BFG Asylum 5900 Review - PAGE 3

Uncharted waters- The Mysterious 250$ Price Point

200$ is considered to be the price point for the mainstream market and 300$ is when we start hitting the higher end. The 5900 manages to squeeze between the two and plop down at the 250$ mark. I remember like it was yesterday when I forked over 250$ at E3 for a top of the line GeForce2 32 Meg card. Snapping back to reality and present day, 250$ is no longer considered the high price point for a videocard seeing as how the flagship offerings from both ATi and NVidia are at a whopping 499$ MSRP.

Luckily though, street prices are as low as 199$ (after rebates) for the 5900, which will turn a few heads. Considering the fact that the cheaper (and generally slower) 5700s are still near the 200$ mark even at street price level, the 5900 is an absolute steal in the under 250$ range and will be going head to head against the 9700 Pro, which coincidentally is around the 250$ mark at the street level also. Add in Call of Duty as a bonus and we have a very compelling product. We were told by BFG that the MSRP for the 5900 with Call of Duty is 299$. However, during this last week most large retailers were still selling the BFG Asylum 5900 for 250$.

The pricing strategy is a bit strange as the 5900 could conceivably cannibalize the sales of the 5700 Ultra. Fortunately for us consumers, the 5900 provides a good inbetween solution for those that are not hardcore enough to drop 4 or 5 bills onto a vid card but yearn for more performance that is availiable in the more mainstream market segment.