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eVGA GeForce 7300 GS |
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A Big Step Up... for Some |
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by Josh Walrath |
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Other Gameplay Impressions Since this is not an enthusiast level product, I thought I would explore a few other programs that this card might run into. The Sims 2 is one of the top selling games of all time, and more than likely a user with this card might just find themselves playing it. Gameplay up to 1600 x 1200 was smooth and enjoyable. Not a lot of fast action occurs during this game, but sometimes things would get a bit choppy at that resolution when zooming out and moving around. Otherwise all high quality settings could be enabled along with AA at high resolutions. Chronicles of Narnia is a popular game for the youngsters, and it does feature some very nicely rendered graphics. It is not necessarily a twitch game, and rarely did I find myself wanting for a smoother experience. Again, higher resolutions and AA/AF can be enabled with this game and card. Counter Strike: Source was very playable at 1024 x 768 with 2X AA/8X AF enabled, but for those wanting a bit more responsiveness should play at 800 x 600 with no AA and 8X AF. Still, everything is rendered as it should and the gameplay was quite enjoyable. Age of Empires 3 is also tearing up the sales charts, and it also features some really nice HDR and SM 3.0 rendering. I found with this card that 800 x 600 gave the smoothest gameplay. 1024 x 768 was a bit choppy once I started to pan around the maps, but it was still playable. The graphics, water, and lighting effects are all very nice for this game, and the 7300 GS can handle it really well. Final Thoughts I cannot stress enough that this card should not be considered an enthusiast’s card. It is not really even in the same league as a budget enthusiast card like the GeForce 6600 DDR-2. This card is for people looking to spend the bare minimum to get a graphics card that can play most of today’s games at a decent level of quality, yet still greatly outperform integrated graphics parts.
This is a scale picture of the X1300 (left) and the 7300 GS (right). Note that the dies are about the same size (the 7300 GS is actually about 20% smaller than the X1300), but the packaging of the X1300 is huge compared to the 7300 GS. This is mainly due to the 128 bit memory controller and its associated data/power/ground pins vs. the 64 bit on the 7300 GS. Compatibility is excellent with this card with all applications that I have tested. In real world testing the 7300 GS is about 3 to 4 times faster than the Intel DX9 integrated part. That is a huge jump considering that the card in questions costs around $85. Going from integrated to this is night and day, and most everyone can justify spending less than $100 for such an improvement. eVGA has created a very solid card with excellent construction. It also runs very cool and the fan is whisper quiet. The bundle is also decent for the price, and the packaging should protect the card quite well. The design decisions with this card should insure that it will last for the lifetime of the computer (good quality fan, polymer capacitors, etc.). Even if the fan were to fail, I doubt the G72 chip will heat up so much to crash the machine, even when overclocked. NVIDIA has produced a really nifty little chip that should provide plenty of performance at decent quality levels, yet still be amazingly low in price. eVGA has also helped to produce a nice little card that should find its way into many a system which demands higher performance than what integrated graphics can provide. The 7300 GS does appear to be marginally faster in most applications than the X1300, but the difference between performance and price is fairly insignificant between the two. It comes down to personal preference in the end, as both cards provide about the same experience. Overall I can highly recommend the 7300 GS for those looking to purchase a budget card to handle video and gaming functions above that of integrated graphics. This is not the card to buy if a user hopes to play at high resolutions with AA enabled, or play games such as F.E.A.R. which requires higher end GPU’s. The level of performance and competence that can be had for $85 is actually quite impressive, and NVIDIA and eVGA together have produced a nice little product.
Overall Score: 90%
Pros Inexpensive Good performance Wide application compatibility Video acceleration using PureVideo Excellent 2D and 3D quality Full GeForce 7 featureset A big jump over integrated Excellent WinXP 64 support Small and cool running card
Cons WinXP 64 transparency AA not working AA performance and quality not as good as X1300 FP16 HDR not particularly useful on this card
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