N-patch higher order surface support
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Discrete and continuous tessellation levels per
polygon for dynamic LOD
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DirectX 9.0 displacement mapping
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VIDEO FEATURES
-VIDEOSHADER?
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Seamless integration of programmable pixel shaders
with video data
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High quality, hardware accelerated de-blocking of
internet streaming video
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Noise removal filter for captured video
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Integrated MPEG-2 decode
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Hardware accelerated iDCT, motion compensation, and
color space conversion
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Top quality DVD and all-format DTV/HDTV decode with
low CPU overhead
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Back-end scaler delivers top quality playback
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Upscaling and downscaling with 4-tap horizontal and
vertical filtering
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Filtered display of images up to 1920 pixels wide
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Unique per-pixel adaptive de-interlacing feature
combines the best elements of the ?bob? and
?add-field? (weave) techniques
FULLSTREAM? video
de-blocking technology
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Noise removal filtering for captured video
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MPEG-2 decoding with motion compensation, iDCT and
color space conversion
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All-format DTV/HDTV decoding
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YPrPb component output
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Adaptive de-interlacing and frame rate conversion
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Dual integrated display controllers
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Dual integrated 10-bit per channel 400MHz DACs
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Integrated 165 MHz TMDS transmitter (DVI and HDCP
compliant)
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Integrated TV Output support up to 1024x768
resolution
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Optimized for Pentium® 4 SSE2 and AMD Athlon? 3Dnow!
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PC 2002 compliant
DISPLAY FEATURES
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Dual integrated display controllers
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Drive two displays simultaneously with independent
resolutions and refresh rates
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HYDRAVISION? software provides complete control over
multi-display configurations with a user-friendly
interface
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Dual integrated 10-bit per channel palette DACs
operating at up to 400MHz
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Integrated 165MHz TMDS transmitter supports
resolutions up to QXGA (2048x1536) and complies with
DVI and HDCP specifications
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Integrated TV-Out support up to 1024x768 resolution
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YPrPb output for direct drive of HDTV monitors
DISPLAY SUPPORT
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15-pin VGA connector for analog CRT
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S-video or composite connector for TV/VCR
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DVI-I connector for digital CRT or flat panel
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Independent resolutions and refresh rates for any
two connected displays
GENERAL FEATURES
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Comprehensive 2x, 4x, and 8x AGP support
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High performance quad-channel DDR memory interface
supports 64/128/256MB configurations
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Fully compliant with PC 2002 requirements
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Optimized for Pentium® 4 SSE2 and AMD Athlon? 3Dnow!
processor instructions
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Supports optional THEATER? 200 companion chip for
NTSC/PAL/SECAM video capture
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Highly optimized 128-bit 2D engine with support for
new Windows® XP GDI extensions
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The
Bundle:
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Tyan Tachyon G9500 Pro
4-pin Power Cable
S-Video Cable
Composite Video Cable
S-Video to Composite Video Cable
DVI-to-VGA Adapter
User's Manual
Software & Drivers CD
Quick Installation Guide
TGM 2.0 User's Guide
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| Tyan aims to
please graphics enthusiasts with their Tachyon line of
cards but didn't add in frivolous extras that might raise
the overall cost. There are three cables for S-Video
out, Composite video out, or converting S-Video to
Composite. There also was a DVI-to-VGA adapter for
users looking to use multiple monitors. Tyan
included no less than three manuals; a fairly
comprehensive User's Guide, and two brief guides on
installation of the card and use of the Tachyon Graphics
Monitor 2.0 software. The CD came with drivers, the
previously mentioned TGM 2.0 software, and a full copy of
WinDVD 4.0. Aside from a packed-in game, the bundle
appears to have all the necessary pieces to get the most
out of the card.
A
closer look at the card.
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