New Ultra High End Price Point With GeForce 8800 Ultra
by Derek Wilson on May 2, 2007 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
The Test
As for our performance tests, we will be looking at a handful of games running the extreme resolutions and quality settings the 8800 Ultra is designed to enable. We will be including the stock 8800 GTX as well as the EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTX KO ACS3. This should give us a good sense of what the new 8800 Ultra really has to offer.
We are using the same testing rig we've employed for quite some time now.
Games include staples such as: BF2, Prey, Oblivion, and Rainbow Six: Vegas. We will also be testing new comers S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and Supreme Commander. This article sees the addition of AA modes in Oblivion and Rainbow Six, as this high performance hardware needs some room to stretch its legs.
Where possible we use built-in benchmarks. FRAPS is used for Oblivion, Rainbow Six, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. (which has demo play functionality but no demo record).
As for our performance tests, we will be looking at a handful of games running the extreme resolutions and quality settings the 8800 Ultra is designed to enable. We will be including the stock 8800 GTX as well as the EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTX KO ACS3. This should give us a good sense of what the new 8800 Ultra really has to offer.
We are using the same testing rig we've employed for quite some time now.
| System Test Configuration | |
| CPU: | Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800 (2.93GHz/4MB) |
| Motherboard: | EVGA nForce 680i SLI |
| Chipset: | NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI |
| Chipset Drivers: | NVIDIA nForce 9.35 |
| Hard Disk: | Seagate 7200.7 160GB SATA |
| Memory: | Corsair XMS2 DDR2-800 4-4-4-12 (1GB x 2) |
| Video Card: | Various |
| Video Drivers: | ATI Catalyst 7.4 NVIDIA ForceWare 158.19 |
| Desktop Resolution: | 1280 x 800 - 32-bit @ 60Hz |
| OS: | Windows XP Professional SP2 |
Games include staples such as: BF2, Prey, Oblivion, and Rainbow Six: Vegas. We will also be testing new comers S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and Supreme Commander. This article sees the addition of AA modes in Oblivion and Rainbow Six, as this high performance hardware needs some room to stretch its legs.
Where possible we use built-in benchmarks. FRAPS is used for Oblivion, Rainbow Six, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. (which has demo play functionality but no demo record).
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dsumanik - Wednesday, May 2, 2007 - link
Let this be a lesson kids, buy an ATI card, and an AMD processor or two.Even the low end stuff, for your mom or your kids machine.
The reason why the CPU market is so awesome right now is because intel felt real pressure from amd and they had to respond with a superior product at lower prices or face a continual market share loss.
We now see nvidia's true colors, the sky's the limit on the prices, and they quite surely, could have released a product with far more performance, at a lower price point, had AMD been simply been putting pressure on them.
If anyone buys this card, you are wholeheartedly supporting $1000 dollar retail graphics cards, that will increase in performance incrementally over the years instead of quantum leaps, at a fair, and still profitable cost...
Mise well just buy a wii im thinking...
sxr7171 - Thursday, May 3, 2007 - link
I'm not buying an AMD processor or graphics card simply because they offer competition to Intel or Nvidia. I will buy an AMD product when they offer simple superior performance to the competition again. At the $300 I paid for my 8800GTS, there is nothing that comes close in performance for the money.Don't tell me that ATI didn't try some insane pricing when they had the lead.
DerekWilson - Wednesday, May 2, 2007 - link
AMD would love to join NVIDIA on this. Don't forget about the FX series of processors or the 4x4 program.Rather than pressure companies to build hardware that doesn't cost much, let's encourage them to build hardware that's worth the price they put on it.
There is a market for high end hardware. There is no reason NVIDIA, AMD, and Intel shouldn't satisfy that market. But there's no point in charging $830 for performance we can get for $650 just because people will buy it.
mlambert890 - Friday, May 4, 2007 - link
Great point. Yeah, lets be a charity for AMD. Come on. Where are these people coming from??? When AMD offers a competitive part again for a decent price, I will buy from them again. If Intel starts offering parts I feel are not worth it, I wont buy from them.I have 8800GTX in SLI and am running at 629/1000 and these are just plain old air cooled GTX parts. NVidia is nuts on this Ultra. It wont sell well at this price and they will either have to put more value or drop this down to regular GTX pricing.
THe market adjusts itself and doesnt need political statements from ideological consumers to drive it. Of course if you choose to spend your money that way, more power to you! One could argue that it keeps AMD weak though. If they know they have a comfortable revenue stream for substandard parts, the can rest. Remember... they rose to challenge Intel from NOTHING, not from a flow of "charity" revenue.
strikeback03 - Thursday, May 3, 2007 - link
I think they are following Murphy's Law: It is morally wrong to allow suckers to keep their money. They made changes at minimal cost to a product, slap a high price on it, and see if anyone is dumb enough to bite. When sales numbers drop off, they cut the price, and probably end up closer to $700 where the performance should leave it.I don't blame nVidia for making it, I just laugh at anyone who buys it.
Speedo - Wednesday, May 2, 2007 - link
Yeah, I don't think its worth that much more $$ just for that little extra edge in performance.FIXX719 - Monday, December 5, 2016 - link
HELLOOO... I CAME FROM THE FUTURE :v ...... YOU CANT RUN 4K IN THIS CARD :v .... byefelicityc - Tuesday, January 11, 2022 - link
I come from the even further future. A magical fairy wizard has blessed nvidia with the ability to create price pressure without doing anything by themselves or even pretending to sell sports-model GPUs.Also, SLI is dead, you still can't run Crysis (it looks pretty good on those 2x 8800 GTX) because it breaks on newer versions of Windows, the mortgage market is about to crash in a year or so, and you should invest in Bitcoin.
Also, AMD saves the CPU market briefly and AMD rebrands as ATI, except as AMD.
It's been a weird few years.