Bigfoot Networks Killer NIC & Killer K1 Network Cards
Introduction & Specs
Published: 21st March 2007 | Source: Killer NIC | Price: |
Mice, Mouse Mats, Keyboards, Sound Cards & Headphones - These are the products that are often targeted by gamers and manufacturers as being the 'areas for improvement' in assisting the average gamer with making the most of their skills. Over the past 2 years we've seen a storm of high-DPI mice, low-friction mouse mats, illuminated keyboards and high-quality sound cards hit the market, all with the gamer in mind. Many gamers swear by these products, and it's no wonder (with gaming being such a large market nowadays) that many companies are 'jumping on the bandwagon' and looking into new ways of further improving the gamers 'game'.
It doesn't seem surprising then, that one company based in Texus, USA has taken it upon themselves to create the worlds first gamers network card. With a vision to decrease ping response and increase their in-game frames per second (fps), the "Killer NIC" promises to help gamers get the edge over the competition.
This concept has had gaming communities split down the middle over its plausability, but we only need to go back to a few years when gamers and PC enthusiasts were opting for the Hardware based dial-up modems over the inferior 'softmodem' variants to see that it's not so far fetched after all. However, as with any review here at Overclock3D, the proof of the pudding is in the testing. So without further ado let's get down to the nitty gritty and see what Bigfoot Networks have to say about themselves and their rather innovative product.
| About Us Harlan "Tytus" Beverly was sick of playing games online and suffering from Lag. He hated losing due to circumstances out of his control. As a network architect, Harlan had the skills and expertise to research where Lag was occurring and began to talk to game developers on ways Lag could be fought. The fruits of his work became the foundation for LLR Technology. While in business school at the University of Texas, Harlan teamed up with Bob Grim and Mike Cubbage to found Bigfoot Networks. Together they wrote an award winning business plan that won prizes in the Fortune Magazine New Venture contest, the University of Texas MOOT CORP Competition, San Diego State’s Venture Challenge, and the Carnegie Mellon competition. The prize money combined with Angel investment allowed Harlan to further refine the technology and for Bigfoot Networks to build its first prototype, which was critical in securing a $4MM investment from Venio Capital Partners in late 2005. Financially secure, Bigfoot Networks has now launched full throttle on its mission to fight Lag and provide gamers with technology that can dramatically improve the performance of their gaming systems. Stay tuned for more details on its upcoming product launch (this summer), and other ways that Bigfoot Networks is going to make gaming more fun. The Killer NIC The award winning Killer NIC Network Interface Card gives you the best gaming experience money can buy. Not only does it give you lower pings and a smoother online gaming experience, it also looks stellar inside your rig and gives you the ability to run applications on its Network Processing Unit (NPU) rather than on your CPU. The Advantage The Killer NIC delivers you a faster online gaming experience by ensuring that your data gets to the game as quickly and efficiently as possible. This means you will get more stable and lower latencies and more frames per second in your favorite online games which results in a smoother game play experience while you are in the heat of online battle. |
Specifications
The following information has been taken directly from the Killer NIC website.
| Powered by Lag and Latency Reduction (LLR™ ) Technology Killer NIC is powered by Lag and Latency Reduction Technology, which fully optimizes the way networking works in your computer: tweaking it out specifically for Online Games. Learn more about LLR here. The Killer NIC’s 400Mhz (333mhz for the K1) Network Processing Unit (NPU) that allows the Killer to completely bypass the Windows Network stack through hardware acceleration by implementing it’s own interrupt driven networking model. Bypassing the Windows Network stack reduces your latency (Ping), and shortens every game frame loop: boosting your FPS. The Killer NIC’s NPU is specifically designed with online gaming in mind, and handles gaming network traffic much more quickly and efficiently than standard networking products, including packet prioritization. All this gives you a faster and smoother online gaming experience. The best part of LRR is that it is entirely plug’n’play, and requires no software changes, patches, upgrades or customizations by game developers. This means that you can just plug the Killer NIC in, and get the benefits right away with your favorite online game. In addition, the Killer NIC comes with the Flexible Network Architecture (FNA™) Applications built in which lets you run applications called FNApps inside the Killer NIC. With FNApps, you are just a click away from being able to run BitTorrent clients and firewalls on your Killer instead of burdening your CPU with them. Killer NIC Technical Specifications • Data Rates: 10/100/1000 Ethernet Fast Ethernet Controller • 400Mhz Network Processing Unit • Integrated Memory: 64MB DDR PC2100 • IEEE Compliance: 802.3, 802.3u, 802.3x, 802.3z • Data Path Width: 32-bit PCI • Data Transfer Mode: Bus-master DMA Killer K1 Technical Specifications • Data Rates: 10/100/1000 Ethernet Fast Ethernet Controller • 333Mhz Network Processing Unit • Integrated Memory: 64MB DDR PC2100 • IEEE Compliance: 802.3, 802.3u, 802.3x, 802.3z • Data Path Width: 32-bit PCI • Data Transfer Mode: Bus-master DMA |
It has to be said that the Killer NIC and Killer K1 have some very impressive specs for network cards. Complete with 333mhz and 400mhz processors coupled with 64mb of PC2100 memory and a USB 2.0 port, you'd be forgiven for thinking we were talking about a slightly dated Dell PC here!
One of the key features of the Killer NIC is its 'NPU'. Possibly not an acronym that many of us will be familiar with, but I'm afraid I won't be giving out any prizes to the first person who guesses it stands for Network Processing Unit. The job of the NPU is to offload the networking tasks traditionaly performed by the CPU and memory to the Killer NIC's onboard processor. This helps free up system resources so that applications and games that can make better use of it. In addition to this, the NPU can also be used to run 'FNApps' - a collection of applications designed to run on the Killer NIC's Linux based operating system.
To further improve the performance of the card, Killer NIC have written advanced drivers that bypass the Windows networking stack and instead make use of the highly optimised, Linux based networking code on the card. The diagram above gives a simplified overview of how this system works.
Most Recent Comments
Yeah, a bit expensive as it's about the same price over here $175-200. I guess I really fail to see where NIC's incur that much cost, same with the Killer? So you can buy single port NIC's for $5, but that extra port justifies a price jump of $175? WTH? And I would assume that the Killer's CPU is probably powerful enough to handle the second port without problems. This would be a good time for Killer to come answer some more questions :p
The intel's expensive because it's a new product and it's going to have demand. The Killer.... because Bigfoot have an overblown self efficacy? ;)Yeah, a bit expensive as it's about the same price over here $175-200. I guess I really fail to see where NIC's incur that much cost, same with the Killer? So you can buy single port NIC's for $5, but that extra port justifies a price jump of $175? WTH?
its the technology of it. Most $5 NIC's are cheap, where as server NICs like intel or boardcom have the TCP offload engine, or teaming.
w00t Phnom, I just found a used OEM expi9402pt on eBay for $65 and picked it up :D Bidding on 2 more cable modems now too, w00tage!
Now your talking. But your board SHOULD have one gigabit ethernet port right? Just get another gigabit card and use that extra PCI slot.Thus the reason Intel decided to EOL it's PCI-based card and upgraded it to a PCI-X platform, but there is STILL a market for a PCI dual port NIC which needs to be filled. Hence myself needing one, there's a market for it as I'm sure I'm not the only one needing a dual port NIC which uses PCI. Now a PCI-E dual port NIC would be about the greatest thing since sliced bread, use up some of these seemingly useless slots on my mobo.
w00t Phnom, I just found a used OEM expi9402pt on eBay for $65 and picked it up :D Bidding on 2 more cable modems now too, w00tage!
Great news Fraggles .. i take it they are Moto Surfboards/Techie friendly
Next week on OCN: Frag opens up a hosting company and the RIAA Move in next door
I read the reveiw and I must say, im not impressed.
Nice review, good read but the "NPU" is pants... :(
Nice review, good read but the "NPU" is pants... :(
w00t Phnom, I just found a used OEM expi9402pt on eBay for $65 and picked it up :D Bidding on 2 more cable modems now too, w00tage!
Good stuff! :D.
Nice review.
One thing ...
A piece of hardware such as this will not have much effect on your online gaming ping times by itself. It can't.
Ping times/lag are a function of the network you are on as a whole. And you only have control over very little of it.
Once it has left your network it is out of your hands.
You want low "online" gaming ping times?
Here's what you have to do.
1) Get the fastest NIC you can afford, Gigabit etc. Fiber optics is good. Then get a second one and install the both of them.
In Windows you can "bridge" the two of them and in effect double you connection speed. But ONLY on you local network.
In Linux/Unix you can use "bonding" to accomplish the same thing. Mac users? Don't have a clue, so good luck.
2) Get a network switch that matches you new NICs.
3) Make sure that the cables that you connect your computer to your network are "top of the line". Gold connectors, etc.
4) Pay an arm and a leg for as fast an internet connection as you can. Anything as fast as YOUR network hardware is good.
Faster then it is, is better.
5) Hope that you are really getting the bandwidth you are paying for. Remember that most bandwidth is measured in bits, not bytes. Providers have been known to stretch the truth when they tell you what speeds you are getting/paying for.
And last but not least, if you beleave in such things ...
Pray that the server has at least as good networking/bandwidth as you. That there are not to many hops between you and the server. That the weather is good everywhere between you and the server. And that about another 100 things that you have no control over, go your way.
On a local network, such as a LAN Party, it can help. A bit. Anything that reduces the amount of work on you system can help. Like an FPU, or a GPU reduces the load on your CPU. Like a faster FSB or more memory. Multi-processors or multi-core processors. Can and will help just as much.
Sorry people.
But there is one thing that hardware like this does, ok there are two.
The first is it looks soooooooo cool. Second and most importantly, is the physic value. At your local LAN Party, IF your buddies think that this new NIC CAN or WILL give you an advantage over them, it has. Not it WILL give you an advantage, it HAS.
So show it off. Brag about what the maker says about it. Then go and frag their sorry butts. They deserve it. And so do you.
George
One thing ...
A piece of hardware such as this will not have much effect on your online gaming ping times by itself. It can't.
Ping times/lag are a function of the network you are on as a whole. And you only have control over very little of it.
Once it has left your network it is out of your hands.
You want low "online" gaming ping times?
Here's what you have to do.
1) Get the fastest NIC you can afford, Gigabit etc. Fiber optics is good. Then get a second one and install the both of them.
In Windows you can "bridge" the two of them and in effect double you connection speed. But ONLY on you local network.
In Linux/Unix you can use "bonding" to accomplish the same thing. Mac users? Don't have a clue, so good luck.
2) Get a network switch that matches you new NICs.
3) Make sure that the cables that you connect your computer to your network are "top of the line". Gold connectors, etc.
4) Pay an arm and a leg for as fast an internet connection as you can. Anything as fast as YOUR network hardware is good.
Faster then it is, is better.
5) Hope that you are really getting the bandwidth you are paying for. Remember that most bandwidth is measured in bits, not bytes. Providers have been known to stretch the truth when they tell you what speeds you are getting/paying for.
And last but not least, if you beleave in such things ...
Pray that the server has at least as good networking/bandwidth as you. That there are not to many hops between you and the server. That the weather is good everywhere between you and the server. And that about another 100 things that you have no control over, go your way.
On a local network, such as a LAN Party, it can help. A bit. Anything that reduces the amount of work on you system can help. Like an FPU, or a GPU reduces the load on your CPU. Like a faster FSB or more memory. Multi-processors or multi-core processors. Can and will help just as much.
Sorry people.
But there is one thing that hardware like this does, ok there are two.
The first is it looks soooooooo cool. Second and most importantly, is the physic value. At your local LAN Party, IF your buddies think that this new NIC CAN or WILL give you an advantage over them, it has. Not it WILL give you an advantage, it HAS.
So show it off. Brag about what the maker says about it. Then go and frag their sorry butts. They deserve it. And so do you.
George
CSS Valid
Onboard gigabit's kinda filled the gap in the pci market. It usually bypasses the pci bus and goes straight into the chipset avoiding the bottle neck.