9800GTX's Are Now Widely Available

[T_Flight]

Hi Folks,
Just got a nVidia e-mail stating the 9800GTX's are widely available. They range in price from 300-330 dollars or so. They look like nice cards. They also were showing off the GX2's also. I didn't price the GX2's, but I'd expect them to be in the 500-600 dollar range.

Just thought I'd let those know who were in the market for a card. BFG, EVGA, and all the top names have them on the market now from places like the Egg, and ZipZoomFly (used to be GoogleGear for you hardware buff's that have been around), and other places like CompUSSR. I usually buy from the Egg and ZipZoomFly if the Egg doesn't have them in stock.

I'm still looking for release dates on the new stuff for mid to late 2008. It's possibl we may see another world beater, but so far nothing but rumors and forum guesses.

[Afterburner]

I wouldnt waste time with the 9800 series. They are pretty much the 8800 series re-used. The GT200 should provide some interesting competition cum summer... :smile:

[Funky]

Do you guys know why they only put 512M of ram on 9800GTX?

[Afterburner]

To make them more affordable plus 512mb suffices as far as resolutions are concerned. Even @ 1920 x 1200 there is sufficient memory available for use. Not sure about 2560 x 1600 though. The most common resolutions used by gamers are...

1280 x 1024
1600 x 1200
1680 x 1050 (widescreen but dubbed the new 1280 x 1024 standard)

At these resolutions, 512mb doesnt even come close to peak usage unless your a professional or game developer but the cards these blokes use have memory in excess of 1GB and cost a bomb.

This is all from my rusty memory though... :smile:

[T_Flight]

I wouldnt waste time with the 9800 series. They are pretty much the 8800 series re-used. The GT200 should provide some interesting competition cum summer... :smile:


That's me...the G100 or GT200 or whatever they are calling those things these days. Whatever the next World beater will have is what I'm putting in my new system around years end. I'm building a Bloomfield system.

I posted this for the "Bang for the Buck" cards. They are not the super uber, but they do perform very well.

I'm looking ata video card that will more than likely cost 5-600 dollars, and that is big bucks. Actually it's insane is what it is but when I build a computer I do it every 5 years and put the highest performing stuff I can find in it. On some things I go a step down, but basically I build a benchmarking machine.

The GTS and GTX cards are nice. I run at a res of 1360x768. I use an Olevia HDTV as my monitor so that's what I have to use. I'm insterested in frames, and NO bottlenecks. The reason I want a 500-600 world beater is becasue I really believe the a Bloomfield (Nehalem Syetem) is gonna need it, and with the RAM and all the satuff I'm putting into it, it wouldn;t do the system justice not to get that new card.

I will be watching things VERY closely. Things can and do change when you are building a system like this that is this far out in advance with brand new bleeding edge tech. If ATi comes out with a world beater I will buy it. Heck, my Olevia HDTV has a ATi processor so I'm no fanboi.

Heck, for that matter AMD could pull something out of their hat. At this point I kinda doubt it, but one never knows.

I wanted to post this for the folks looking for that nice and stout 300 dollar card. It's a good price point. It doesn't break the bank, but offers nice performance and for most won't be hurting with any of the games today or in the not too distant future.

I wouldn;t say these are 8800's refreshed though. They are shrunk, and they have alot of nice features, and are performing great. The 8800GTX was THE world beater when it was new...that is true, but it was also 600-800 dollars depending on the model you got. Now they are not, but that was THE high end enthusiast level card.

These 9800's are the regular affordable performance cards. :smile:

[Afterburner]

I should have been more specific... :tongue:

The 8800GT 512mb / 8800GTS 512mb / 9800GTX / 9800GX2 use the same G92 core made on TSMC's 65nm process. Because the process is much smaller and much cheaper to produce compared to the 8800GTX's monstrous and hot 80nm G80 cores, this explains the cost of the 9800 series. Sure there are some tweaks but essentially the same G92 core name. The average joe DOES NOT know this and can't figure out for the life of them why they are so cheap and snap them up in glee. Little do they know that Nvidia is screwing them over with their seemingly new but renamed cards. We are talking zero innovation here while raking in cash on unsuspecting consumers. We @ XS are well informed and so are pissed becoz of this which is also why alot of us are waiting to see what ATI's 4800 and Nvidia's GT200 will offer.

ATI had exceptional yields with their 3800 series and these are even smaller at 55nm which is a half node compared to 65nm and 45nm which made them even cheaper to produce hence the highly competitive prices. The 8800GT/GTS 512mb spanked all including the 8800GTX and were ridiculously cheaper much to consumers amusement. The reason I believe is these were actually meant to be the 9800 series in the first place but were pulled out ahead of schedule and called the GT/GTS 512mb variants on top of the existing of the 320mb and 640mb variants to keep Nvidia infront as ATI's 3800 cards were pretty strong perfomance and price wise and this would explain the use of the same G92 core. From what I recall there is not much difference between the performance of the 8800GTS 512mb and 9800GTX (9800GTX is Tri SLI enabled & 9800GX2 is Quad SLI enabled) other then the fact its small lead is due to some tweaks in the core. If you are a current 8800GT/GTS 512mb owner, the 9800 is not worth the upgrade.

Basically the 9800's are not regular performing cards but meant to be top end cards built on a much cheaper manufacturing process but becoz they pulled it ahead of schedule, the good feeling and performance lead is just....off :smile:


GeForce 9800 GT will be available on both 65nm and 55nm process as we learned. The 65nm version is actually a rebranded GeForce 8800 GT based on G92 core while the 55nm version is actually G92b core we have told you before. Both will be higher clocked than the 8800 GT. The reason is that Nvidia is not comfortable to go full fledge 55nm process like AMD so the 65nm version is more of a safety precaution just in case the yield from 55nm doesn't turn out well.

[Maple]

good reading:thumb:

[Maple]

i almost when out and bought 2 9800 gtx's to replace my 8800 gtx, glad i didnt. Thanks guys

[Afterburner]

No prob.... :tongue:

Btw Nvidia's upcoming GT200 core based cards will be known as GTX 260 and GTX 280 respectively. ATI's will be known as the 4800 series. Both companies are ejaculating these cards in June.... :evils:

[_Big_Mac_]

Both companies are ejaculating these cards in June.... :evils:


Does that mean we can expect a further drop in price of the 8800GT (and other G92 cards) in June?

[BHawthorne]

Does that mean we can expect a further drop in price of the 8800GT (and other G92 cards) in June?

Not to read too much into things, but it should go like any other price point, when the next series of cards come out. Although the price point of the G92 cards as is, are very nice.

[Afterburner]

Agreed :smile:

[T_Flight]

No prob.... :tongue:

Btw Nvidia's upcoming GT200 core based cards will be known as GTX 260 and GTX 280 respectively. ATI's will be known as the 4800 series. Both companies are ejaculating these cards in June.... :evils:

Just in time for them to be released tested, and get some mileage on the drivers. That's real good for my new system build at the end of this year! Bwahahahah! :evils: I will take over the world and clone your machines, and they will ALL BE MINE...yesssss, bwhahahhaaha, MINE ALL MINE!