Related Articles

NVIDIA launched a few new notable products today; let's look at them briefly. Unfortunately -- for whatever reason -- review samples have been much more limited than usual for a NVIDIA product launch, and a number of hardware sites were not offered a review sample of this new card, including ourselves. However, NVIDIA did brief us on the product briefly yesterday, so we can relate to you the general summation of these new products' features. 

NVIDIA introduced the GTS 250 512MB, the GTS 250 1GB, the GTX 260M, the GTS 160M, and the GTX 280M to the world today.

Say what you want about this whole 'worldwide recession' thing, but it sure has been great for the price of computer hardware. The first card well talk about today, the GTS 250, will be selling for less than $150 USD.

The GTS 250 512MB is in, many respects, in the same mold as the prior 9800 GTX+. However, the most important and notable change is that the price is lowered. NVIDIA has put the price tag at $129 for this product.

While some hardware followers have been abnormally annoyed that the GTS 250 is a refresh of the 9800 GTX+, this move may not be as abhorrently nefarious as some have suggested. 

Here's NVIDIA's side of the "refresh" coin: they needed to update there line-up, and rearrange their nomenclature, bringing more mainstream parts into the 200 series of cards. Using a revision of a G92-based card makes a lot sense from an economic standpoint. The G92 is a workhorse of a GPU that is still capable of keeping up with anything else on the market. What NVIDIA is guilty of here is simply trying to sell a fast video card under $150 -- and really, some folks burning them over hot coals for doing this seems a little overdone. 

Though, to be fair, this hardware reviewer would cede that NVIDIA's recent nomenclature has been a touch hard to decipher for those that don't follow hardware religiously. Going from the 9000 series to the 200 series (without much of a 100 series) sort of sent some heads spinning -- trying to keep track of +'s and different memory configurations might have been a bit of a trick for many gamers. With this refresh, NVIDIA's current lineup is more logical: GTS 250, GTX 260, GTX 280. Let's hope the naming scheme accrues some stability. Now, let's move on... 

The GTS 250 1GB is in the same mold as the 9800GTX+, sharing the same GPU, but has more significant changes. The card is shorter (by an inch and a half), has a different cooler than earlier 9800GTX+ cards, and most importantly, requires about 10 watts less power than the 9800GTX+. This allows the GTS 250 to require only PCIE power connector, instead of two.

Another small thing NVIDIA changed with the GTS 250 is that it will allow for an SLI connection with a a 9800 GTX+, so, this might make for a good upgrade path for gamers who own a 9800GTX+ already, or can acquire one inexpensively (hint,hint.) Previously, only cards of the same SKU could be SLI'd.

Additionally, the GTS 250 supports the current selection of NVIDIA technologies including CUDA, and support for 3D Vision glasses.

The GTS 250 512MB / 1GB should be in stores any moment now.

On the next page, we'll take a real brief look at some of NVIDIA's new notebook parts, and what ATI is doing to counter NVIDIA's last GTS 250 maneuver.