Hercles 3D Prophet 4800 KYROII SE

[nemesismk2]

"Hercules extends its 3D Prophet KYRO range to include a new 3D performance leader for home entertainment

La Gacilly, March 13, 2002. Hercules is happy to unveil the new 3D Prophet 4800, the latest contribution to the 3D Prophet KYRO line. Powered by the KYROII SE chipset, 3D Prophet 4800 is optimized for the latest OpenGL® and DirectX? APIs, offering home users the best 3D performance in all current and future games. Equipped with the latest high speed AGP4X/2X KYROII SE chipset, 3D Prophet 4800 offers gamers a 200MHz core clock with 64MB of RAM, new 3D technology features and a quality TV-Output enabling users to significantly upgrade their PCs for playing games and watching DVDs.

?3D Prophet 4800 is Hercules? solution for gamers and home users looking for an optimized and complete graphics solution at a reasonable price. Impressive 2D and 3D image quality, amazing speed in 3D applications and fluid DVD video playback can now be experienced by every user?, says François Garet, Video Group Manager in Hercules Technologies. ?In the meantime, Hercules will continue to manufacture and market 3D Prophet 4000XT and 3D Prophet 4500 series and offer to our customers a successful and non-stop support.?

3D Prophet 4800?s new 3D processor offers a remarkable assortment of the most up-to-date graphics technology features for key 3D effects in the latest applications. 3D Prophet 4800 stands out with its unmatched enhanced Transform And Lighting technology engine which has been specifically designed by PowerVR for the new generation of KYROII chipsets. It mixes intelligent 3D and CPU resources applied to Transform & Lighting and enables the 3D processing to calculate in real time how light intensity will vary on surfaces, where shadows are positioned in 3D applications. These operations guarantee more realistic scenes without increasing CPU resources overload, which maximizes the frame rates in games. The enhanced T&L engine proves to be up to 15% faster than standard engines in games where T&L causes a bottleneck.

In addition, 3D Prophet 4800 offers gamers the highly innovative and intelligent SMART 3D Render technology, an implemented Tile-based rendering engine. This technology enables faster 3D rendering by eliminating back-end polygons (Hidden Surface Removal technology) and mapping textures onto visible surfaces only. SMART 3D Render achieves ultra efficient bandwidth optimization and uncompromising fill rates in high-resolution scenes, which provides gamers with extra power in first person games. SMART 3D Render is fully transparent under Direct®X and OpenGL® APIs and enables designers of current and future games to take advantage of its innovative features without needing to carry out additional programming.

3D Prophet 4800?s KYROII SE chipset incorporates Texture8 technology for full support of single pass 8-layer multi-texturing. The processor can combine up to 8 layers of different textures, taking the best of DirectX® 8.1 for highly detailed 3D backgrounds and natural looking 3D models. For flawless image quality, 3D Prophet 4800 fully supports Internal True Color? enabling all pixel operations to be rendered in the graphics processor at full 32-bit Internal True Color resolution, which means added levels of color interpolation.

The board also features TrueRender OnChip FSAA. Pixel-perfect FSAA is performed with zero memory footprint allowing the memory to be dedicated to other operations such as the storage of larger and more complex textures. KYROII SE employs TrueRender OnChip to implement both 2X and 4X high quality Full Scene Anti-Aliasing. For ultra-realistic surfaces and reflections (plastic, metallic, rubber & shiny effects), another plus is the support of Bump Map Complete bump-mapping, providing optimum support for DirectX®8.1 features: EMBM, Dot3 and Embossed bump mapping.

3D Prophet 4800 displays up to 1940X1440 at a refresh rate of 60Hz with incredible sharpness and true 32-bit color. 3D Prophet 4800 TV-out version also comes with a high-resolution TV-Output for watching DVDs on TV. Accompanied by Cyberlink® PowerDVD? 4.0 XP DVD player, the graphics board allows users to watch their DVDs with hardware motion compensation on their PC or, through the PAL/NTSC video output, on TV Sets in resolutions from 640x480 to 1024x768.

3D Prophet 4800 is Hercules? latest board, focused on innovation and specifically designed for long-lasting home entertainment. Based on future-proof 3D technology, it enables the whole family to take advantage of current and future 3D games at an affordable price.

3D Prophet 4800 and 3D Prophet 4800 TV-out will be available through Hercules? worldwide retail and distribution network. "

hercules release 4800 information

 

[Idoxash]

Kick ass but i was hoping 225 or more mhz for the core........oh well i want' be getting this kyro II card cause my Kyro II card want work with
windows xp at all...........that's blows eh oh yeah anyone knows how to dual boot 98se and xp if so pm about how to do so thanks.

 

[Sunner]

Can anyone say, too little too late?

 

[JeremiahTheGreat]

well.. if the price is right..

It should at least kick the low end versions of Geforce4MX's.. otherwise - yup.

 

[nemesismk2]

<< Can anyone say, too little too late? >>



The KyroII SE is just the product they need to grab what remains of the old Geforce2 market and IMO it will be very competitive compared to even the Geforce4 MX.

BTW:The Videologic version has been confirmed as the VideoLogic Vivid!XS Elite?

 

[Mingon]

nemesismk2 your support for the kyro chipset is admirable but it does verge on fanboyish. good as the kyro is unless the 4800 actually has TnL and not just PnR then it is too late for it to make an impact.

 

[Killrose]

The Radeon 7500 is a much better card than this, and will probably be in the same price range.

 

[LongCoolMother]

i agree its a little too late, but if it can hold its low-cost tradition the kyro II had, itd still be good. agreed?

 

[vedin]

I think it will sell very well in places where Nvidia cards still cost nearly twice as much as they do in America. Europe for one. In these places the Kyro 2 and SE are the only REAL budget cards available. As for dismissing it as far too little too late...I wouldn't be entirely sure. Not until we actually KNOW how much faster it is than the first. We can overclock K2s all day, but that doesn't mean that we get to se all the SE can do. My guess would be that ENT&L isn't just a little driver trick, or they would have released it apart from a new card. Therefore it could increase the performance of the card quite a bit. On the other hand, it may not make any real difference at all. We'll have to wait and see. Plus, we don't really know if the boards can be overclocked better/worse than the first. I don't really know anything about it, but I think it's a bit early to tell whether or not it can give the GF4 MX a run for it's money. We'll see.

 

[Idoxash]

nemesismk2 your support for the kyro chipset is admirable but it does verge on fanboyish. good as the kyro is unless the 4800
actually has TnL and not just PnR then it is too late for it to make an impact.

Dude we are all fanboys of what we like....who came up with this crapy fanboy stuff anyways...if you like it use it.....

 

[nemesismk2]

<< nemesismk2 your support for the kyro chipset is admirable but it does verge on fanboyish. good as the kyro is unless the 4800 actually has TnL and not just PnR then it is too late for it to make an impact. >>



It's not so much the video card which I find so impressive it's the technology behind it, ie tile based rendering. Imagine a video card with the specs of the Geforce4 but using TBR, that's a video card I want to own!

 

[zsouthboy]

Where the heck is the kryo III? Where the heck is the Geforce 3 killer?

All I want to know is the price... Might be worth 75 bucks...

Only ATI and nvidia will put out competitive stuff... WTF?

Zs

 

[nemesismk2]

The Kyro 3 was delayed by STM selling it's graphics division. A person leaked information about the Kyro 2 SE and he was spot on with the specs and he said something about another release in April/May which IMO will be the Kyro 3 and the next major release will be right before chistmas.

The limited information available seems to indicate that the whole STM situation has been or is about to be resolved, the new buyer I'm sure will want to rush the new products into the shops asap to start making money from their investment.

 

[holdencommodore]

It'll be interesting, especially if VIA buys the licence for the Kyro.

 

[Innoka]

The wording of the press release suggests no new feature but that they'd like some people to misconstrue that there is. Are you sure VIA is such a great buyer- they didn't do much for the Diamond S3 line.

 

[holdencommodore]

I think that VIA would make an excellent Kyro partner. They have the power to get the Kyro cards out into the market - much better than STMicro. VIA really need a card with the decent technology of the K2 SE or the K3 to establish a good reputation. I think that S3 will now be concentrating on the mobile sector.

Cheers

 

[vedin]

EnTnL isn't just a driver implementation. The drivers for the 4800 will work for the 4500, but without the new hardware of the 4800, the T&L part of it won't work. Picked that off of Paraknowya. That pretty blatently tells me that the TnL engine is, in part at least, a hardware solution. To what extent I have no idea, but it isn't quite as simple as a "geometry assist" like the Voodoos had.

 

[unclebud]

got a choice... 4000xt agp for $20 MAYBE (from friend)
4500 agp for $69.99 + tax
don't want gts-v from newegg really probably wouldn't notice anyway
neither radeon whatever
using v 3 2000 in machine right now with 256 mb, k6-2 350, win 95 with this board, which shows 1x/2x agp in the bios.
primarily to play quake 3 and maybe some serious sam 2
opinions? i'm thinking i ought to just play for now and enjoy what i got, but $20 don't sound bad for an investment
4000xt/4500 owners please chime in... tia

 

[Jalidi]

Isn't the 4000xt agp based on the original Kyro I chip? If so, then I'd definitely go with the Kyro II 4500 (which I have in my current machine) a hundred times over: you're basically getting GF2 Pro performance at a very good price... and the drivers are nice and solid, with monthly releases on the PowerVR site. I think I paid $120 originally for the Kyro II 4500 when it was brand new last April, the price has come down much further than I expected. Can't go wrong with it on Win98/AXP 1800+, it works well on a friend's WinXP/Athlon 900 platform too.

 

[unclebud]

much thanks! yes, it's the same as the original according to some reviews out on the net. what i'm asking is it(4500) as good as three times the cost of the card(4000xt for $20)? guess you answered my question. thanks again.

 

[nemesismk2]

<< much thanks! yes, it's the same as the original according to some reviews out on the net. what i'm asking is it(4500) as good as three times the cost of the card(4000xt for $20)? guess you answered my question. thanks again. >>



The 4000XT is a good video card especially for only $20, as for performance at lower resolutions 640x480 and 800x600 the 4000 can keep up with the 4500 but at higher resolutions or higher quality settings the 4000's performance drops off.

Quake 3 (high quality)

640x480 Kyro=108 Kyro2=108
800x600 Kyro=96 Kyro 2=107
1024x768 Kyro=66 Kyro2=94
1280x1024 Kyro=40 Kyro2=62

Serious Sam (normal)

640x480 Kyro=81 Kyro2=86
800x600 Kyro=79 Kyro 2=81
1024x768 Kyro=59 Kyro2=79
1280x1024 Kyro=36 Kyro2=64

Unreal Tournament (medium)

640x480 Kyro=101 Kyro2=105
800x600 Kyro=81 Kyro 2=102
1024x768 Kyro=55 Kyro2=81

Kyro=Hercules 4000 or Videologic Vivid etc
Kyro 2=Hercules 4500 or Videologic VividXS etc

I hope this bit of information helps, also remember that the Kyro 2 SE with it's ehanced t&l will be in the shops soon. Maybe it would be better to see what kind of price that's going to be sold for before making any purchase but $20 for the Hercules 4000 is a bargain!

 

[unclebud]

much thanks also! will be running this card in 800x600 (15" mon ) like my v3, so that DEFINITELY is a factor. just what i needed to know! thanks again!

 

[unclebud]

okay, installed it (replaced win 95 in the process and yes i did the format--clean install) and am getting 31.6 fps on fastest in q3arena. bad drivers from the cd? what are going to be the best drivers for me to get? i'm suffering here--the riva 128 got 24/25 in 640x480 at least [ugh]. thanks to everybody in advance.

 

[Blurry]

One word..........Too late.

 

[unclebud]

duuuude... that's AT LEAST two right there