kyro 2 at cheap prices !!!

[ummwhatever]

Hrm.. we tried to replace it on a system with a former GF 2 GTS - we broke it by accident while trying to replace the GPU fan - then we followed all possible tweaks for the Kyro 2 (and there aren't many).

Tons of texture tearing, and bad video updating during video sequences.

The Kyro 2 has major issues - not sure if they can be solved with driver updates.

We are returning it and replacing it with a GF 2 Pro 64mb - which mail order is only about $20/30 more than a Kyro 2 retail.

Good luck...

 

[AppleTalking]

ummwhatever:

What game(s) were you running? Were you using the latest drivers? I was under the impression that Hercules/PowerVR had tested this card out with a lot of different games and had released a whole slew of driver updates to correct the issues that hadn't been fixed by the time the card hit the stores.

Nick

 

[UKtaxman]

I have just purchased a Videologhic Vivid!XS 32mbKYRO2(withTVout) in the UK for £82 on release. If I was to try to buy an equivalent branded GF2mx card with TVout in the UK it would cost almost exactly the same. My card beats the living daylights out of the mx! In fact it comes very close to the GF2pro. Unfortunately the GF2GTS is getting more difficult to source due to Nvidia dropping production. I would recomend anyone to buy the K2 over an mx for 9 out of 10 applications(and I do).
I make a lot of systems and I'd be stupid to put a video card in to one of them that wasn't going to perform to the purchasers needs. I don't know about in the states, but here in the UK margins on PC hardware are already very slim, so having a few returns would eliminate that margin altogether. I actually bought the Kyro2 to find out what it was capable of and I am very impressed!
If you are having any difficulties with games, then I would suggest visiting the following site http://pvr.gamestats.com/start.shtml#newsitem991478878,15335, as it has a whole host of information on it.

BTW I am not necessarily pro PVR, I just like top have a choice and prior to this there wasn't one!(I don't count ATI as I have had far too many problems with them in the past)

 

[PotNoodle]

ummwhatever,

? Tons of texture tearing, and bad video updating during video sequences.

The Kyro 2 has major issues - not sure if they can be solved with driver updates. ?

If this is the case, then you might find that its your installation of KYROII that?s suffering from these issues, not necessarily KYROII as a whole ? you?ll find there are plenty of people who don?t have issues.

From what I?ve been hearing is that many issues surrounding KYROII can just be resolved by people installing the correct AGP / system device drivers in the first place!

AppleTalking,

? Did anyone notice that this new product is named the Inno3D 4500 and the Hercules card is the 3D Prophet 4500. What's up with the 4500? Of course, there was also the infamous Voodoo4 4500 product as well. ?

Its purely to do with the naming of the chip series by ST ? KYROI was STG4000 and KYROII was STG4500.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand ? it seems as though KYRO prices may get even cheaper soon enough as ST / Img have just announced another 10 manufacturers for KYROI, KYROII chipsets at Computex Taiwan (assuming some of these far east brands make it further than just the far east) -- that should please nVIDIA

 

[Pocatello]

If you want PowerVR to stay around you better hope that the price of a Kyro II won't dip below $100. 3dfx sold a bunch of voodoo 3 for cheap, and ran out of cash real quick. I still don't see any major OEM PC makers buying the Kyro II, that could be a concern down the road since Sega isn't buying any chip from PowerVR anymore.

 

[rickn]

graphics biz only makes a portion of Imgtec's portfolio. They are involved in other areas(sound, multimedia, DSP's). 3dfx didn't have anything else to fall back on.

 

[powervr2]

I never found any of those issues... (those issues)
I tested in win2k,win9x ...
maybe nvidia has something to do with those reports... spreading lies ... like that PDF !
arghhhhhhhhhhh !!! buuuuuuuuuuu !!!

 

[PotNoodle]

?If you want PowerVR to stay around you better hope that the price of a Kyro II won't dip below $100. 3dfx sold a bunch of voodoo 3 for cheap, and ran out of cash real quick. I still don't see any major OEM PC makers buying the Kyro II, that could be a concern down the road since Sega isn't buying any chip from PowerVR anymore. ?

Fundamental difference between 3dfx and PowerVR is that 3dfx had the overhead of a board vendor business, PowerVR don?t. In fact PowerVR are further abstracted from the potential pitfalls because they are an IP house; they only design the 3D core, and license it out ? in the case of KYRO ST are responsible for translating the design into functional silicon block, producing the chips, and signing up vendors; PowerVR receive royalties on the chips sold.

3dfx made several mistakes in their board vendor operation; not least being caught out by memory prices. During V3?s lifetime they bought the RAM it a relatively high price, and it subsequently dropped significantly, to the point the new CEO admitted that they were actually loosing money on some of their V3 OEM deals!! PowerVR/ST do not have these type of worries since they are only selling a chip ? it the board vendors that have to concern themselves with memory pricing worries.

Not only that, but V3 was a considerably more expensive chip than KYROII ? it is roughly the same complexity, but based on a .25um process, which means its quite large and the silicon wafer costs are high; KYROII is only .18um hence the actual chip prices will be significantly lower than V3.

PowerVR have several other irons in the fire as well, not least being PowerVR MBX. The MBX is a low power device that has been licensed to ARM ? for those that don?t know who ARM are they make CPU?s for many well known Mobile phone / PDA manufacturers. MBX has been designed for use in G3 Mobile/PDA devices, and with ARM onboard they could well see it happen soon. 3dfx were desperate to break into this market before they went under, and NVIDIA have said they want to as well; PowerVR already have the leg up.

 

[powervr2]

well well well !!!
it looks that kyro 2 is going to kill geforce 2 mx (it is way bettter in performance, it will be lower in price)

CHANCE-I announces its BLOOD KYRO-2 featuring ST's KYRO II. The BLOOD KYRO-2 will be available with 32 Mbytes.

Club3D Technology Inc (Grand Hyatt Hotel Taipei, Suite number : 1430 & 1431) announces its Club3D KYRO I CLK-1064TV featuring ST's KYRO with 64MB and TV-out. Also, its Club3D KYRO II CLK-2032TV and CLK-2064TV featuring ST's KYRO II with 32MB and 64MB with TV-out and TV-Out/DVI respectively.

Ennyah Technologies Corp (Hall 1, booth number C833) announces its Michelan KYRO 3D Pro K4000 featuring ST's KYRO and its Michelan 3D Pro 4500 featuring ST's KYRO II. The Michelan 3D Pro 4000 and the 3D Pro 4500 will both be offered in 32Mbyte and 64 Mbyte options, with each memory configuration available with TV output as an option.

InnoVISION Multimedia Ltd (Hall 1, booth number B1277 and 1227) announces its Inno3D KYROII 4500 featuring ST's KYRO II. The Inno3D KYRO II 4500 will be available in 32 Mbyte and 64 Mbyte options, each available with TV Out as an option.

Joytech (Hall 2, booth number E081 and E082) announces its APOLLO KYRO 2 featuring ST's KYRO II. The APOLLO KYRO 2 will be available with 64 Mbytes with either TV Output or DVI Output.

Kifer announces its Royal Kings KYRO-1 STG4000 KO4000S64-T0 with TV-out and KO4000S64-00 without TV-out featuring ST's KYRO I. Also Royal Kings KYRO-2 STG4500 KO4500S64-T0 with TV-out and KO4500S64-00 without TV-out.

Lung Hwa (Hall 1, booth number D401) announces its 3D Best 4000 featuring ST's KYRO and its 3D Best 4500 featuring ST's KYRO II. The 3D Best 4000 and 4500 will be available in 64 Mbytes with optional TV output function.

MPLUSTECH announces its MPLUSTECH KYRO featuring ST's KYRO and its MPLUSTECH KYRO II featuring ST's KYRO II. The MPLUSTECH KYRO will be available with 32 Mbytes and the MPLUSTECH KYRO II will be available with 64 Mbytes.

OJU CTN (Hall C, booth C1253) announces its CV-024AKYRO II featuring ST's KYRO II. The CV-024AKYRO II will be available with 64 Mbytes with either TV Output or DVI Output.

SUMA (Hall C, booth 1257) announces its SUMA KYRO and SUMA KYRO II featuring ST's KYRO and KYRO II. The SUMA KYRO will be available with 32 Mbytes and TV Output and the SUMA KYRO II will be available with 64 Mbytes and TV Output and Video Input.


excelent !!!
low prices with these board-makers for sure !!!

 

[TechieJ]

ADxS: Where do you see GeforceMX cards going for $48? The only Geforce cards going for that cheap are the GeforceMX 200 cards which perform at the level of TNT2 cards. I don't know about you but paying $48 for TNT2 performance isn't my idea of a good investment.

 

[ADxS]

It is the MX200s that are going for $48, but if you think that is buying into TNT2 performance, you've obviously never run a TNT2.

Seriously - the MX400s are faster and more expensive, but they can be found now for $77. Which is 40% less than the cheapest OEM Kyro2.

 

[Eug]

The OEM Kyro 2 cards are 64 MB cards. I wonder when the 32 MB cards will be avail. in North America.

 

[Mingon]

<< I tihnk that nvidia is even slowing down the progress of games. >>



OK powervr2, now that the Nforce preview are starting to appear do you understand my point of view yet ? Do you still think that nvdia are the 'bad guys' ?

If this board is as good as it looks I cant see a need for the value sector in the market place, and somehow the kyro II wont be on many peoples minds as an upgrade, it will be a radeon 2 or a geforce 3.

 

[PotNoodle]

&quot;If this board is as good as it looks I cant see a need for the value sector in the market place, and somehow the kyro II wont be on many peoples minds as an upgrade, it will be a radeon 2 or a geforce 3.&quot;

You appear to be suggesting that everyone will run out an change their motherboards to nForce's for the sake of MX leel 3D performance...!

 

[Mingon]

No what I am trying to say is that if this board takes off, which looking at its plus points eg. data prefetch, 4.2gb/s audio etc I cant see the need to have a value based card. Lets face it instead of spending money upgrading the video card, you can get that and a new sound card, better performance and just 1 driver and best of all upto 20% extra performance (nvdia's figures). Do you not think this chipset could take away the need for the value sector of the graphics card market ? I would buy one tommorrow if I could.

 

[PotNoodle]

&quot;Do you not think this chipset could take away the need for the value sector of the graphics card market&quot;

Do you think the value segment of Videocards is going to stagnate?

 

[Mingon]

I think the value market is not the most profitable for manufacturers, the oem market is the best money maker and with this chipset AMD has a market winner with all of its features and 1 chipset driver need

 

[PotNoodle]

The point of the question is, that by the time that nForce has gained any type of the user popularity it is highly likely that the performance of the value segment has moved significantly on from that of the GeForce2 MX in nForce, meaning that value cards six months down the line are still going to be a significant upgrade to the users.

As has been shown, KYROII is fighting ground not with MX, but with GTS's quite often - why wasn't a GTS part of the Crush chipset? Becuase its too complex, and large - for this reason its highly likely that integrated chipsets will always remain a step behind in terms of graphical prowess because of the number of components that need to be integrated onto a single (or two) chip(s).

 

[Rand]

<<

why wasn't a GTS part of the Crush chipset? Becuase its too complex, and large - for this reason its highly likely that integrated chipsets will always remain a step behind in terms of graphical prowess because of the number of components that need to be integrated onto a single (or two) chip(s). >>



The GTS was hardly too &quot;large&quot; or &quot;complex&quot; for the Crush chipset, afterall, if you recall they are effectively the same core, just with slightly different memory interfaces and clockspeeds. You could just as easily say the Crush has an integrated GF2 Ultra as MX because they are pretty much the same core at different clockspeeds. The main differentiation between them being the available memory bandwidth.

 

[Mingon]

The Nforce has an intergrated mx400/gts core and has 4.2gb of bandwidth, this should put it between the mx and GTS which is where the kyro II seems to sit, plus the branch prediction is supposed to add some performance and I cant see why it wont be around the Kyro II performance. Would you buy a Kyro II if you had the Nforce motherboard ? I dont think you will find many people would consider this.

 

[PotNoodle]

Rand,

?The GTS was hardly too &quot;large&quot; or &quot;complex&quot; for the Crush chipset, afterall, if you recall they are effectively the same core, just with slightly different memory interfaces and clockspeeds. You could just as easily say the Crush has an integrated GF2 Ultra as MX because they are pretty much the same core at different clockspeeds. The main differentiation between them being the available memory bandwidth.?

Ummmm ? yeah, eaxcatly the same; if you want to overlook the fact that GTS has double the number of pixel pipelines. Twice the pixels pipes don?t come for free you know?

Transistor usage, and hence eventual chipset size will always be an issue as far as motherboards are concerned ? if this wasn?t already an issue with Crush why isn?t the north and south bridge on the same die?

Of course, given the available bandwidth it would be fairly futile putting a GTS performance core on their because (read later) it would drag it down to below MX400 performance anyway ? heh, ironic that PowerVR architectures have an incredibly strong case being integrated themselves!

Mingon,

? The Nforce has an intergrated mx400/gts core and has 4.2gb of bandwidth, this should put it between the mx and GTS which is where the kyro II seems to sit, plus the branch prediction is supposed to add some performance and I cant see why it wont be around the Kyro II performance.

Remember, the MX on the core is effectively in a UMA situation, and so that bandwidth isn?t all for itself. Heres what Digit-Life said about the 3D performance:


http://www.digit-life.com/articles/nvidianforce/index.html

As for the integrated graphics core, here we may expect both lower and higher performance than that of the GeForce2 MX. Highs: a wide memory bus (when all other devices and the processor load the available bandwidth incompletely), a wide internal bus &quot;processor - integrated graphics core&quot; with a bandwidth equivalent to that of AGP 8x. Lows: the total memory and the lower clock speed (a maximum of 133 MHz instead of 166 or 200), low quality 2D graphics.

NVIDIA has given the results of the nForce in the Quake3 (1024X68X32) in the presentation. The nForce's performance with 64bit memory access is nearly the same as that of GeForce2 MX200 based cards, and with the 128bit memory access the nForce performs nearly 25% faster than the GeForce2 MX200.

So, were are only looking at 25% faster than an MX 200, not 400. However, the point I was making earlier is that by the time these are out in quantity in the marketplace, KYRO?s (as well as lots of others) successor will only just be around the corner.

 

[TechieJ]

ADxS: Well, I've owned most of the latest video accelerators since Trident 512k video cards were considered advanced. One of them was a TNT2 Ultra and at that time it was state of the art. However, I don't see why you are trying to defend the GeforceMX 200 as a good investment for even $48.. I also don't see GeforceMX 400 video cards for $77.. If the GeforceMX400 was really $77, I would have at least considered it as an option when I purchased the Radeon LE for one of my workstations last week.

 

[ADxS]

Oh, I wasn't &quot;defending&quot; MX200s as a &quot;good investment&quot;. They're not. I was just pointing out their current price.

(Is any graphics card a good investment?)

This was about how low Kyro2 prices could go, and I was just pointing out that the older Kyro can now be found for ~$65 - and that other 32MB cards like the MX are cheaper still.

Is there really a +$50 difference in bill of materials between Kyro1 and Kyro2 based cards?

 

[PotNoodle]

?Is there really a +$50 difference in bill of materials between Kyro1 and Kyro2 based cards??

Something to consider here: KYROII: .18um ? GF2 MX: .18um ? KYRO: .25um.

KYROII is actually less complex than MX, and both being based on the same process (from the same manufacturer ? TSMC) the wafer costs of KYROII are likely to be lower than that of MX; also with only 25% more transistors than KYRO1 but about a 40% wafer saving (from .25um to .18um) it wouldn?t surprise me if KYROII is actually cheaper to produce, and hence for the vendors to purchase, than KYRO is (dependant on yields of course). It could be that there is much further for KYROII to drop.

One of the main reasons Hercules cited that they went with KYROII was that the margins were just plain better than MX. The price you are seeing at the moment is probably the price of its performance relative to its competition, not the price with ultra thin margins for the board vendors (as it is with MX).

 

[BFG10K]

I tihnk that nvidia is even slowing down the progress of games.

And I think you're trolling again.

Who provided the first mainstream T&amp;L board?
Who was one of the first to provide a unified driver model?
Who was the first to provide a mainstream programmable T&amp;L engine that is DirectX 8 compliant?

nVidia, that's who. Not PowerVR.