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Sparkle GTS250 Graphics Card Review

Date Published:
05-30-2009

Written By:
Tulatin

Edited By:
Diceman

Provided By:
Sparkle Computer

Where to Buy:
Product Page

Discuss Article:
VH Forum link

Pages: 1 2 3

Introduction:

Packed to the gills with performance? We'll find out!

Despite hardly being a massive player on the North American computer circuit, Sparkle has managed to spread their affairs out over 5 continents in some 80 countries in their last 27 years of existence. Traditionally speaking, I'd paraphrase to you all the contents of the "About us" or "Company History" pages, in the case of Sparkle it seems a little contradictory to the company's goal. So, rather than boasting over their fleeting victories, and sponsoring lavish events, I'd like to regale you all with a bit of my experience with Sparkle. Between their product page and the correspondence with Sparkle representatives, I've gained the impression that these are people who care about their product. They'd rather try to send one of their own along to explain a customer through their purchase, rather than shaving a few dollars off the sale. I suppose then, it's this feeling of care that put me at ease when working on this Sparkle product, since I knew that if anything went wrong, I'd have some very talented support staff there to back me up. The only important question now is - does the product match the service? We'll find out.

Features & Specifications:

Ah yes, this page. The proverbial tease before the show. It's always good to know what a product has to offer though, right? I must forewarn you, it's a bit of a long run to the end, so if you need to procure a drink, or dispense of an existing one, you might want to do it now.

NVIDIA® unified architecture
Fully unified shader core dynamically allocates processing power to geometry, vertex, physics, or pixel shading operations, delivering up to 2x the gaming performance of prior generation GPUs

Full Microsoft® DirectX® 10 support
DirectX 10 GPU with full Shader Model 4.0 support delivers unparalleled levels of graphics realism and film-quality effects

NVIDIA PhysX™ technology 1
GeForce GPU support for NVIDIA PhysX technology enabling a totally new class of physical gaming interaction for a more dynamic and realistic experience with GeForce

NVIDIA CUDA™ technology 2
CUDA technology unlocks the power of the GPU’s processor cores to accelerate the most demanding system tasks-such as video transcoding-delivering incredible performance improvements over traditional CPUs

3-way NVIDIA® SLI™ technology3
Industry leading 3-way NVIDIA SLI technology offers amazing performance scaling by implementing AFR(Alternate Frame Rendering), under Windows Vista with solid ,state-of-the-art drivers.

PCI Express 2.0 support
Designed for the new PCI Express 2.0 bus architecture offering the highest data transfer speeds for the most bandwidth-hungry games and 3D applications,while maintaining backwards compatibility with existing PCI Express motherboards for the broadest support.

GigaThread™ Technology
Massively multi-threaded architecture supports thousands of independent, simultaneous threads, providing extreme processing efficiency in advanced, next generation shader programs

NVIDIA® Lumenex™ Engine
Delivers stunning image quality and floating point accuracy at ultra-fast frame rates:
16x Anti-aliasing Technology: Lightning fast, high-quality anti-aliasing at up to 16x sample rates obliterates jagged edges
128-bit floating point High Dynamic-Range(HDR) Lighting:Twice the precision of prior generations for incredibly realistic lighting
effects-now with support for anti-aliasing

NVIDIA® Quantum Effects™ Technology
Advanced shader processors architected for physics computation enable a new level of physics effects to be simulated and rendered on the GPU –all white freeing the CPU to run game engine and AI

NVIDIA® ForceWare® Unified Driver Architecture (UDA)
Delivers a proven record of compatibility reliability and stability with the widest range of games and applications
ForceWare provides the best out-of-box experience for every user and delivers continuous performance and feature updates over the life of NVIDIA GeForce® GPUs

OpenGL® 2.1 optimizations and support
Ensures top-notch compatibility and performance for OpenGL applications

Dual 400MHz RAMDACs
Blazing-fast RAMDACs support dual QXGA displays with ultra-high, ergonomic refresh rates –up to 2048x1536@85Hz.

Dual-Link DVI Support
Able to drive industry’s largest and highest resolution flat-panel displays up to 2560x1600 and with support for High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection(HDCP).

HDMI Ready
HDCP compliant. Supports standard, enhance and high –definition digital video signals, plus multi-channel digital audio on a single cable.

SPDIF Input
Digitally transferring audio signal from motherboards to graphics card.

NVIDIA PureVideo HD technology5
The combination of high-definition video decode acceleration and post-processing that delivers unprecedented picture clarity, smooth video, accurate color, and precise image scaling for movies and video.

Discrete, Programmable Video Processor
NVIDIA PureVideo is a discrete programmable processing core in NVIDIA GPUs that provides superb picture quality and
ultra-smooth movies with 100% offload of H.264 video decoding from the CPU and significantly reduced power consumption.

Hardware Decode Acceleration
Provides ultra-smooth playback of H.264, VC-1, WMV and PEG-2 HD and SD movies.

Dual Stream Decode Acceleration
Hardware acceleration for HD picture-in-picture enables a complete HD movie playback experience.

Dynamic contract Enhancement
Provides post-processing and optimization of High Definition movies on a scene basis for spectacular picture clarity

Dual-link HDCP Capable6
Designed to meet the output protection management (HDCP) and security specifications of the Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD formats,
allowing the playback of encrypted movie content on PCs when connected to HDCP-compliant displays.

Advanced Spatial-Temporal De-Interlacing
Sharpens HD and standard definition interlaced content on progressive displays, delivering a crisp, clear picture that rivals
high-end home-theater systems.

High-Quality Scaling
Enlarges lower resolution movies and videos to HDTV resolutions, up to 1080i, while maintaining a clear, clean image. Also
provides downscaling of videos, including high-definition, while preserving image detail.

Inverse Telecine (3:2 & 2:2 Pulldown Correction)
Recovers original film images from films-converted-to-video (DVDs, 1080i HD content), providing more accurate movie playback
and superior picture quality.

Bad Edit Correction
When videos are edited after they have been converted from 24 to 25 or 30 frames, the edits can disrupt the normal 3:2 or 2:2
pulldown cadence. PureVideo uses advanced processing techniques to detect poor edits, recover the original content, and display perfect picture detail frame after frame for smooth, natural looking video.

Noise Reduction :
Improves movie image quality by removing unwanted artifacts.

Edge Enhancement:
Sharpens movie images by providing higher contrast around lines and object

1 - NVIDIA PhysX drivers are required to experience in-game GPU PhysX acceleration. Refer to www.nvidia.com/PhysX for more information
2 – Requires application support for CUDA technology
3 - NVIDIA SLI certified versions of GeForce PCI Express GPUs only. A GeForce GTS250 must be paired with another GeForce GTS250, regardless of graphics card manufacturer.
4–Feature requires supported video software. Features may vary by product.
5 - Requires other HDCP-compatible components.

And now, on to the specs!

Model number :	SXS250512D3-NM
Graphics Processing :	NVIDIA GeForce GTS250
Stream Processors :	128
Core Clock :	738MHz
Memory Clock :	2200MHz
Memory Type :	512MB GDDR3
Memory Interface :	256Bit
Shader Clock :	1836MHz
Bus Type :	PCI-Express 2.0
RAMDAC :	400 MHz
* The specifications of the above product are for reference only. Please refer to the actual product for the actual specifications. SPARKLE COMPUTER CO., LTD shall retain the right to amend.

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