Leadtek 9800GT

Do starshippy looks on this video card equal space-age performance?

Leadtek, funnily enough, doesn't actually use any lead in its graphics cards - but the company does make each and every single one with plenty of loving care. This card is no exception, and is definitely an interesting addition to a very crowded market. But what trick makes this card tick? What clocks dost this card rock? And is the different cooler worth the moolah? Read on!

Specs for this card are quite respectable, featuring the 55nm version of the G92 core that's seen extensive (and exhaustive) use in many other products. 112 shaders, 512MB of GDDR3 memory on a 256-bit memory bus and a multitude of solid capacitors are all here, slotted into the right places (think square peg in a round hole, but make the round hole square first). This is all pretty standard fare, and certainly isn't amazingly different.

Something that is different however is the cooler. Gone is the single-slot stock cooler (although a silkscreened white outline of where that cooler would be is still present), as it has been replaced by another cooler - a cooler one! Sporting a large 92mm fan at one end, this enables the card to suck in a lot of air, and do so at a constant 53.7dBA. The core has a single heatpipe over it that runs towards the top lip of the card, before curling downwards around the circumference of the fan, dissipating the heat through the surrounding aluminium. Just next to this heatpipe is a series of aluminium fins, and the whole heatsink/pipe array is covered with a plastic shroud that guides the airflow through the fins, and past a separate black heatsink on the power regulation.

This plastic shroud has a somewhat unidentifiable mechanical construct pictured on it, somewhat resembling a mix between a starship and IG-88 from Star Wars! Had Leadtek used a black PCB instead of old-school murky green, this would have looked particularly exciting.

Performance is pretty good for the card's price, and certainly well within what we expect to see after what last issue's roundup showed (Issue 96 - there might still be time to grab a copy!). Since temperatures were managed down to 52 degrees at idle and 68 at load, there's a little wiggle room for some overclocking; just don't expect a miraculous increase in clocks. Those clocks that you do eke out will most certainly not be knocking off your socks. While we could go on with funny ways of describing the overclocking ability of this card, we really must press on.

Twin DVI ports and an analogue video out port are standard fare on the PCI bracket, as is the SLI nipple tab at the the top-left of the card. Power is provided via a 6-pin connector, and the fan is connected with a 4-pin PWM connector - you'll be able to control the fanspeed through software quite easily.

Bundled with this card is a decent array of all the cables and adaptors that you could want, and it even includes a game - Overlord. It's a pretty good inclusion, certainly enough to keep you entertained for a goodly amount of time.

So with performance acceptable, a bundled game, and a funky-looking cooler, this card will be very good for a LAN system, or even a cheaper gaming rig. Or even better, grab two of them in SLI and watch those pixels really fly!