Written: 7/28/99
Written by: Moto
Racer®
Price: $99.99 US ($149.99 Canadian)
Ship Date: Available Now
SNiper 2 Provided by:
AMK Services
A TNT2 for $100? Can this be for real? Well, yes and no. While the Power Color SNiper 2 is a TNT2 card, it doesn't use the same TNT2 chip used by other TNT2 cards, like the Viper V770. The Power Color SNiper 2 uses a TNT2 chip known as the TNT2 M64. This is a lower level chip the NVIDIA created to kinda fill the gap between the normal TNT and TNT2.
The TNT2 M64 chip uses a 128 bit internal data bus like the normal TNT2. However its memory bus is only 64 bit, hence the name M64. The M64 chip runs at just 100Mhz. This is only 10Mhz more than a standard TNT chip and up to 75Mhz slower than the TNT2 Ultra chip used in the Hercules Dynamite TNT2. Luckily the M64 chip is VERY overclockable.
To sell a 32 meg video card for just $100, corners had to be cut. And you can tell that when you first look at the box the SNiper comes in. This box is used to hold the SNiper 2 TNT2 card as well as the SNiper 2 TNT2 M64. The only way to tell which card you have is by looking for a sticker telling what chipset the card is using. I guess this saves on printing cost. No need for 2 different boxes for each card.
The ram used in the SNiper are 7ns units that runs at just 110Mhz. Memory quality is where Power Color cut corners the most. Let's face it, there is just no way you can bring a 32 meg video card to market using the highest quality ram. Add in a 64 bit memory bus and you got a really slow memory sub system.
Both APG 2X and 4X are support and you can expect rendering quality to be the same as a TNT2, which is to say excellent.
Software wise, there isn't any, unless you consider a WinDVD software player a cool program. Other than the DVD player, all you get is the drivers and manual. The card I tested came with 32 megs of ram and no TV-out, which is just fine with me.
One can't help but wonder if any 32 meg video card that sells for just $100 is any good? Well, let's find out.