6600 Preview

[rbV5]

Yeah, this is getting old! When the hell is someone going to give us a review of the PVP???? I can't make heads or tails from that little tease

LOL, ironically, I now have hardware encoding in my NV rig....but its because of the ATI eHome wonder I installed yesterday.

 

[SneakyStuff]

Originally posted by: ronnn
Forget the mid range stuff (won't be much above my 9700pro anyways), lets see some availability and most importantly - price drops in the high range. Besides this does not look like a great improvement over cards already available in the same price range. :beer:

Actually there are reports it could be over 20% faster than the 9800 pro over 8k in 3dmark03? YIKES.

 

[Keysplayr]

Wow!! Your just a happy & peppy, & bursting with love type a guy eh? Try not to be so positive next time.

 

[GeneralGrievous]

Actually there are reports it could be over 20% faster than the 9800 pro over 8k in 3dmark03? YIKES.

If that's the case they just killed the 6800 nu. I'll wait for benches from a site; it doesn't make sense to release such a fast card at $200.

 

[amheck]

If that's the case they just killed the 6800 nu. I'll wait for benches from a site; it doesn't make sense to release such a fast card at $200.

Well, us poor folk can always hope, huh?

 

[Megatomic]

Originally posted by: amheck

If that's the case they just killed the 6800 nu. I'll wait for benches from a site; it doesn't make sense to release such a fast card at $200.

Well, us ppor folk can always hope, huh?

Indeed we can.

 

[Acanthus]

Originally posted by: SneakyStuff
Dual 6600 GT's, that will be interesting.

im thinking the same.

 

[SneakyStuff]

Originally posted by: GeneralGrievous

Actually there are reports it could be over 20% faster than the 9800 pro over 8k in 3dmark03? YIKES.

If that's the case they just killed the 6800 nu. I'll wait for benches from a site; it doesn't make sense to release such a fast card at $200.

Well, keep in mind, in CERTAIN cases the 6800 non-ultra is over 40% faster than the 9800 pro. SO, the 6800 still has its uses.

EDIT: And of coruse it makes sense to release such a fast card, it's next-gen baby! This can only be good, seeing as how ATI will no doubt bring out a nice mid-range card again. OR I could be wrong, and the 6600 GT could be the next Ti 4200

 

[ronnn]

Originally posted by: SneakyStuff
Actually there are reports it could be over 20% faster than the 9800 pro over 8k in 3dmark03? YIKES.

That would be good news for mid range buyers! Hope it is true, but if I remember rightly Nvidia released 600 x 800 scores on other pre release statements.

 

[SneakyStuff]

Well, the thing that got my attention was 45 FPS on doom 3 at 1600 x 1200. That's very good, and that was only a single GT, 2 of them could effectively DOUBLE that performance And they also mentioned that at 1024 x 768, AA and AF are now possible for mid-range cards. That's a big leap IMO. This new core seems to be doing wonders. I am really comming back to nVidia. This whole 6 series is looking better and better.

 

[spaceman]

hey look! its my next card!

 

[Kondik]

Yeah i think its the next choice for me maybe

 

[SneakyStuff]

Originally posted by: Kondik
Yeah i think its the next choice for me maybe

Me too! Wehn I move to a PCI-E board, this is going to be a very nice option.

 

[gururu]

Originally posted by: SneakyStuff
Well, the thing that got my attention was 45 FPS on doom 3 at 1600 x 1200. That's very good, and that was only a single GT, 2 of them could effectively DOUBLE that performance And they also mentioned that at 1024 x 768, AA and AF are now possible for mid-range cards. That's a big leap IMO. This new core seems to be doing wonders. I am really comming back to nVidia. This whole 6 series is looking better and better.

i heard 42 fps at 1600 (x-bit). anyway, this seems to be a nice card indeed that is going to hit the market in droves. As Nvidia continues to stomp ATI...

Time for ATI to do something hugely innovative (MAXX x800xts) or pro-consumer (X800xts for 250.00?).

 

[Childs]

I actually wish they would have mentioned this sooner! $200 for a 6600GT is more up my alley, as the GT purchase was out of character. Its not like I'm the kinda guy who needs super duper quality.

 

[SneakyStuff]

Originally posted by: Childs
I actually wish they would have mentioned this sooner! $200 for a 6600GT is more up my alley, as the GT purchase was out of character. Its not like I'm the kinda guy who needs super duper quality.

exactly.

 

[nitromullet]

Originally posted by: GeneralGrievous

Actually there are reports it could be over 20% faster than the 9800 pro over 8k in 3dmark03? YIKES.

If that's the case they just killed the 6800 nu. I'll wait for benches from a site; it doesn't make sense to release such a fast card at $200.

That might actually be the idea... Who knows? With the FX generation, nVidia killed off the 5900NU not long after they came out with the 5900SE/XT. I could be wrong on this, but I imagine that the NV40 core is pretty pricy to manufacture, so using neutered NV40's to make the 6800NU's once the yields increase may be a waste of money when they could use those cores for GT's and Ultras. The 6800NU really only makes sense in beginning when lots of NV40's are being produced with damaged pipes, but once they get over that stage it is a waste of money for nVidia.

 

[Shinei]

This is definitely reminiscent of the Ti4200, though I'm leery of the 128-bit bus; with such a powerful core (approaching X800XT speeds), it would probably be better to keep it fed with the most bandwidth you could manage. I'll wait for the benches before I drop the cash, 6800s will probably be more numerous and cheaper by then anyway.

 

[ss284]

The 6800 NU still has the 256-bit memory bus, as well as 4 extra pipelines. Granted, its at a lower speed. If anything, this exactly mirrors the whole situation with the:
9700 pro, 9700 non pro, radeon 9500 pro, radeon 9600 pro, radeon 9600 non pro.
6800 ultra, 6800 gt, 6800 NU, 6600 GT, 6600.

It fits if you ignore some discrepancies like how the 9500 pro has the same number of piplines as the 9700, but a cut down memory bus.

-Steve

 

[amheck]

So it sounds like we're really gonna have to wait for the benchmarks for all 3 of the cards (6600 x 2 and 6800LE) to see what fits where. Any ideas how long that might take? I assume it'll be a month(s) until the cards are on the shelves, but hopefully some of the review sites can get a card to play with for a while asap.

 

[Lonyo]

Wow, an nV biased site reporting numbers, most probably from nVidia, on a card that's not been released yet.

Sorry if I don't jump on the hype bandwagon and instead wait for review of the card to see what it's REALLY like.

 

[beserker15]

just curious, if the 6800le has so much trouble outperforming the 9800xt/5900ultra ...how exactly will the 6600gt beat out the 9800's by 20%?

 

[nitromullet]

Originally posted by: beserker15
just curious, if the 6800le has so much trouble outperforming the 9800xt/5900ultra ...how exactly will the 6600gt beat out the 9800's by 20%?

Good point. Obvioulsy, these results are prelimenary, so we'll have to see how these numbers work out once the cards are released. However, the increase could be a result of the faster clock speed. There is most likely a point at where a faster clocked core with less pipes will perform better than a slower clocked core with more pipes.

 

[Lonyo]

The core is listed on Guru 3D as a die shrunk core (0.11 vs 0.13) which accounts for the high clock of the GT, but also it is listed as 222 millions transistors, the same as the 6800 cards.....
Does this mean we'll be able to unlock a few extra pipes on those 6600's?

 

[jiffylube1024]

Originally posted by: beserker15
just curious, if the 6800le has so much trouble outperforming the 9800xt/5900ultra ...how exactly will the 6600gt beat out the 9800's by 20%?

The 6800LE runs at 300/350 on a 256-bit memory bus I have read.

The 6600GT runs at 500/500 on a 128-bit memory bus.

Both are 8X1 pipeline designs, to the best of my knowledge.

So, while the 6800LE has more memory bandwidth (40%), the core of the 6600GT runs 67% faster than that of the 6800LE. So, in situations where the 6600GT is not heavily memory bandwidth limited, it's pretty easy to see that the 6600GT should be faster.