Gigabyte GeForce 6800 Ultra vs ASUS AX800XT: total Deathmatch
Introduction
| Gigabyte GeForce 6800 Ultra |
| GPU chip |
NV40 (0.13) |
| Memory |
256Mb DDR; 256Bit;
Samsung 1.6 ns |
| Frequencies: |
400MHz/1100MHz DDR |
| Bus: |
AGP 8X |
| Category: |
Ultra High-End |
| Price: |
$660 |
NV40 / R420. This combination of digits/letters can be called a live legend. Before the official release there were so many talks, hopes, sometimes incredible assumptions around. All were astonished when these products were finally presented to the public, and the results of first tests announced. And the reviewers... These "tears invisible to the world" when you can't believe your eyes on seeing the FPS output. Is it reality or an illusion, "Matrix" hallucinations?
| ASUS AX800XT |
| GPU chip |
R420 (0.13 low-k) |
| Memory |
256Mb DDR; 256Bit;
Samsung 1.6 ns |
| Frequencies: |
525MHz/1,250MHz DDR |
| Bus: |
AGP 8X |
| Category: |
Ultra High-End |
| Price: |
$660 |
All this is behind. First delights are over, those who fainted awakened, and the bodies of those who failed to come to the senses were brought out. Initially raw drivers seemed to be brushed up. All started to think, hardly finding their ways in new video card lines and lots of specifications that fell upon the readers' heads from all hardware editions.
Now it's all behind. What is currently going on used to be dubbed as "interlunation". Cards have been released, all are about to guess what each looks like, some even have got them on hands (such semi-mythical persons enjoy an immense popularity on forums of the respective topics), but at the same time the high price (we are now talking only about ultra high-end cards) and the scanty quantities of the boards in the retail are serious obstacles in the way to the cherished box.
But those who are going to buy such a video card for their home computers (simply, the vast majority) are excited and pleased to follow the fight for leadership "at the Olympus summit". This "third person view" can be compared to how fans are watching the games of their favorite teams in the Champions League over TV. Yes, they do see
(the test results) with their own eyes, therefore they can produce own impression, which sometimes differs from that of the arbiter. Also, during the whole match we always hear the commentator's voice (the reviewer's comments) who distinctly and as impartially as possible assesses the situation that has shaped up (because football is a very dynamic game, so are computer games) thus assisting the audience (the reader) in finding their ways, analyzes the situation on the field (on the video cards market) that's currently going on in the market creating the effect of own presence, at least, on the stadium stand. We have now presented to you a description of the ideal commentator. It's up to you to decide on the analogies in this regard. But it's hardly arguable that this comparison fully expressed the essence of what is going to be today on these pages.
Two products of the ultra high-end products, a major advance in science and technology, will be competing today for the title of absolute champion with Catalyst 4.8 and ForceWare 61.77 drivers that has gained the latest WHQL certification. The Nightmare tier. No kidding.
We won't be repeating for the hundredth time the technical specifications describing the specifications for each solution in detail. To refresh those detail in memory, just look at the following table:
| Video cards |
NVIDIA GeForce 6800Ultra |
ATI Radeon X800XT |
| Chip code name |
NV40 |
R420 |
| Process technology |
0,13 |
0.13 low-k |
| Q-ty of transistors |
222 mln |
160 mln |
| Memory bus |
256 Bit (GDDR3) |
256 Bit (GDDR3) |
| AGP |
AGP 3.0, 8X |
AGP 3.0, 8X |
| Memory |
256Mb |
256Mb |
| Chip clock speed |
400MHz |
525MHz |
| Memory speed |
550MHz(1100MHz DDR) |
575MHz(1150MHz DDR) |
| Q-ty of Vertex Pipelines |
6 |
6 |
| Pixel pipelines |
16 |
16 |
| Vertex shader version |
3.0 |
2.0 |
| Pixel shader version |
3.0 |
2.0b/w 3Dc |
| DirectX version |
9.0+ |
9.0+ |
| Bits per color channel |
10 |
10 |
| Q-ty of monitor outputs |
2 |
2 |
| General optimizations |
CineFX 3.0,
Intellisample 3.0,
UltraShadow II,
MPEG4/WMV-decoding,
Improved adaptive deinterlacing,
NVIDIAŽ nView,
DVC 3.0,
NVIDIA HPDR,
Displacement Mapping,
MRT,
EMBM. |
Temporal AA,
TrueForm,
Fullstream,
VideoSoap,
MPEG-II decoding,
deinterlacing,
3Dc,
HyperZ,
VideoShader,
SmoothVision,
Z-compression,
Fast Z Clear,
Hierarchial Z,
Early Z, Z/Stencil Cache,
Color Compression |
| Antialiasing modes |
2x, Quincunx 4x, 4xS, 6xS, 8x, 16x |
MSAA 2/4/6x, frame compression, Temporal AA. |
| Anisotropic filtering |
2/4/8/16 |
2/4/8/16 |
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