21. Conclusion

The GeForce4 Go does take the performance crown in the majority of our testing, but the Mobility Radeon 7500 (and Mobility FireGL 7800) wasn't far behind. When the GeForce4 Go is coupled with our test system, this makes quite a combination. Of course, the addition of the GeForce4 Go in the 64 MB configuration adds an additional $99 to the cost. Still, when you are looking at system of this caliber, it is understood that, to have the best features, you can expect to pay a little more.

Our Dell test system is what we have come to expect in the Latitude 8xx/Inspiron 8xxx product line. Very few changes in the product design gives Dell the ability to deliver a product that is worthy of consideration for purchase. Cross platform peripheral compatibility across the product line is an advantage for IT shops that have already standardized on Dell notebooks. This value should not be overlooked, as it can help your company continue to save money by recycling old peripherals for use with newer systems.

We expect the pricing for our test system to start at a very reasonable $2700, but then escalate to about $3300 for our tested configuration. This price is still acceptable, though, when compared to other systems in the same class. Again, this would only be a guess based on information on Dell's web site.

The GeForce4 Go does deliver on its performance promise and does deserve purchase consideration, but the lack of notebook vendors that are using the GeForce4 Go will cause consumers to continue to pay a higher price for it. However, depending on your applications, you might be just as happy with the purchase of the Radeon Mobility 7500 equipped notebook.

As we can see from the results of our PowerMizer in-depth testing, there is no doubt that PowerMizer reduces the power requirements of the notebook, but again, we question how much real-world benefit users will see. The maximum battery life setting uses 25% less power, but again, we question how much real-world benefit the end user will see. 25% does sound like a lot, but it appears that it will take time for other system components to catch up with NVIDIA's lead and reduce overall battery consumption. New advancements in the science of battery chemistry are also part of the puzzle in getting longer battery life, and of course this cannot be overlooked. At least for right now it would appear to us that ATI continues to have a lead over NVIDIA in power management performance. We will continue to take the OEMs to task for not making use of the full power management support provided by ATI and NVIDIA; more can be done to increase battery life.

For the time being, each of the new mobile GPUs has areas where they have gained ground. Selecting a clear winner would be difficult, as there seems to be a good balance between each of the cards, but performance of the GeForce4 Go would appear to have a bit of an edge over the Mobility Radeon 7500 at the moment. The Mobility Radeon 7500, on the other hand, does show better performance in a few areas where the GeForce4 Go is lacking. The bottom line is that, depending on what you are using your notebook for, the decision is almost a draw.

Until such a time that we are able to test optimized versions of both mobile video solutions on the same platform, in the same machine, the jury is still out. We would welcome an opportunity to do this, but currently it looks like the odds are against it happening anytime soon.