First test: Nvidia GeForce 8600 GTS & GT

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By Clive Webster

Posted on 17 Apr 2007 at 14:56

Curious to see how the 8600 GTS compares to the higher-end 8800 GTS, we ramped up the testing to our High settings (see below). Again Far Cry produced a playable frame rate of 36fps, but Call of Duty 2 proved more troublesome, as our test requires 512MB of local graphics memory thanks to the Extra texture settings we use. The score of 18fps is therefore unrepresentative of the GPU.

Using the 256MB-friendly High textures and dropping the AA and AF produced a barely tolerable 32fps. Oblivion is playable at 1,600 x 1,200 with no AA and AF though, racing along at 42fps.

This can't compare to even the GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB card, though, which scored 57fps in Oblivion with 4x AA and 8x AF in the same test rig. The 8800 clearly remains the most future-proof investment.



Far Cry (standard settings)

Call of Duty 2 (standard settings, no AA or AF)

Conclusions

All of this is pretty good news for Nvidia fans - as are the projected pricings. At $149 we expect the 8600 GT to cost around £80-100 over here, and considering it will blitz all your games at 1,280 x 1,024 without any image quality sacrifices, it's looking an attractive buy.

The 8600 GTS meanwhile is projected to cost $199 to $229, which should translate to £110-130. Again, considering the bags of performance on offer that's an incredible price.

Cards are already available from online retailers and there's even the extra promise of 100% GPU-based High Definition decoding. Alas we haven't had time to fully test this yet, but we'll update you as soon as we have the results.

SETTINGS
Standard settings
Far Cry - 1,280 x 1024, no AA or AF, maximum detail settings, HDR
Call of Duty 2 - 1,280 x 1,024, 4xAA, 8xAF, High texture settings
Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion - 1,280 x 1,024, 4xAA, 8xAF, maximum detail settings

High settings
Far Cry - 1,600 x 1,200, no AA, 8xAF, maximum detail settings, HDR
Call of Duty 2 - 1,600 x 1,200, 4xAA, 8xAF, Extra texture settings
Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion - 1,600 x 1,200, 4xAA, 8xAF, maximum detail settings

TEST KIT
2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Duo E6700; Intel 975XBX motherboard; 1GB Corsair 800MHz RAM; 36GB Western Digital Raptor