Top 10 Graphics Boards

Our Best Buy ATI Pro Turbo PC2TV is the only board on the chart to top $200. But when you consider that you get 8MB of SGRAM, it's a bargain--especially for graphics professionals. When it comes to graphically intense multimedia and 3D programs, the extra power on this board will give you a boost. And if you're running desktop publishing or image editing programs at very high resolutions, this is the board for you. To top it all off, the 3D Pro Turbo can hook up to your TV.

The 3D Pro Turbo gets our highest multimedia score thanks to blazingly fast performance in our PowerPoint tests--especially at resolutions above 800 by 600. It didn't have the highest quality or fastest overall 3D performance that we've seen, but it held its own in our tests. The board's performance in business programs (represented by our PC WorldBench test) was strong, but no better than less-expensive boards on the chart. And if you play video clips a lot, be warned: ATI's 3D Pro Turbo slogged through our AVI video clip at a choppy 10.5 frames per second.

In addition to high-quality utilities to change graphics settings, the 3D Pro Turbo comes with some nice software: Macromedia's Extreme 3D for professional-level 3D modeling and animation, MGI's 3Dvision for adding 3D objects to business documents and presentations, and MGI's PhotoSuite for photo editing. Overall, ATI's 3D Pro Turbo PC2TV is a powerful bundle that's fairly priced at $219.

SUMMARY

ATI 3D Pro Turbo PC2TV PRO: Outstanding overall multimedia performance, good 3D. CON: Mediocre AVI playback, no toll-free support. 8MB of SGRAM; 200-MHz RAMDAC; ATI Rage II chip; bundled 3D modeling, image editing, and VRML software ATI 905/882-2600 www.atitech.com