AGEIA PhysX is the first dedicated Physics Engine that hits the market in 2006. Ageia has a good selling point, aiming at enthusiast users who want to add extra realism to their gaming experience. Looking at the blurb, Ageia PhysX looks and feels like a great idea, however, we have to see if the final product fulfills the promise.

Asus and BFG are two manufacturers that sell PhysX enabled cards on the market. Both manufacturers use the same design, with different cooling systems (both fan based).

Passing to the installation part, no problems here. Just remember to grab the latest driver pack from the Ageia website. The supported game list is, for now, kind of small, with only GRAW supporting Ageia PhysX out-of-the-box. Asus bundles it in their retail package. CellFactor is another impressive technology demo that fully showcases Ageia PhysX card abilities and opens a window for the retail version, coming early in 2007.

In both mentioned games, the PhysX card adds extra physics and gaming experience for its users. While you can see the difference, the issue is that if you can almost feel it. There's more debris flying out after an explosion and more fire and liquid effects. However we think that in 3D person shooter games, where the action is super fast, such things may not be noticed during the thick of the action. Certainly, it will offer more eye pleasant effects and add to the realism. GRAW has very minor visual differences, while CellFactor cannot be played without a PhysX card (at least at a respectable frame rate).

Both Asus and BFG sell their PhysX cards at the price range of US$240~270, which doesn't make them cheap. What you get with the retail package (the card, GRAW retail version, and 3 CDs with Demos) is not worth the price, especially since it doesn't accelerate or boost your current graphics card setup. You can just as easily add a second card to your system (either SLI or Crossfire) will boost frame rates in 3D person shooters or enable higher AA/AF rendering modes.

As so many others have already stated, Ageia needs a "killer" game that will boost and unleash all the abilities of PhysX chipset. After all, games are driving the hardware industry, not the other way around.

Overall, we advise users to keep their money and wait until Physics technology matures. Don't forget that already, ATI and Nvidia claim that their GPUs can do physics as well, and that there is no need for an extra PPU card in your system. If that claim is true, only time will tell. We hope that Ageia will continue developing innovative products which will bring more realism to our gaming world.