XFX 8800GT 512MB

Josh Collins takes this XFX card for a spin. Does it perform or is it best left in the garage?

First thing’s first, this is not the same XFX 8800GT 512MB reviewed in our roundup from issue 84. This is a revised edition of the card from XFX, now utilising a custom PCB design and sporting the trademark XFX black PCB and fluro green DVI port colours. Adding to these distinct characteristics is the metal bracket running down the length of the card to assure minimal PCB flexing.

Even though this 8800GT is sporting a custom PCB, the actual design and traces are still near identical to the reference design. This means the same two-phase power management as the reference cards, and for those into the extreme ends of the enthusiast world, the same volt mod points as well. That’s not the end of the symmetry between this and the reference card; the cooler is the exact same as the reference NVIDIA design, and as the same as that found on the initial XFX 8800GT 512MB release.

With the similarities outlined already, it should come as no surprise that the clock frequencies, while they are overclocked, are much same as the original release albeit with 50MHz less on the shader. This means a core frequency of 670MHz with memory at 975MHz and a shader clock of 1650MHz.

At these speeds, the card scores 12,553 3DMarks and an average, minimum and maximum fps of 18.85, 13.30 and 21.78 respectively in Crysis at a resolution of 1280 x 1024 and with all the eye candy maxed out. These kinds of results place it smack dead in the middle of the reference 8800GT 512MB and the reference 8800GTS 512MB – both based on the G92 core.

Now that we’ve had our stock baseline run, it’s time to check out what this card can overclock to. Firing up the duo of Rivatuner v2.06 and ATI Tool, we started to tinker with the frequencies of the card. With the core, memory and shader each tested individually we ended up with maximums of 760MHz, 990MHz and 1860MHz respectively. When combined we found the maximum stable frequencies required a step back to 735MHz, 975MHz and 1800MHz for the core, memory and shader.

At these speeds the benchmarks returned almost 13k flat for 3DMark06 and an average, minimum and maximum fps in Crysis of 19.73, 13.89 and 22.82 respectively.

For $425 retail we can’t help but feel that XFX has priced itself out of the running in the 8800GT market. With a faster reference-clocked 8800GTS 512MB available around the same price point and a higher overclocked 8800GT 512MB available cheaper from other brands, such as the ECS offering reviewed in issue 85, we can only see serious fans of XFX going forth to purchase this card. A solid product, but unfortunately priced out of the market.