NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4400/4600 Roundup - April 2002

Taking a look back at the past several NVIDIA product launches we haven't been overly positive about any of their flagship GPUs for quite some time. We hounded NVIDIA for bringing an overclocked GeForce2 Ultra to the market in order to meet their self-imposed 6-month product cycles. And while we praised the GeForce3 on a technological level we never recommended buying it as enjoyable DX8 games were clearly months (that turned into years) away from its release. NVIDIA's Titanium nomenclature was first introduced with the GeForce2/3 Ti series and even then we only found it prudent to recommend the GeForce3 Ti 200.

This all changed with the release of NVIDIA's GeForce4 GPU as the Ti 4400 and Ti 4600 models impressed us beyond belief. The performance these two GPUs offered not only in today's games but in other highly anticipated titles was beyond respectable. For the first time we had a graphics solution that could run almost any currently available game at 1600 x 1200 at very smooth frame rates. NVIDIA's new flagship also turned out to be the highest performing solution for Unreal Tournament 2003 and all other forthcoming games based on the latest Unreal Engine. To say the least, we were very impressed with the GeForce4 Ti 4400 and Ti 4600.

Then came the Ti 4200, a GeForce4 for the masses. While Ti 4200 cards are still a couple of weeks away from being in the hands of most retailers, the rest of the GeForce4 line are available in healthy quantities. Although NVIDIA's goal is to ship as many GeForce4 MX cards as possible, to those that know better, it's the real GeForce4 that we're after.

Because of a relative lack of interest in the GeForce4 MX, the existence of the GeForce4 Ti 4200 and as a semi-protest against NVIDIA's misleading nomenclature you won't find a GeForce4 MX roundup on AnandTech. Instead, we've gathered our IR thermometers and rounded up 11 cards based on the GeForce4 Ti 4400 and GeForce4 Ti 4600 GPUs. If you want the fastest 3D accelerator available today, we'll tell you which one fits the bill.