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Ghostbusters is the First Film to Be Released on a USB Stick

Paul Lilly — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 12:21:15 -0500

If nothing else, give PNY points for creativity. In an attempt to differentiate its USB keys from other companies, the memory maker will attempt to sell a 2GB USB flash drive with the movie Ghostbusters pre-installed.

"As a market leader in the USB market, PNY's focus is to offer consumers added value by providing enjoyable blockbuster content on their USB," said Stefanie Summerfield, UK and Nordic sales and marketing director for PNY Technologies.

It remains to be seen exactly how many people will be interested in receiving a free 20-year-old movie with their USB key, but if it proves popular enough, it's conceivable that the partnership between PNY and Sony could lead to more flicks on more flash drives. That's assuming consumers won't be put off by the DRM scheme. According to a PNY spokesperson, customers will be able to download Ghostbusters to their laptop or PC, but they'll have to have the USB key plugged in if they want to watch the movie.

Is PNY on to something here, or are pre-loaded movies ultimately just a marketing gimmick? Hit the jump and post your toughts.

Image Credit: PNY

PNY XLR8 GeForce 9800 GTX

Michael Brown — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:44:20 -0500

If you’re already gaming with a G92-based 8800 GTS, there’s very little reason to move up to a G92-based 9800 GTX such as PNY’s XLR8. The architecture in both GPUs is nearly the same, with 128 stream processors, a 256-bit interface, and 512MB of GDDR3. Slightly faster clock speeds yield only a modest bump in performance.

The most important difference between these two architectures is the fact that you can build a rig with three 9800 GTX cards, thanks to the presence of three SLI edge connectors on the top of the board (the 8800 GTS has only one, so it’s limited to two-way SLI). The new card also consumes more power and requires two six-pin connections to your PC’s power supply (the 8800 GTS requires only one).

The 9800 GTX also supports Nvidia’s HybridPower technology, which will be of interest only to consumers who own a motherboard that also supports HybridPower (currently, that means a motherboard outfitted with an nForce 730a chipset). When running less graphics-intensive applications (surfing the web, using productivity software, or watching a movie, for example), HybridPower will shut down the videocard in the PCI Express slot and rely instead on the integrated graphics built into the motherboard.

PNY bumped the 9800 GTX’s clock speeds just a wee bit beyond Nvidia’s reference design: The core runs at 725MHz (from a stock 675MHz), the shaders at 1.813GHz (from a stock 1.688GHz), and the memory at 1.160GHz (from a stock 1.1GHz). These tweaks mark the extent of PNY’s customization, as the card features a reference-design cooler. All 9800 GTX cards are equipped with two six-pin power connectors and two SLI edge connectors; the 8800 GTS has one of each.

In our benchmark tests, PNY’s implementation of the 9800 GTX proved to be roughly 10 to 15 percent faster than a stock 8800 GTS—a performance delta that we don’t think justifies a price premium that ranged from $50 to $75 at press time. Adding a second 9800 GTX to run in SLI mode resulted in a 34-percent boost in Crysis performance (at 1920x1200 resolution with 2x AA and all other values set to high), but even with SLI, the game remains just barely tolerable at those settings. And that’s unfortunate, because we imagine most people won’t see how exquisite this game can look because there just isn’t any hardware available today that’s capable of delivering it.

So what if you’re moving up from an older GPU architecture? AMD still doesn’t have anything worthwhile for the hardcore gamer, and frankly, we’d still stick with the cheaper G92-based 8800 GTS. Aside from making three-way SLI a possibility and supporting HybridPower, the 9800 GTX has no significant new features worth the extra dough

PNY XLR8 GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB

Michael Brown — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 18:17:36 -0500

Rumors were swirling at press time that Nvidia was poised to introduce an even lower-cost version of its powerful 8800 GPU, but the least-expensive 8800s we can review today are like this PNY model, which couples the 96 pixel-shader 8800 GTS with a puny 320MB frame buffer.

A host of manufacturers sells cards based on Nvidia’s reference design, but these cards can differentiate themselves in just a few ways: Price is the most obvious and most attractive (to the consumer, anyway), but there’s also factory overclocking, exotic cooling, warranty coverage, and merchandise bundling.

Factory overclocking is beneficial because the higher clock speeds are covered by the manufacturer’s warranty. On the other hand, Nvidia makes GPU and memory overclocking a snap with its nTune tweaking software. On the other other hand, the card’s manufacturer might not be sympathetic if you fry your card while probing its outer limits. PNY didn’t take any chances: Its entry features the typical stock-clock rates of 513MHz for the core and 792MHz for the GDDR3 memory.

We’ve yet to see any exotic cooling solutions on 320MB 8800 GTS cards, including this one, but several manufacturers do offer lifetime warranties on their cards. The definition of “lifetime” varies, so you should make sure you understand each manufacturer’s definition of this term along with all the other legalese in its warranty. PNY covers this card with a three-year warranty, which it extends an additional two years if you register your card on the company’s website. Depending on how often you upgrade your videocard, three to five years might be a “lifetime.”

PNY offers a better warranty than some manufacturers, but the XLR8’s $300 street price is a trifle high for a stock-clocked 8800 GTS with 320MB of memory. In our book, that’s enough reason to deny this card a Kick Ass award.

PNY Verto GeForce 6800 GS

Michael Brown — Sat, 18 Mar 2006 13:58:25 -0600

The words “budget” and “performance” typically fit together about as well as “Dick Cheney” and “cuddlemuffin.” But thanks to nVidia’s sweet GeForce 6800 GS and a little overclocking work from the engineers at PNY Technologies, budget-minded upgraders can lay their hands on one powerfully cheap videocard.

If you can spring for two of these and run ‘em in SLI—either now or a little ways down the road—you’ll be the proud owner of a rig that can not only hang with boxes powered by the likes of a single GeForce 7800 GTX 512MB or an ATI X1900 XTX, but one that will also outrun them on some benchmarks. Really.

Although the 6800 GS has only 12 pipes, its high clock speeds, 256-bit memory bus, and increased transistor count enable it to deliver better performance than a 16-pipe 6800 GT, which is outfitted with just a 128-bit memory-interface. nVidia accomplished this trick by taking the GeForce 6800’s basic architecture and moving it from a 130nm fabrication process to a 110nm process. In fact, the benchmarks for PNY’s card come within spitting distance of the 6800 Ultra—not bad for a card that’s selling for just $220 at press time.

This card manages to get by with a single-slot cooler, despite its GPU being clocked at 470MHz (compared to 425MHz in nVidia’s reference design) and its 256MB of memory cranked up to 550MHz (compared to the stock 500MHz). The fan is fairly quiet, but we wouldn’t recommend installing it in a home-theater PC if you’re sensitive about noise.

It’s been some time since we’ve been this enthusiastic about a videocard priced under $300. In fact, our only criticism stems from PNY’s decision to include just one DVI output along with a TV-out; the remaining output is a lowly VGA. Aside from that minor shortcoming, this is one of the best videocards in this price range.

Month Reviewed: April 2006

Verdict: 9
kickass=yes

URL: www.pny.com