Date 2008-03-10
Provider: Asus
Author: Niko Lupala
Editor: Amber Lupala
Asus 8800GS TOP Videocard Review
Today we take a look at a relatively inexpensive videocard from Asus. We recieved a sample of their 8800GS card that cost around 200$. This card is cheaper than the 8800GT card but can it compete with it at all or will it fall behind in every test we put it through? How does it perform and is it actually worth even looking at this card? Those are a few questions that we will digg deeper into.
NVIDIA® GeForce 8800GS
PCI Express & PCI Express 2.0 support
Microsoft DirectX 10 and Shader Model 4.0 support
OpenGL®2.0 support
HDCP compliant
NVIDIA PureVideo HD technology - Essential for the Ultimate HD Movie Experience on a PC
NVIDIA Quantum Technology - Advanced Shader Processors architected for physics computation
The box is nowhere near as big as the 3870 box we had here awhile back. On the box you see the Asus logo along with a woman as usual. There is also a logo describing that this is a TOP card which means it is overclocked by Asus. Inside the box you will find a driver cd, manual, DVI adapter, S-video to RGB adapter, and a molex to PCI-E power adapter.
Please click on thumbnails to get bigger pictures
The TOP card looks a bit different from the normal 8800GS card as it has a big gold colored cooler in the middle of the card and a gold heatsink on the right side of the card. Since this card is already overclocked this cooler is needed to keep it running stable with the frequency is set at.
The big heatsink on the right side of the main cooler gives the cooler a very nice looking addition and it also fulfills a duty of course by cooling of the chipsets mounted there.
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The fan blades are clear but this does not mean that the fan has leds mounted to it. I guess it would look good but Asus seems to have decided to minimize the heat on the card so they never considered leds. In the back you got two DVI ports, one yellow and one white. You also got a S-video plugin so you can hook your computer to your TV.
Please click on thumbnails to get bigger pictures
The fan/heatsink combo is mounted with four screws which are really easy to remove so you can mount your waterblock on this card or change the cooler to something quieter. It is time to turn the page and start checking out our testing results.
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