The new GeForce3 Ti 500 includes all of the standard features of the GeForce3, including its nfiniteFX Engine. The main components of this component are the Programmable Vertex Shaders and Pixel Shaders, which help contribute to both the visual quality of a game scene as well as potentially adding some extra framerates along the way. The Vertex Shader portion allows a more realistic level of vertex melding (such as smoothing the leg/arm joints in a 3D character) while the Pixel Shader processes a greater number of shaded pixels and also supports specialized effects through its programmability.

Memory bandwidth is a common limitation with higher-end GeForce2 boards, and NVIDIA has helped alleviate this concern through the use of the Lightspeed Memory Architecture. This feature is also found on all GeForce3 models and includes the following important features: a Crossbar Memory Controller (four independent memory controllers), Higher Order Surfaces, Lossless Z Compression, and Z-Occlusion Culling (hidden surface removal). These are all technologies intended to make better use of the card's memory, rather than simple relying on higher clock speeds.

The GeForce3 also introduced instituted hardware HRAA (High-Resolution Antialiasing) support directly on the chip itself. In addition to the inherent HRAA processing power of the GeForce3's wider data paths, NVIDIA also hard-coded a new Quincunx AA pattern right into the GeForce3 architecture. This Quincunx AA is somewhere between standard 2X and 4X HRAA image quality, and offers exceptional performance on the GeForce3. Quincunx AA seems to offer an excellent tradeoff between performance and image quality and it will be interesting to see what sort of HRAA framerates we get with the higher-clocked GeForce3 Ti 500.

Since we're here to review the VisionTek Xtasy 6964 card, it's high time we got down to business. This board features the new GeForce3 Ti 500 chip along with a full 64-MB of DDR memory. This board itself is similar to the NVIDIA reference design and features bright blue heatsinks for the memory chips and a matching blue HSF for the GeForce3 Ti 500 chip itself. There are also a few amenities such a S-Video out and Digital Video-Out ports on the back of the card, but other than that, the Xtasy 6964 looks to be a pure gamer's card.

The Xtasy 6964 is clocked at the default 240-core/500-memory speeds that NVIDIA has set out for the GeForce3 Ti 500, though overclocking is always an option with GeForce3 cards. Due to the presence of heatsinks on the memory, it was difficult to ascertain the actual speed ratings, but remember that the 3.8 ns DDR used on the introductory GeForce3 boards, but was underclocked to 460 MHz. Theoretically this speed of memory should be able to hit 526 MHz or higher, so we suspect that VisionTek has stuck to standard NVIDIA specifications.

As far as included documentation or 3D games are concerned, VisionTek seems to be taking the spartan approach. Included in the Xtasy 6964 retail box, you will find a driver CD, a copy of PowerDVD and a small, fold-out install guide. Not including any 3D games is a good choice, if it translates into a lower retail price just as including an inexpensive DVD software CD is a great move for the entertainment crowd. While sometimes it's nice to get a new game in the box, the hardcore crowd looking to move to the GeForce3 Ti 500 will likely already have an ample supply of hot new games.

While the hardcopy documentation is good enough to get the card up and running, it would have been nice to see a bit more detail in the hardcopy docs, especially when we're talking about a high-priced item like the Xtasy 6964. Granted there are softcopy install docs included on the driver CD, but we expect more for such an expensive item. The other potential issue is that these hardcopy install docs are very generalized and have nothing relating to the specific features (such as DVI-I or S-Video) of the Xtasy 6964.

We should also note that the retail packaging and brand name has improved a bit from previous VisionTek products, both in form and function. Gone are the generic card names and they have been replaced by a very serviceable Xtasy brand with a nifty new logo. While this may not make the cards any faster, it may do wonders for the VisionTek presence on the retail shelf, something that we have noticed is increasing a great deal lately.