NVIDIA kicks out low-end GeForce 9400 GT, starting price $59

While it likely won't cause the same clamoring for benchmarks that we see around the release of a new high-end NVIDIA card, those on a budget will no doubt nonetheless be pleased to know that the company's just bolstered it's low-end offerings a bit, with a new card that starts at just $59. That, of course, won't exactly get you a Crysis killer, but the GeForce 9400 GT does at least boast 16 processor cores, a 128-bit memory interface, dual-link DVI, DirectX 10 support and, in its standard configuration, 512MB of graphics memory (from the looks of it, 1GB versions are also available). Unlike something like a GTX 280 SLI config, this one also likely won't make a noticeable impact on your power bill.

[Via Computer Monger, thanks Ivana]

[Zelatio @ Aug 27th 2008 11:32AM]

Is that a circuit board? I haven't seen one of those on an NVidia in a while. The heatsinks normally cover everything...

[Mario @ Aug 27th 2008 12:24PM]

I'm a little worried that the processor seems to have been utilized as a capacitor heater.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capacitor#Aging

[Serial 8-Ball Mouse @ Aug 27th 2008 1:43PM]

That's the plan. With a heater like that, they will hit the curie point on those capacitors.

[Serial 8-Ball Mouse @ Aug 27th 2008 11:35AM]

This is great. My sister would like a PC just for playing Guild Wars and whatever other strange MMOs she gets her hands on off of shady Korean websites (she's 13, cut her some slack). This is definitely going into that build. What a great price.

[OneLove @ Aug 27th 2008 11:45AM]

Does this make sense when you can get a 8600 gt/gts (32 core) for the same price or less?

[Mike @ Aug 27th 2008 12:33PM]

Although I hate OneLove, he does have a point.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130084

I own an 8600GTS, and its performance is quite good. The 8600GT not so much though...

But seriously...the 8600GTS is worth the money for the casual gamer who would like to turn up some of the pretty settings for once :)

[Serial 8-Ball Mouse @ Aug 27th 2008 12:33PM]

So it is in your opinion that Nvidia just released a worse card for more money?

[whowhatme @ Aug 27th 2008 1:23PM]

yes, your 'sister' should be able to run those korean MMO's fine with one of these. ;)

[OneLove @ Aug 27th 2008 3:18PM]

@Mike: Your mum loves me.

[xcrunk @ Aug 27th 2008 11:38AM]

Why bother when you can an ATI 4850 for almost $150 after rebates?

[King Mustard @ Aug 27th 2008 11:42AM]

There is a big difference between $59 and $150 ($150+ not inc. rebates).

[From My Cube @ Aug 27th 2008 11:42AM]

$150-$59 = $91 savings that could be spent on other things....I know this is hard to believe but not everyone plays compter games...

[XenoX101 @ Aug 27th 2008 11:45AM]

Yeah, why would nVidia release a $59 graphics card when a COMPETITOR is selling a similiar card for $150 (Triple the price)?

How silly of them ;).

[Jason @ Aug 27th 2008 11:47AM]

Plus, ATI drivers are sketchy at best.

[1234321 @ Aug 27th 2008 11:49AM]

if you aren't going to game, get an AMD motherboard with built in ATi 3200/3300
no need for low end cards, on budgets older high-end cards beat them dollar for dollar

[OneLove @ Aug 27th 2008 12:05PM]

ATI software is ASS! I had the 4850 and the additional tuner software killed my computer, kept asking me to install extra shite and when i did it killed my OS. Thank god for norton ghost. I have a 9800GT superclocked and couldn't be happier.

[xcrunk @ Aug 27th 2008 12:29PM]

Wow....OK. Sorry I said anything. geeeeeez....sensitive.

I'll cancel that MSI R4850 order and get this card instead.

[JViz @ Aug 27th 2008 2:19PM]

Don't feed the trolls.

[OneLove @ Aug 27th 2008 6:53PM]

@xcrunk: I still love you .

[BananaBoat @ Aug 27th 2008 8:46PM]

ATI's drivers are fine most of the time. Nvidia and ATI are about equal on that front. As for the 4850...comparing it to a 9800GT? Give me a break. The 4850's competition is the 9800GTX+ for 50 bucks more, not the sickly 9800GT. I'll admit that ATI still hasn't fixed the fan issue in the 4800 series though. If Catalyst 8.9 doesn't solve the problem, I'm going to be fairly pissed. That said, I can now play crysis at 1920x1200, so I could care less about a little extra heat in my case.

At 59 bucks, the 9400GT looks to be a great option for someone that just wants a little extra oomph in World of Warcraft, or something similar that is, well, old. Saying that people should get a 200 dollar (MSRP. 180 online. 150 if the shady rebates that almost never go through, happen to go through) card instead of a 59 dollar card is ridiculous. Why don't we all just get Falcon Northwest PC's for 3-4 grand and call it a day.

[1234321 @ Aug 27th 2008 11:44AM]

Why bother when you can an ATI 3850 for almost $80 after rebates?

[avester @ Aug 27th 2008 11:51AM]

Why bother when this is 59$ without any rebates?

[bartoron @ Aug 27th 2008 11:53AM]

Because the 3850 is a very long video card. It would be very hard to fit a 3850 into a small case.

[1234321 @ Aug 27th 2008 12:08PM]

never was for me
but if it is for you, Why bother when you can an ATI 3650 for almost $40 after rebates ($56 before rebates) ?
and yes it's a faster card

[xValentine @ Aug 27th 2008 9:54PM]

Why bother posting when you can just close this tab and not make yourself look like an idiot ?

oh I forgot the rebates.

[comineeyeaha @ Aug 27th 2008 11:45AM]

At 60 bones I can hardly justify NOT throwing it in my computer. It's used mostly for internet and watching DVD's, so this seems like the perfect card to upgrade from my old ass hand-me-down

[avester @ Aug 27th 2008 11:51AM]

It won't make your internets or movies faster, mate.

[XenoX101 @ Aug 27th 2008 11:56AM]

Yes it will, everything display related uses the videocard, from those cute little flash animation ads you see on various websites to those DivX compressed movie files featuring glamorous girls being especially friendly to eachother. It's a multimedia world and with the amount of imagery, music, video, spreadsheets, documents and entertainment going around it is unavoidable that you will need a videocard like this one for standard use of a computer without slow-downs or graphical issues.

[aquatsr @ Aug 27th 2008 1:29PM]

There is no possible way a graphics board increases the speed at which you access and transfer information through the Internet. Read before you type?

[Danny F. @ Aug 27th 2008 1:41PM]

This is definitely good to replace the hand me downs, I plan to build some new office pcs for the work place and will definitely look towards using these cards instead of relying on integrated graphics.

[avester @ Aug 27th 2008 2:28PM]

And XenoX101, none of those things use GPU acceleration, so how on earth can they be faster?

Movies might use HW acceleration, but if you got a CPU made in the past four years, 1080p will do just fine.

[phanbouy @ Aug 27th 2008 3:18PM]

"but if you got a CPU made in the past four years, 1080p will do just fine."

tell that to my Core Duo 1.87 in my first gen MBP.

p.s. GPUs are adding decoding support; it's more than just games ya need em for.

[sixtyfps @ Aug 27th 2008 11:51AM]

I've been rocking a 7900GS GO on my XPS for about a year, and am tired of the crapTASTIC driver support (for people even stupider than I am, it's actually a laptop card); I've only just recently been able to fix a persistent stuttering problem in games (nForce 163.75).

Even though I've enjoyed the reduced power consumption of my laptop card... no more limping to laptopvideo2go.com for me, thanks!

[Muhammed @ Aug 27th 2008 11:53AM]

I dont like crysis.

[Jason @ Aug 27th 2008 12:01PM]

Yeah, and +1 to Don for preempting the stupid "Will it run...?" comments.

[Macdelaney @ Aug 27th 2008 11:56AM]

How does this measure against a 8600 for example?

@Muhammed: I dont like Crysis either

[futurepastnow @ Aug 27th 2008 2:31PM]

Slower. This will fall somewhere between the 8500GT and the 8600GT in speed.

[michas_pi @ Aug 27th 2008 11:58AM]

Bawwww, it looks like you can't SLI these.

That kinda sicks.

[Jason @ Aug 27th 2008 12:02PM]

Yeah, sicks me so bad I wanna Bawwww.

[phanbouy @ Aug 27th 2008 3:19PM]

SLI? on a low end card? GTFO

[WiiFTW @ Aug 27th 2008 3:50PM]

I don't understand why people are so infatuated with SLI and Crossfire. Even if these supported SLI, you'd still be paying $120 for 2 graphics cards which would end up worse than the most any recent card you could pick up for the same or less (for example the 3850). Not everything supports SLI and Crossfire so you're better off just picking up a single graphics card.

[Serial 8-Ball Mouse @ Aug 27th 2008 4:08PM]

Newegg claims you can SLI this piece of shit.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814500027

So why not the newer cards?

[crsh @ Aug 27th 2008 12:12PM]

Given the recent unlocking of PhyX on Nvidia driversm, could you use one of these as a cheap physics card to go along a more powerful GPU (anything 8800/9800 and up)?

[Schnapple @ Aug 27th 2008 12:32PM]

I would like to know this as well.

[Schnapple @ Aug 27th 2008 12:33PM]

And by that I mean it's probably possible but would it be worth a damn? Like, would it even be $59 worth of a damn?

[TravisO @ Aug 27th 2008 5:32PM]

You could also tie a golf cart to your porsche to use it as an extra trunk, but that doesn't make it a good idea.

Ok my analogy isn' perfect, but it's still half correct. I question this card's ability and lackluster speed ram as a good idea for Physx but I guess we don't know for sure until somebody benchmarks it.

[broli @ Aug 27th 2008 12:15PM]

Engadget forgot to mention that this is a rebranded overclocked 8500GT. Even higher clocked 8500GT's can be gotten for the same price, so what's all the fuss about?

[cheater912 @ Aug 27th 2008 12:20PM]

Is it at least better than my 7800GT?

[HAZE @ Aug 27th 2008 12:29PM]

Crap, I just bought an XFX 8500GT a few weeks ago.

[O2 @ Aug 27th 2008 12:54PM]

Cool, time to upgrade from my 6800. New equal fast.