Legit Reviews

Posted: **Wed Dec 20, 2006 9:40 am**

A month ago, NVIDIA unveiled the GeForce 8800 series of graphics cards and the gamers are impressed by the results that they saw with a single 8800 GTX in gaming benchmarks. Legit Reviews has a pair of production XFX 8800 GTX graphics cards and compares them to Quad-SLI, X1950 XTX Crossfire, 7900 GTX SLI and a 7950GX2 to see how past generations hang with the latest and greatest!

NVIDIA really came to play with the 8800 GTX and in SLI you can bet that just about anything you can throw at them will run as smooth as silk. I spent several days with the cards in my own system trying to find something that could bring them to their knees and only found a couple of games that did just that. While not a wildly popular title, Marvel Ultimate Alliance can absolutely kill a single 8800 GTX at just 1920x1200 with Dynamic Lighting enabled. Throw in some AA and you have a card that is just able to keep the frame rates playable.

Article Title: XFX GeForce 8800 GTX SLI Video Card Review
Article URL: http://legitreviews.com/article/421/1/
Current Pricing: ~$620 shipped

Posted: **Wed Dec 20, 2006 12:20 pm**

Nice to see the bleeding edge combined with the mainstream.

A friend wants to get one of these, but is only playing at 1280x768. He has a 7900GT now. I dont think its worth it personally. Anyone think otherwise?

Dan

Posted: **Wed Dec 20, 2006 12:27 pm**

Gaming at 1024 x 768 ? Really?
I would say at that rate that even his 7900GT is overkill.
In short, no - he need not upgrade. EVER.

I've got an 8800GTX from eVGA and game at nothing but 1600x1200 and the frame rates are outstanding. I'm even considering bringing my 21" CRT back over to this desk so I can game beyond 1600x1200. That is, until I feel comfortable shelling out the $1500 for the Dell 30" LCD. Going that route will most certianly mean getting another 8800GTX to SLI with. JUST to make sure i will have NO issues at 2560x1600 - EVER.

Which leads me to question why testing a pair of cutting edge video cards was testing on such an antiquated platform. Just me personally, I would NOT build any gaming platform on ANYTHING that AMD or DAAMIT has to offer at the present time. Just my .02

Posted: **Wed Dec 20, 2006 1:23 pm**

There was a line in the article that states that they are having issues with the intel board.

Our test system has quickly become dated. A faulty Intel Bad Axe motherboard has put our test system upgrade on a delayed timeline.

To me it shows just because you can buy/use the cards in you system, doesn't mean that you can take full atvantage of it.

Posted: **Wed Dec 20, 2006 1:33 pm**

The test system will be switching to an E6700 soon for video card reviews. We are currently sorting new motherboards and games to test.

Posted: **Wed Dec 20, 2006 2:17 pm**

Khaotic wrote: Which leads me to question why testing a pair of cutting edge video cards was testing on such an antiquated platform. Just me personally, I would NOT build any gaming platform on ANYTHING that AMD or DAAMIT has to offer at the present time. Just my .02

Welcome to the forums... This is a complex question... Our video card shelf contains over 50 video cards and when a new card comes out it is impossible to benchmark all of them again. By using a single platform and just swapping cards we can use the same numbers over a period of time. Our readers get to see more cards in the charts this way. Since I personally already wrote an article showing F.E.A.R., Quake 4, and 3DMark06 on a X6800 processor we already covered the ultimate in performance...

The test bench will be moving to a Core 2 Duo E6700 and Intel D975XBX2 motherboard that Legit Reviews picked up on our own. We get one sample and when we have a staff of a few writers who all live in different cities and states it's hard to buy everyone a $1200 Kentsfield for a test system.

Speaking of which our new E6700 test system will be out of date in a few weeks anyway... With Intel's quad-core's coming mainstream the Q6600 will be $530 after Q2 and will be the new in thing... it's a battle that can't be won unless we had a million dollar budget.

Posted: **Wed Dec 20, 2006 4:58 pm**

feel free to buy the reviewers kentfields I'm sure they won't mind

Posted: **Thu Dec 21, 2006 8:53 am**

This almost makes one want to give up trying to keep pace with technology... I spent $1000 on a pair of 7900GTXs hoping to Step-Up but nVidia took too long so now I'm "stuck" with DX9 cards. They certainly still tear up the dirt though. And besides, at 1280x1024 if games start getting demanding I can turn down my normal 16xSLIAA/16xAF

Posted: **Fri Dec 22, 2006 9:30 am**

Q6600 == $851 in 1000 lots. $450 == Fud.
Lots of inaccurate information from people on this board...

Posted: **Fri Dec 22, 2006 9:37 am**

never mind... I had a brain fart...

Posted: **Fri Dec 22, 2006 9:39 am**

Yoxxy wrote:Q6600 == $851 in 1000 lots. $450 == Fud.
Lots of inaccurate information from people on this board...

It will launch at $851 and then drop to a rumored $450, but yesterday The Inq and other sites updated their posts and changed it from $450 to $530...

Intel will launch a pricing campaign in the second quarter of 2007, with the price for the Core 2 Quad Q6600 processor falling to US$530, according to industry sources.

It's the rumor mill -- nothing is certain! ;)