VisionTek Introduce GPU/NIC Hybrid, But Should Gamers Be Interested?

VisionTek and Bigfoot have co-developed a PCI Express x16 expansion board featuring both a GPU and NIC (Network Interface Card).

It’s being billed as the ‘worlds first online gaming upgrade card’.

The single slot card combines a Radeon HD 5770 with Bigfoot’s Killer E2100 network controller and its commented on being the only PCIe device that joins high quality graphics with low latency networking.

If your wondering, the Killer E2100 is sold as a standalone NIC for around £100. It is said to reduce latency and boot general gaming performace over a standard onboard network controller, only problem is reviews tend to show the improvement as tiny at best especially when broadband speeds are on the increase.

Full specifications include:

• Powered by Radeon™ HD5770
• Powered by Bigfoot Killer™ E2100
• 1GB GDDR5 memory
• 400MHz NPU
• Compliant with DirectX® 11 and earlier revisions
• Supports OpenGL 3.1
• ATI Avivo™ HD video and display technology1
• Dynamic power management with ATI PowerPlay™ technology7
• PCI Express® 2.0 support
• Speed: 10/100/1000 Mbps

Supported Operating Systems

• Windows 7 (32 & 64-bit), Windows Vista (32 & 64-bit), Windows XP (32-bit only)

System Requirements

• PCI Express® based PC is required with one X16 lane graphics slot available on the motherboard
• 450 Watt or greater power supply with one 75W 6-pin PCI Express® power connectors recommended (600 Watt and two 6-pin connectors for ATI CrossFireX™ technology in dual mode)
• Certified power supplies are recommended. Refer to http://ati.amd.com/certifiedPSU for a list of Certified products
• Broadband internet connection (wired)
• Minimum 1GB of system memory
• Installation software requires CD-ROM drive
• DVD playback requires DVD drive
• Blu-ray™ playback requires Blu-ray drive

What’s in the Box:

• Killer™ HD 5770 combo card
• Setup CD
• Adapter(s) may be included for additional output configurations