Graphics specialist S3 Graphics has just announced the introduction of its Chrome 430 GT graphics card in the US market. Currently available only in the US, the new graphics offering from S3 comes with PCI-Express 2.0 connectivity and full support for Microsoft's DirectX 10.1 technology.

S3's Chrome 430 GT offering is a low-end, low-cost graphics card that is extremely energy-efficient. The integrated ChromotionHD 2.0 engine allows users to decode and playback high-definition content (such as MPEG-4/AVC (H.264), MPEG-2, VC-1, WMV-HD, and AVS video), via the built-in D-SUB and DVI interfaces with HDCP compatibility. However, given the fact that it's a low-end offering, don't expect to fing HDMI or DisplayPort connectors on the graphics card.

The new card is targeted especially at office computers with basic multimedia and word processing capabilities. The low-profile card works great inside small-form factor PCs and the discrete fan allows it to be placed even in the most crowded computer cases.

The Chrome 430 GT comes with a 65-nanometer GPU process technology from Fujitsu, clocked at at 625 MHz. The 256 MB of GDDR2 graphics memory works at a stock core clock speed of 500 MHz.

"S3 Graphics has once again delivered an outstanding product, leveraging our graphics, video, and power savings core competencies," said Dr. Ken Weng, GM for S3 Graphics. "The feature-rich Chrome 430 GT challenges the current discrete graphics landscape, bringing new functionalities previously seen only on high end desktops, bringing new meaning to the terms 'affordable gaming' and 'home entertainment'."

The Chrome 430 GT also comes with built-in PowerWise technology for a power smart design to minimize heat dissipation, thus playing cool and quiet even when working at full load.

The S3 graphics Chrome 430GT is available immediately on the US market and comes with an estimative price tag of $59.