Introduction

At a time when NVIDIA's competitors are recovering from the GeForce2 GTS hangover, it comes as a shock for them to discover they have yet another reason to drown their sorrows in the shape of the GeForce2 MX chipset, which ingeniously is targeted as a low cost consumer solution. This at first glance may not seem like amounting to a great deal, but don't be fooled by appearances only, as NVIDIA has made a grant entrance into the low cost consumer arena, with a chipset that will blow the socks off many a fine video card along with some of it's competitors. NVIDIA are not only using a derivative of the GeForce2 GTS chipset, but also providing the first ever GPU that is T&L ready. Recent polls quite clearly reflect NVIDIA's dominance in the GPU marketplace with some of the finest graphic solutions currently available.

Before we leap into action it will do no harm to understand why NVIDIA has leapt from a standard chip manufacturer to one of the main suppliers to the market. NVIDIA came to the forefront with it's TNT and TNT2 chipset's offering a low cost solution mainly for entry level systems, although successful it's popularity was soon to be shadowed by the emerging GeForce range and the GeForce2 GTS, of which the later has become a market leader replacing the former. This left a vacuum in the low end consumer market for NVIDIA, but with the release of the GeForce2 MX which ultimately will replace the TNT range, NVIDIA has completed the full circle and achieved dominance of the market place.

How we carried out our tests

Our objective was to test the performance, implementation, stability, and ease of use of the Hercules 3D Prophet II MX 32MB and the ELSA Gladiac GeForce2 MX. To achieve our objective, we used Mad Onion 3DMARK 2000.

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