Hypersonic Aviator EX7: NVIDIA GeForce Go 7800 GTX First Look
by Josh Venning on October 10, 2005 9:30 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Introduction
When thinking about the ideal gaming system, your first choice probably wouldn't be a laptop. It's common sense that desktop systems are better suited to meet the requirements needed for serious gaming. Lately though, we've been seeing some notebook systems that try to tackle this preconception, with interesting results. One of these systems, made by Hypersonic, does the job very well. While it is an excellent laptop, one part on the inside really caught our attention.
Any gaming system needs a good graphics card, and if you were thinking about the most powerful one right now, you'd be thinking about NVIDIA's 7800 GTX. (The X1800 XT might surpass it, but it will be another month before you can purchase such cards.) We've reviewed many of these cards and given their huge power draws, high heat levels, and generally monstrous size (for a graphics card), the thought of one of these cards in a notebook would have seemed a bit ludicrous. But it looks like NVIDIA has managed to fit one in there with their mobile version of the card, the GeForce Go 7800 GTX.
The system that we're reviewing is the Hypersonic Aviator EX7, and it appears to be the most powerful gaming notebook on the market at this time. The GeForce Go 7800 GTX does differ slightly from its desktop counterpart, and we'll be talking about those differences in the next section. We'll also be looking at some performance test results to give us a better idea of how the Go 7800 GTX compares with a normal 7800 GTX. Rest assured, the Go 7800 GTX lives up to its name and the results are impressive indeed.
Notebook gaming is, by no means, new. Both NVIDIA and ATI have been making quality mobile versions of their most popular parts, which we've looked at in the past. Specifically, the Mobility RADEON X800 XT by ATI and NVIDIA's GeForce Go 6800 Ultra. Now, we have a chance to look at the performance of the mobile version of the 7800 GTX: the most powerful mobile graphics card currently on the market.
When thinking about the ideal gaming system, your first choice probably wouldn't be a laptop. It's common sense that desktop systems are better suited to meet the requirements needed for serious gaming. Lately though, we've been seeing some notebook systems that try to tackle this preconception, with interesting results. One of these systems, made by Hypersonic, does the job very well. While it is an excellent laptop, one part on the inside really caught our attention.
Any gaming system needs a good graphics card, and if you were thinking about the most powerful one right now, you'd be thinking about NVIDIA's 7800 GTX. (The X1800 XT might surpass it, but it will be another month before you can purchase such cards.) We've reviewed many of these cards and given their huge power draws, high heat levels, and generally monstrous size (for a graphics card), the thought of one of these cards in a notebook would have seemed a bit ludicrous. But it looks like NVIDIA has managed to fit one in there with their mobile version of the card, the GeForce Go 7800 GTX.
The system that we're reviewing is the Hypersonic Aviator EX7, and it appears to be the most powerful gaming notebook on the market at this time. The GeForce Go 7800 GTX does differ slightly from its desktop counterpart, and we'll be talking about those differences in the next section. We'll also be looking at some performance test results to give us a better idea of how the Go 7800 GTX compares with a normal 7800 GTX. Rest assured, the Go 7800 GTX lives up to its name and the results are impressive indeed.
Notebook gaming is, by no means, new. Both NVIDIA and ATI have been making quality mobile versions of their most popular parts, which we've looked at in the past. Specifically, the Mobility RADEON X800 XT by ATI and NVIDIA's GeForce Go 6800 Ultra. Now, we have a chance to look at the performance of the mobile version of the 7800 GTX: the most powerful mobile graphics card currently on the market.
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Avalon - Tuesday, October 11, 2005 - link
What is the purpose of this comment?
Uhh, Pentium-M? Next dumb answer.
This is about the most constructive reply I've read all day. In fact, you should win the Nobel prize for most constructive post of the year here.
Avalon - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link
Since this laptop was soley aiming at the hardcore gamer, why not use that 2.26ghz P-M in there? Battery life would go up, and heat output would drop. The difference in gaming power between the two would be small enough to not matter at such a high resolution. If they were truly worried about keeping the same amount of CPU power in there, they could have still used a low voltage 2.4ghz Turion. It would still be infinitely better in the heat and power department.peldor - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link
So the Doom3 score at 39.7 fps qualifies as "no trouble at all", but poor BF2 is merely "playable"? I guess you gotta draw the line somewhere. 39 fps ftw!
DerekWilson - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link
I believe you've missunderstood.Battlefield 2 did actually perform the worst at 19x12 with 4xAA. Worst out of the tests run does not necessarily mean it performance was unsatisfactory. Playable is playable ...
At the same time, Doom 3 remains playable down around 30 fps while BF2 really does need a little more help. With the fast paced multiplayer action of BF2, higher framerates often make or break the game. They are two different games judged on their own merits of playability.
Hope that helps!
Pannenkoek - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link
I'm extremely sceptical about Anandtech's general remarks about FPS games being "playable" at 30-40 fps AVERAGE. Old CS is unplayable if the fps drops below 40 nowadays, and I get 30+ average in ET but sure as hell can't shoot straight when it drops to 10-20 in the heat of the fight or explosions. Average framerates are only an indication, you guys should hurry up with your benchmark tool which should give usefull fps numbers for actual experience. Until then I request that you stop putting your judgement on playablity between objectively measured numbers...Oh, you were talking about BF. That's an exception as it's not a FPS but a simulation game.
Jedi2155 - Tuesday, October 11, 2005 - link
Battlefield 2 is not a simulation imo...but it is playable somewhat in the 30 fps range....I managed to get pretty decent scores with only 15-35 fps (got top in a 64 person server).Degrador - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link
I've seen the posts for other articles saying the Anandtech has dropped a bit in their reviews, and I was a bit sceptical of that, but with this one I just can't hold back. The systems are way too different to give much of a comment about anything. Yes, I realise we're comparing a desktop to laptop systems, but would it have been that hard to get a desktop system and put a P4 670 in it with 2GB of DDR2-533? These are desktop parts... not exactly uncommon... The Athlon 64 has been shown time and time again to be the performance leader for gaming, and there's no reason why this review couldn't have been done properly. You didn't even have the same amount of RAM between the systems - wtf is up with that? Other reviews have shown that some games do depend on RAM, while others don't, which is now adding more variation to the results.It may sound arrogant, but this truely is a poor review... Can these reviews please be a little more scientific next time?
Phantronius - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link
Whine whine...bitch bitch.bob661 - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link
LOL! That's all I've been reading for the past week.bob661 - Monday, October 10, 2005 - link
They're testing the graphics, not the systems. What you want is to minimize the effect the CPU has on performance here. Memory has VERY little impact above 1GB. 1 fps doesn't count.