PNY GeForce3 200 Ti

[Yoshi]

It seems to happen each year, the video card upgrade bug. Over the weekend I gave in and upgraded from a Radeon 64 DDR to a PNY GeForce3 200 Ti for $199.99 plus tax. I have no regrets and would like to help answer some of the questions regarding this card on this forum over the past couple weeks.

1. Image Quality

No problems here, looks just as good as the Radeon. Looks much better than my old Creative TNT2 and Creative GeForce256 DDR. Both those cards had very crappy 2D image quality. The PNY goes up to 1600x1200 with sharp readable text.

2. Overclocking

My sample overclocks as follows. The core runs stable at 215Mhz, I start getting STOP errors faster and faster as I approach 220Mhz. The memory is good for 465Mhz effective clock speed, after this I start to see very subtle artifacts. I am a little dissappointed by the abilities of the core, but have no complaints about the abilities of the RAM. This card must have some high quality fast RAM, I have not removed any of the heatsinks to discover the actual manufacturer and speed.

3. Overall Performance

This card runs everything well and allows me to play most any game at resolutions above 1024x768x32. The only complaint I have with this card is with the TV out. It is not bad, it is better than the TV out on past nVidia based cards. However, it does not quite offer the level of refinement the TV out on the Radeon has.

If you are in the market for a new card, I would certainly recommend this card. It offers excellent performance for the price.

PS If anyone is interested in buying a Radeon 64 DDR VIVO mine is up for sale here.

 

[Smbu]

<< 2. Overclocking

My sample overclocks as follows. The core runs stable at 215Mhz, I start getting STOP errors faster and faster as I approach 220Mhz. The memory is good for 465Mhz effective clock speed, after this I start to see very subtle artifacts. I am a little dissappointed by the abilities of the core, but have no complaints about the abilities of the RAM. This card must have some high quality fast RAM, I have not removed any of the heatsinks to discover the actual manufacturer and speed. >>



Before I returned my PNY GF3 Ti200 card, I was able to take it to 250/472. I was definately disappointed in the performance of the RAM. It is rated at 4ns and should be able to hit 500mhz easily. Even the 4.5ns ram on my Gainward GF2 Pro/450 was able to clock higher than that.

 

[GoonSquad]

I got a reply from PNY regarding the rated speed of the RAM, they stated that it is 5ns but may be overclocked to 4ns although this voids your warranty.

Most people seem to be able to get 460 to 480mhz from them anyway, not a bad overclock.

SMBU, I don't think your card was rated at 4ns despite what was printed on the chips, I haven't heard of any PNY getting higher than 500 whereas all Leateks (which definitely use 4ns) seem to get above 500, usually 500-520mhz. Just makes sense.