Reactor 3D Graphics Video Board
Review by Al Giovetti, 11/17/96
Price: $149
Genre: 3D 4MB graphics card
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Publisher: Intergraph
Order by Phone: 1-800-692-8069
Phone: 1-800-226-4891
Website: http://www.intergraph.com/ics/reactor/differen.htm,
http://www.ingr.com/order/express.htm
Requirements: PC with PCI Interface

Company line: Reactor 3D -- technology-driven to deliver a whole new interactive 3D experience on your home or business personal computer. See the difference! Don't play it -- Live it! Transform your PC into an awesome adventure arcade. Get a Rendition Ready™ Intergraph Reactor and plunge into 3D games with more realistic motion, more colors, more textures, and more speed than you’ve ever imagined on a PC. Test your nerve and your reflexes in a world-famous auto race. Challenge your favorite sports star in a tough, realistic contest. Battle savage dinosaurs, armored knights, and alien spaceships.

The newest 3D games take full advantage of Reactor’s architecture, which includes a programmable RISC processor that demands 50 percent fewer CPU cycles and consumes 80 percent less PCI bandwidth. Intergraph’s Reactor introduces real-time 3D action to the home PC -- plus no-compromise performance for videos, Web browsers, Windows applications, and DOS games.

Check out the exciting games bundled with your Reactor 3D card: IndyCar II™ (full version), Quake™; (shareware), and Microsoft's Hellbender™; and Monster Truck Madness™. With a Reactor 3D graphics accelerator on your PC. The reactor board makes software look better than other 3D boards changing the way you look at games.

3D games users see high detailed visuals with real-time interactivity and heightened realism. The price of the board is not expensive at one and one half bills.

Reactor also provides the following features:

Perspective Correction : Ensures that textures mapped to a polygon move in tandem with the polygon when the viewing angle changes.
Bilinear and trilinear filtering: Enables smooth, realistic surface textures.
Gouraud shading: Provides exceptionally photorealistic shading effects.
MIP mapping: Eliminates "blockiness" of images when viewed from different distances.
Antialiasing: Removes "jaggies" or stairstep patterns from polygon edges.
Sub-pixel and sub-texel positional accuracy: Enables smooth, natural display of moving objects.
Alpha blending: Enables visually convincing display of transparent or semi-transparent surfaces.

REACTOR Won the "Stellar" Award from Windows Sources, December '96, "Editors Choice" from PC Magazine, December '96, and a "5 Stars" Rating from Computer Gaming World, December '96. REACTOR is delivered with four free rendition ready games: Indy Car II (full version), Quake (CDROM shareware version), and trial versions of Microsoft's Monster Truck Madness and Hellbender.

The downside to reactor is that it is not a mainstream video board and support is spotty. Another problem with this not in the mainstream board is that it will be replaced within less than a year with another board and will be forgotten quickly. The company is not large and does not report large sales numbers when compared to Diamond and others in this field. The board has the best performance, but where it comes to support and compatibility, other boards surpass it. (Acually Reactor was replaced by January of 1997 and Intergraph was acquired by another company. - Ed.)

References:
http://www.intergraph.com/ics/reactor/differen.htm
Order over the Web: http://www.ingr.com/order/express.htm