Well, it's been a long time since Matrox has released a new graphics card chipset - so long, in fact, that 3d users have completely given up on Matrox as a 'big player.' nvidia and ATI have pretty much ruled the 3d graphic card market, leaving Matrox and their frail G400/450/550 (all same chipset) in the dust.
But after 3 years of silence, Matrox strikes back. This time, they don't just go for top dog status, they aim to completely dethrone the known leaders of the graphic card industry.
Just to make a side-note: while nvidia and ATI have lead the 3d graphic card market, they have always suffered poor 2D display quality (when compared to Matrox). As far as 2D display quality is concerned, Matrox has always lead the pack. Now, they not only lead the pack, but they left the pack behind in a cloud of innovative smoke.
This newest graphics chipset from Matrox, called the Parhelia-512, is the first chipset to process at 512-bits. Incredible, if you think about it. Not only that, but it BOASTS a memory bandwidth of 256-bits, enabling TWICE the data transfer rates of the current leading graphics cards, giving it an astounding 20.0 GB/sec. The 3D speed of this card has yet to be benchmarked, but theoretically, it is a monster. It should score some three times as fast (if not more) than the current 3d graphics cards (this is a guess - again - no benchmarks are available yet). The hardware on this thing is amazing. Not just that, but it can utilize three monitors at once - all 3d accelerated too.
Another important feature to note: it renders everything all the way out to the monitor at 10-bits per color channel - as opposed to the traditional 8-bits. Some other noteworthy features of the card are: hardware accelerated anti-aliased text for Win2k and WinXP (no performance loss), hardware displacement mapping (for 3D), 16xFragment Anti-aliasing for 3d rendering (adaptive), TWO 400 MHz 10-bit RAMDAC's with an optional THIRD RAMDAC, plus a lot more.
Check out the impressive specs of this next card by going to the link below:
Matrox Parhelia-512
If this card turns out to be what it is on paper, it will truly be a dream-come-true for all graphic designers, 3d animators, and gamers.
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