The NVIDIA 6800 GS Closer Look: EVGA, Leadtek, PNY, and Evertop
by Josh Venning on January 27, 2006 8:53 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Test Setup/Overclocking
The test setup that we used is designed to focus the stress of the game tests on the GPU. We therefore use very high end components in our test system in order to determine the maximum impact that a graphics card could have on a game. We also disable sound for testing and disable as many background tasks as possible. Since the 6800 GS is a mid-range part, we would expect people who purchase the card to be running a more mid-range system altogether. Performance may end up actually being a little lower in the real world, but for analysis purposes, it's easier to pinpoint the advantages of a specific part (if any) when you eliminate (or at least minimize) other bottlenecks that could be a factor in performance.
NVIDIA nForce 4 motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 FX-57 2.8 GHz Processor
2 GB OCZ 3:3:2:8 DDR400 RAM
Seagate 7200.7 120 GB Hard Drive
OCZ 600 W PowerStream Power Supply
User-overclocking is an important part of our testing, and it gives us an idea of how well these cards overclock above their factory settings. It's interesting to see that sometimes a card with a high factory overclock won't necessarily overclock as high as another lower clocked card of the same type. This can be useful information for those who prefer to overclock their own cards. At the same time, factory overclocked parts can be more attractive to users who just want to plug in the part and forget it (or who don't want to worry about voiding any warranties). In any case, here's what we ended up with when we overclocked these 6800 GS offerings.
So, we can see that the slowest card out of the box actually overclocks higher than any other card that we tested here. All of the cards do see a pretty decent speed bump over the stock 6800 GS, though.
The test setup that we used is designed to focus the stress of the game tests on the GPU. We therefore use very high end components in our test system in order to determine the maximum impact that a graphics card could have on a game. We also disable sound for testing and disable as many background tasks as possible. Since the 6800 GS is a mid-range part, we would expect people who purchase the card to be running a more mid-range system altogether. Performance may end up actually being a little lower in the real world, but for analysis purposes, it's easier to pinpoint the advantages of a specific part (if any) when you eliminate (or at least minimize) other bottlenecks that could be a factor in performance.
NVIDIA nForce 4 motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 FX-57 2.8 GHz Processor
2 GB OCZ 3:3:2:8 DDR400 RAM
Seagate 7200.7 120 GB Hard Drive
OCZ 600 W PowerStream Power Supply
User-overclocking is an important part of our testing, and it gives us an idea of how well these cards overclock above their factory settings. It's interesting to see that sometimes a card with a high factory overclock won't necessarily overclock as high as another lower clocked card of the same type. This can be useful information for those who prefer to overclock their own cards. At the same time, factory overclocked parts can be more attractive to users who just want to plug in the part and forget it (or who don't want to worry about voiding any warranties). In any case, here's what we ended up with when we overclocked these 6800 GS offerings.
| Graphics Card | Factory Speed | Overclocked |
| Leadtek WinFast PX6800 GS Extreme | 485/1.1 | 520/1.15 |
| PNY GeForce 6800 GS Overclocked | 470/1.1 | 490/1.15 |
| EverTop GeForce 6800 GS | 425/1.0 | 525/1.2 |
| EVGA e-GeForce 6800 GS | 450/1.05 | 510/1.15 |
So, we can see that the slowest card out of the box actually overclocks higher than any other card that we tested here. All of the cards do see a pretty decent speed bump over the stock 6800 GS, though.
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bob661 - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
....because AGP is dead. No need to mention it. LOL!JamesDax - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
Gotta wonder why Nvidia and ATI are still releasing AGP cards then. Boggles the mind.DerekWilson - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
Going forward, our focus will be on PCIe.But we could still have one or two things up our sleeves for those still working with AGP, so don't loose heart.
;-)
kmmatney - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
Isn't AGP performance about the same?grizzly7 - Monday, January 30, 2006 - link
The AGP versions of 6800GS only have a core clock of 350MHz, so performance is worse.CuriousMike - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
Honestly, this article did nothing but say, "Zalman makes a superior cooler."Better overclock, better cooling, and more quiet.
They're all ~ the same reference design (maybe different memory.)
Puddleglum - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
Searched Newegg and found 4 eVGA 6800GS cards, and each one has different core clock speeds and memory speeds. http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductCompare.asp?C...">Newegg search resultsIn the results, none of the cards are clocked at 450MHz/1.05GHz, and the fact that one of them comes factory set at 490MHz/1.1GHz makes me wonder if it can exceed the 510MHz/1.15GHz of your test card. An honest defense for eVGA regarding its nominal performance in this review is that you simply didn't use the right card.
DerekWilson - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
Stock speeds are actually 425/1.0Meaning the EVGA is overclocked. They may have a more uber model out there, but this is the one they sent us when we mentioned this roundup to them.
From our experience with these cards, it seems like it would be difficult getting a 6800GS clocked higher than ~525 ... The EverTop card stayed cooler than the rest of them, so heat didn't really become a factor in preventing higher clock speeds. I just think the chip has the juice to get much faster than that.
Killrose - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
Nice article, but the ATi X800GTO is well below the $200 price point. Forget Price Watch even, Newegg has some at the $130 mark and the 6800GS start at $189kmmatney - Friday, January 27, 2006 - link
Would have liked to have seen a X800GTO2 in there, as well as a 7800GT. The X800GTO2 can be had for $189, and unlocking the extra 4 pipes is easy and only has to be done once, ever. Out of the box, the 6800GS looks like a better deal, but the X800GTO2 gains more with overclocking/unlocking.