[Macmac508]

Does anyone use one of them? I always see an advert linked to them on this page but never really heard much about them.

Do they make a big difference with lag in gaming etc.
Do they require any specific specs apart from a free PCI spot?

[Carbon]

No, they're useless - there's a reason that "KILLERNIC" is a satirical meme around PC gamers. There have been tons of reviews showing that at most you get a drop of one to two ping.

[alex]

Glad you asked before contemplating a purchase Mac.

Carbon is absolutely spot on. Don't waste your money.

Infact I'm unsure which would get the most-useless prize: This or a Physx card.

[Macmac508]

I wasn't seriously contemplating it to be honest was just curious. Thought it was probably a lot of hype about nothing.

Everyone is trying to build up the idea of separate processing units for different jobs (PPUs NPUs). Theres no fooling you guys on TCF with their marketing tricks

[dmdougie]

I read quite a few reviews on this card. The team ran in-game tests using the NIC and without it. When entering highly populated areas on games like WoW and LOTR there was a noticeable difference in performance. When using the NIC fps was consistent and at a reasonable lvl, without the card the player experienced fps between 10 and 20. The card also boasts it is able to undertake other operations like downloading/streaming etc without any affect on game performance. Again they tested this with and without the card and while downloading a 5 minute movie from BitTorrent there was interference when not using the card. According to the reviews and tests that I have seen online, this card is worth it to those who game a lot.

[Carbon]

link your reviews.

[dmdougie]

<Link hidden. Register for free to see this link!> review details the tests they did. <Link hidden. Register for free to see this link!>review is slightly more in depth. The second review states that were the card is effective in a lower-end machine, there is little difference noticed in a high-end gaming machine. Most advanced NIC to date, a good idea that will no doubt be improved upon in the coming years.

[Carbon]

CustomPC doesn't know what they're talking about - for example, they claim that without the NIC "there was obvious slow-down as the Bit Torrent data interfered with our game packets" - either way it is a problem of bandwidth, not some sort of arbitrary packet interference.

Integrated networking is fine. Networking does not take much CPU power at all, and even if it did with increased GPU power and offloading of physics etc data to the GPU a separate card. $180 can buy you another 9600GT - that will improve your frame rate much more than a silly networking card would.

[dmdougie]

hey, just forwarding what I heard no need to get so defensive over it!!!