The Present Nvidia Lineup


Looking at the current Nvidia lineup, it is easy to see where some of the confusion comes from since there are so many different cards targeting basically the same $200 to $300 performance bracket. We didn’t include all the other more “minor” and vendor-specific cards like the 8800GS and 8800GT 256MB to keep some semblance of order to the chart above but you can see where we are coming from when we say noobies will do nothing but scratch their heards.

Some people have said (quite loudly too) that with the lack of competition from ATI, the market has stagnated to the point where Nvidia has faced the envious proposition of competing with itself. The HD3870 did provide a spark in the price for performance race but it has mostly been relegated to an also-ran with the swift output of new Nvidia releases. Even the powerhouse HD3870X2 was quickly countered with Nvidia’s dual GPU card which is aptly named the 9800GX2. Yet, while the GX2 retails for upwards of $600 and the ATI HD3870X2 is currently retailing for around $480 here in Canada, Nvidia was still being beat out in the price category; enter the 9800GTX to take up some of the slack.


In one fell swoop Nvidia is aiming to replace the 8800GTX while offering a card which can compete on a price / performance level with the HD3870X2. To do this, they have taken the tried, tested and true 65nm G92 core from the present 8800GTS 512MB and massaged it and the Stream processors so they run at higher clocks. They also added memory which is significantly faster but even though this card is supposed to be close to the top of the Nvidia lineup, it is still saddled with a 256-bit memory interface. On paper, the new 9800GTX looks to be able to perform slightly above the 8800GTS 512MB which means at around $300 this new GTX is priced just right for what it hopes to accomplish.


BFG 9800GTX OCX Specifications


BFG has taken the already high clocks of the G92-based 9800GTX and has pushed them to quite high levels with their OCX model. The core gets a modest overclock of 80Mhz to 755Mhz which is not that much considering we were able to get our stock-clocked 9800GTX to 807Mhz on the stock cooler without much problem at all. The same goes for the memory which gets a somewhat lethargic 100Mhz boost for a total of 2300Mhz (DDR) which is still a far cry from that we able to achieve with the first 9800GTX card we reviewed. While these clocks may not make it the fastest 9800GTX on the block, the BFG OCX definitely boasts some impressive stats compared to most of the competition. It should be interesting to see if all of this can translate into real-world performance increases.