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8600 GT/GTS Reviews

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  • 17-04-2007 5:20pm
    #1
    8T8
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,757 ✭✭✭


    Reviews have lifted on various sites for the mid-range DX10 cards from NVIDIA. Really wasn't too far off the mark from the prior rumours that is it basically equivalent to an X1950 Pro in performance & that's the 8600GTS model.

    Under heavy shader processing pressure like in Stalker or Oblivion the 8600GTS pulls away a small bit but for the most part it's tied with the X1950 Pro which is pretty good as it's better than a 7600GT but can't help but feel it should have been a bit more better than that.

    There are suggestions drivers are also suffering from performance problems in that the GPU is not executing as well as it should be which may offer more once they sort it out, take a look at the SLI results and you can see with SLI enabled performance goes in the tank.

    It also gets a new Purevideo v2 which offloads more of the video decoding sequence to the GPU which is useful for those playing HD-DVD or Blu-ray on a PC, existing 8800 cards do not get this feature as it is a hardware upgrade.

    Hardware.fr
    Firingsquad
    HardOCP
    Anandtech
    Beyond3D


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    #2
    Toolbag
    Closed Accounts Posts: 93 ✭✭Toolbag


    As you said, it doesn't look that great - 128 bit memory bus is a mistake. Future drivers might bring it to life though.
    Not worth buying seeing as DX10 hasn't really come around yet. Makes that €90 leap to the 8800 gts 320mb seem all the more worth it.


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    #3
    Dublin_Gunner
    Registered Users Posts: 7,692 ✭✭✭Dublin_Gunner


    Absolute waste of money.

    8600GTS = 70% of the price, for 40% of the performance of an 8800gts.

    I was really hoping for a part with 64 stream processors, 256bit memory interface, and 256 or 512mb GDDR3.

    That would have filled that segment nicely.

    They have however left a mighty big gap to be filled by another product. I assume they have something else up their sleaves.

    Certainly puts AMD/ATI back in the hotseat though. WIth their cards launching soon, we might see them re-claiming the mid range sector that has been the preserve of NVIDIA since the 6600gt


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    #4
    Matt Simis
    Registered Users Posts: 8,718 ✭✭✭Matt Simis


    Dublin_Gunner wrote:
    Absolute waste of money.

    8600GTS = 70% of the price, for 40% of the performance of an 8800gts.


    The 8600GT is excellent for HTPCs however. Far more Video processing done on the card (than anything out there) at just over half the price of an 8800 320MB and you can get them in "Silent" heatsink form! DX10 support is nice but realistically not going to be used much on that class card.


    EDIT: As long as you get a 8600GT that supports HDCP... annoyingly HDCP support is, yet again, not a given.


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    #5
    Dublin_Gunner
    Registered Users Posts: 7,692 ✭✭✭Dublin_Gunner


    Matt Simis wrote:
    The 8600GT is excellent for HTPCs however. Far more Video processing done on the card (than anything out there) at just over half the price of an 8800 320MB and you can get them in "Silent" heatsink form! DX10 support is nice but realistically not going to be used much on that class card.


    EDIT: As long as you get a 8600GT that supports HDCP... annoyingly HDCP support is, yet again, not a given.

    But is is on the overpriced, underperforming GTS model.

    Not worth the money IMO. Its aimed at an almost enthusiast market (being €250~) and in reality anyone to pay that money for that card is either un-informed or just plain stupid.


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    #6
    TerrorFirmer
    Closed Accounts Posts: 29,930 ✭✭✭✭TerrorFirmer


    They're actually really made a balls of this....they need to drop those prices to make it feasible. At the moment, generally speaking, nobody, even reviewers, are keen on these cards.


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    #7
    awhir
    Registered Users Posts: 4,227 ✭✭✭awhir


    they are mena overclock like mad since you can vold mod them.


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    #8
    8T8
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,757 ✭✭✭8T8


    Not too many folks would be doing that kind of mods though.

    The 8600GT looks to be a nice but modest replacement for the 7600GT as they are appearing at the same price. The 8600GTS is just too expensive at the moment it should be in the sub 200 mark like €180 or so and it would be a much better offer.

    If ATI's Radeon HD 2600 line are anyway better then I'd expect to see a 8700 not too far from know.


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    #9
    Hercule
    Registered Users Posts: 980 ✭✭✭Hercule


    Ive seen reviews whereby the card performs similarly to a 6800 ultra - hardly a step in the right direction. tbh the whole nvidia driver scene is a joke at the moment id expect that with the correct drivers the 8600GT will be say as powerful as a 7800GS - still its hardly got the raw power that the 8800GTS has - ill be getting my bang/buck ratio right with that card soon


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    #10
    8T8
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,757 ✭✭✭8T8


    There is an 8800GS and 8800 Ultra waiting in the wings allegedly.

    The 8800GS I could see as driving down the price so the 8600GTS replaces the 7600GT price point and the 8800GS becomes the top of the line mid-range parts almost like X1950 Pro has become but that may take time.

    The Ultra is just a higher clocked 8800GTX meant to rain on ATI's parade though the word is the Radeon HD 2900XT is no faster than a 8800GTX but will be cheaper than it which sounds good to me.

    Edit: typo's


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    #11
    awhir
    Registered Users Posts: 4,227 ✭✭✭awhir


    they say there will be no 8900 serise because nivida have no confidence in ati and there just jumping staright to 9800!!

    just rumors tho?


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    #12
    8T8
    Closed Accounts Posts: 4,757 ✭✭✭8T8


    Nah I don't buy any of that guff at most any G90 in 2008 will be a tweaking of the G80 just like NV40 (GeForce 6) & G70 (GeForce 7) where nothing more than an improvement on the existing architecture to get better yields higher clocks etc in essence more efficiency.

    G80 was a custom design by hand from NVIDIA which is rare in that industry as they usually rely on semi-automated specialist software to design the logic in the GPU so there is no way after to going to all that trouble NVIDIA is going to throw any of that away with a brand new architecture.

    There was talk of a revised G80 from NVIDIA with double precision support which is not useful for games but it is for GP-GPU tasks coming sometime in 2008 I'd imagine NVIDIA's new GP-GPU line will be the benefactor of this refresh.

    ATI's 2xxxx parts will hold their own against GeForce 8 as I suspect ATI were caught off guard by NVIDIA's design (they bluffed everyone by constantly poo pooing unified shader architectures while secretly building one) so ATI didn't think it would perform as well.

    The second problem was that R600 was terribly delayed by almost 6 months so to get it out the door they may have have scaled back the clocks or have to take into account GF8 performance to make it competitive with GeForce 8 and price it possibly cheaper.

    Word is also leaking that the Radeon HD 2600XT suspiciously performs just the same as the 8600GTS, I wonder if they are colluding as AMD isn't in good health at the moment financially last thing it needs is a war with NVIDIA.


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