Nvidia GeForce 8800 reviews up online now

[Konovalov]

Toms Hardware and Anandtech have detailed reviews online now of the most powerful graphics cards currently available.

http://tomshardware.co.uk/2006/11/08/geforce_8800_uk/

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2870&p=1

The 8800GTX doesn't seem to be such a power hog after all. In fact the new cards appear to be more efficient that the previous generation and certainly are so in terms of performance per watt.

Being a loyal PC fan and one who can't stand consols I particularly liked this quote from the Anandtech review:

Back when Sony announced the specifications of the PlayStation 3, everyone asked if it meant the end of PC gaming. After all Cell looked very strong and NVIDIA's RSX GPU had tremendous power. We asked NVIDIA how long it would take until we saw a GPU faster than the RSX. Their answer: by the time the PS3 ships. So congratulations to NVIDIA for making the PS3 obsolete before it ever shipped, as G80 is truly a beast.

My big concern however is over the size, specifically the length of the 8800GTX card compared to the old 7900GTX. THG claims that the top end card is 11" long! Will this fit in PC cases without having to change or limit your setup inside the case in terms of hard drive bays and such? :hmm: Specifically I'm concerned with this issue regarding the Antec P180B case which I plan to base my new Christmas or early 2007 rig on.

[SUBMAN1]

This part is nuts:

Armed with four PCIe power connectors, the 1kW unit handled the incredible load placed on it by two 8800 GTX cards without a problem. Total system power consumption when running our benchmarks, at times, peaked at over 520W with the SLI setup.

Just to let you know, I had a friend come over a couple days ago and the first thing he said when he went into my computer room is - "It gets warm in here doesn't it?". Yes it does! I can only imagine what this card does since my system is not drawing 520 Watts peak yet. I estimate I'm around 450 Watts. A normal system outfitted with an Athlon 64 and 2 hard drives + a 9800 Pro will consume less than 150 Watts at peak power as an example.

-S

[SUBMAN1]

By the way, I probably only draw 300 Watts total power!!!

Imagine a 520 Watt space heater - this computer will make that much heat in your room!!!

-S

[TteFAboB]

Price?

[Konovalov]

Originally Posted by TteFAboB

Price?

Here in the UK you are talking more than the kids school lunch money.

These guys have them on pre-order: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/8800_Series.html

Sub GBP £500.00 for the standard 8800GTX and if you like extreme crazy then the watercooled near silent version will set you back over GBP £600.00

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Konovalov

Here in the UK you are talking more than the kids school lunch money.

These guys have them on pre-order: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/8800_Series.html

Sub GBP £500.00 for the standard 8800GTX and if you like extreme crazy then the watercooled near silent version will set you back over GBP £600.00

Funny how a water cooled version is already available since this thing generates so much heat - there is no other way to silence it!

[TteFAboB]

Thanks...I guess...

[tycho102]

That's 500 watts of electrical power, not thermal power. But you can figure 50-60% of that ends up as waste heat. That 1kW power supply puts out 72A continuous on the 12v rail, making it run at 50-60% capacity (which is generally a switching supply's most efficient level). It might sound stupid (1kw), but it's actually a pretty decent purchase.

I'm waiting for the day when you can buy seperate 12v and 3.3/5v transformers. Computers need 500w on the 12v, but not anything more than 200w on the 3.3/5.

As for the 8800's, size was the first thing that occured to me when I saw the pictures. The Coolermaster "Stacker" series is a decent case, but you might have to go with a file-server case.

[porphy]

This one seems to be a monster Still, interesting to see the benchmarks at Anands where they turned of AA. Then the difference in perfomance is not that big (but still a good deal). Who needs AA when you run your game in 2560x1600 resolution? At least on my 19" 1600x1200 looks good without AA, which many top of the line cards do easy today.
Did they say something about noise? I'm very impressed with my Gainward 7900gtx, it is very silent indeed. I couldn't stand a hairdryer, even with exceptional graphics performance. On that note, it is interesting that XFX do sell 7950 cards with a heatpipe. Dead silent and good performance for most people. I was going for that until I got a good price on the 7900gtx.

Cheers Porphy

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by tycho102

That's 500 watts of electrical power, not thermal power. But you can figure 50-60% of that ends up as waste heat. That 1kW power supply puts out 72A continuous on the 12v rail, making it run at 50-60% capacity (which is generally a switching supply's most efficient level). It might sound stupid (1kw), but it's actually a pretty decent purchase.

I'm waiting for the day when you can buy seperate 12v and 3.3/5v transformers. Computers need 500w on the 12v, but not anything more than 200w on the 3.3/5.

As for the 8800's, size was the first thing that occured to me when I saw the pictures. The Coolermaster "Stacker" series is a decent case, but you might have to go with a file-server case.

THey don't need 50 Watts on the 3.3/5v. WHole systems from yesterday with 64 bit Athlons, and decent vid cards used slightly more than 100 Watts. Now you are having systems use 3 times that and people will start to complain at some point.

Every watt makes waste heat, so I'd have to bump your figure higher, though it is not as effiecient in generating heat as a heating element might be. My single x1900 XTX + my 600 WATT PSU (apparently it will do 730 WATTS in testing) with 42 amps on the 12 volt rails, + my dual core X2 Athlon, RAID, etc. will heat up a room enough to make you sweat (90+?) regardless if the rest of the house is only 60 degrees. These new video cards coming out are absurd with their power req. and that is why I am complaining. I have hardware that uses less power, yet I already know what it does, and I already know what this thing is going to do.

My new thought is that if the video card needs 2 slots because of cooling, then you have just bought yourself a mini space heater.

-S