San Jose's Casino M8trix card room opened for its first full day of operations Wednesday. Some facts about M8trix and San Jose card rooms.

  • Casino M8trix off Airport Parkway is the $50 million reinvention of the Garden City Casino card room, which started as a downtown pool hall that was bought by brothers Nick, Chris and Louis Dalis and moved to the corner of Market and Post streets in 1946 and relocated to Saratoga Avenue in 1976. Current owners Eric Swallow and Peter and Jeanine Lunardi purchased Garden City out of bankruptcy in 2007.
  • Casino M8trix has an expanded gaming floor area of 55,000 square feet, compared to 12,000 square feet at Garden City. Features include an eight-story, 165-foot tower where the owners hope to secure permission to have additional gaming on the top floor with a view as well as karaoke and other entertainment. The main M8trix gaming floor includes a light sculpture that can produce 16.7 million color combinations, a custom aroma called "Bamboo" and programmable LED light fixtures. The card room also features a sports bar, Zone 8.
  • The number eight central to M8trix' branding is considered lucky in Asian cultures.
  • San Jose allows only two card rooms. The other is Bay 101 Casino, which opened in 1994 on Bering Drive across Highway 101 from Casino M8trix and has specialized in hosting poker tournaments. Each card room is allowed up to 49 gaming tables. A Bay 101-sponsored November ballot 

    measure would allow them to increase the number of tables to 79 each.