What it doesn't have...
I'm sure most of you have heard the saying "you get what you pay for". We will be taking a look at nVidia's top of the line card, the
Ti (Titanium) 4600 in a few weeks. But with a retail sticker nearing $400 on the Ti 4600, you have to wonder what's missing out of
the 440 MX to make it so cheap.
The answer...? Programmable pixel and vertex shaders. What are they? They make up what nVidia calls the "infiniteFX engine", but are actually two
seperate categories, each containing a list of recognizable effects you would expect to see in the latest games. Vertex shaders allow programmers to
work in morphing, fog, and lens effects into their games, all processed by the chipset. Pixel shaders allow for Dot3 and environmental bump mapping
as well as procedural textures and per-pixel reflections. In the end, this all translates into more realistic and visually stunning games.
There is some confusion in the graphics card community over the MX branding, and it's growing. nVidia's entire GeForce3 line included programmable pixel
and vertex shaders, and many people are mistakingly assuming that because of this, they are present in the entire GeForce4 line as well. While the top end
GeForce4 Titanium series include the shaders, they're absent in the MX series of cards. Because of this, some aruge that the GeForce4 MX products aren't
really GeForce4's at all, but nVidia contends that it wouldn't be fair to call them anything less because of their outstanding performance.
CyberLink PowerDVD XP
One of the definate pluses of eVGA's 440 MX package is a copy of CyberLink PowerDVD XP. The PowerDVD software has been a leader in software DVD
decoding for the PC and the latest version, XP, is no exception. Using this software in combination with your DVD drive and the TV-out capability on the
card turns your PC into a DVD movie player, ready for use on your big screen TV. It has a simple, easy to use interface that comes with a few skins so you
can choose a custom look.
