Nvidia GeForce GTX280

  The graphics cards are getting better by the day and the market is getting heating up. Flashback 2007, when 8800 GTXs and 8800 Ultras were ruling the graphics card market, eating all the games for breakfast. These cards seemed to get through every benchmark thrown at them even without SLi.................Then came Crysis, the game with great graphics but sadly, no card was able to run it in its full glory. Nvidia tried to borrow some time to get their 9 series ready by introducing 3 way SLi. The game couldn't even run decently on these so  called "High End" 3 Way SLi rigs. When the 9 series was out with 9800GX2, which was 2 8800GTs on one card, Crysis remained a tough nut to crack. Even two of these were too less to handle crysis. Meanwhile, ATi had released their top end card HD 3870 x2, which was had two HD3870s as a single card. But, the attempt was in vain. Crysis was just too good for this junk (Crysis made them junk!). But now the time has come when Crysis is to be run with all the eye candy turned up and resolutions cranked up to 2560 x 1600. Nvidia's new card, GeForce GTX 280 is the new monster. This card is a beast with 1.4 billion transistors. It is based on the same old 65nm fabrication process. It also supports Nvidia PhysX which will make the physics calculations to a new level. We have to wait for the new drivers to see it in action though. It has 240 shader units and CUDA parallel processing which will reduce the load on the processor in regular tasks other than gaming.

Performance

Call of Duty 4

This card doesn't perform really well if you compare it to 9800 GX2 in quad SLi. But still it shows that it's undoubtedly the best single core card money can buy.

Crysis

Finally, a card that can run crysis in its full glory, that's what you may be thinking but hey, think again. If you believe that a single GTX 280 can run this game at highest settings, think again. It takes three of these cards to achieve that. But that's the only way you can play this game at maximum settings at 2560x1600.

As you see, 3 of these cards run crysis ad 38 FPS at the maximum possible settings at 2560x1600 resolution in the most graphically intense area of the game. Hmmmm......not bad!

Verdict

The verdict doesn't need to be long. The benchmarks show everything. Three of these cards will make the best rig money can buy but at a very steep price of about $640. So, three of them will cost you about $1900. Buy these if you have robbed a bank recently else it may bankrupt you!

Nvidia 9800GTX

With 9800GX2 breaking the performance barrier a week ago, expectations are high from the 9800GTX. Before you throw away your twin 9800GX2, read this review. There is no doubt about the fact that 9800GTX is a sibling of 9088GX2, but the question arises, elder or younger. Lets see.

Basically, the formula behind 980GTX is, take a 9800GX2, rip it into two, overclock it like hell, throw in some changes and you're done! So all of you, stop screaming like hell as this is a card whose performance is roughly the same as the 8800GTX. So, is there anything new? The answer is yes and no! Performance wise, it is the same as the 8800GTX. The price is lesser than its previous generation counterpart, apart from lower power consumption. So, this card is based on the same old G92 core which is used in 9800GX2 and 8800GTS 512MB. But the performance is better than the 8800GTS because of higher clock speeds. The fabrication process has moved to 65nm as opposed to 90nm of 8800GTX.

PERFORMANCE

The performance of this card is a huge letdown. It is at par with 8800GTX which has been around for atleast two years now. However, two of these are a shade better than the 9800GX2 due to the higher clocks.

Call of duty 4 shows that this card is slightly faster than 8800GTX.

You can draw absolutely no conclusion from Crysis. At lower resolutions, the card is better than even the 9800GX2 but higher resolutions show an absolutely different story.

VERDICT

If you were planning to buy an 8800GTX, dump the idea. 9800GTX is the way to go. Although, the performance of both these cards is similar, go for the 9800GTX because of lower power consumption, lower price and slightly better performance.