BigFoot Killer NIC Reviewed

The gang over at PC Perspective have taken a look at Bigfoot Networks new Killer NIC ethernet card to see if it is worth the hefty $250 price of admission. Although the Killer NIC showcased some impression performance gains on an Intel 975X platform, the performance gains seen on an old nForce2 platform were the largest and easily most surprising. Now the real question is, would your $250 upgrade for an AthlonXP platform be best spent on the CPU, memory, GPU, or on a Killer NIC ethernet card?

It is obvious that the Killer NIC is not for everyone, but the potential for the card is actually quite compelling. And unlike some other recent additions to the gaming add-in card market, you can get some real-world benefits with this card right out of the box. World of Warcraft and other MMO games will see a drop in latency and a possible frame rate increase, not to mention an overall "faster" feel to the game. Before getting a card in to test, I was a Killer NIC non-believer; I am still not completely convinced, but I'm definitely on the edge now.

Our assessment of the product is also posted here, for comparison.