Nvidia 8600GTS has only 32 shaders

Just saw this on the inq...

GeForce 8600GTS comes at a default clock of 675MHz for the GPU and 1GHz DDR (2GHz) for GDDR-3 memory. The GPU consists of 289 million transistors, putting it right in G71, or 7900 territory. These 289 million transistors are spent on 32 Scalar Shader units clocked at 1.45GHz each. Power draw with default clock should not exceed 71 Watts, but theoretical headroom is 125-150W (45-75W from PCIe slot, 75W from 6-pin PCIe power connector), hence the overclocking competition between the companies.

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=38884

I was expecting 64 shaders on the GTS, with only 32 is goes some way to explain just why it's so far behing the likes of the 8800GTS, it's only a third of the card...

ekk the 8600's are looking like a let down

Yeah, except that the $250 is MSRP, which is usually why BB is bad pricing, and for the first couple of days the GF8600GTS will be hovering around that price even at places like NewEgg, so with the GTS-320 within $10 it's gonna be tough, and even if it's $200on NewEgg, that's still not worth it compared to a $180 X1950XT.

Launching a weak card into a tough last generation market, like I've said before, this looks like the X1600 of the DX10 generation.

Big selling point? Its like the only selling point. Why would I want to buy a more expensive x1950?

dont forget thats 20 more than the midrange 7600 series cards, and as for the 8300/8500 series with 16 piplines, thats more than the 7300 series with 8 pipelines

yeah, unfortunately the 8600gt and gts are pretty weak in terms of mid-range graphics cards. In some cases the 7600gt would be a better buy for performance since its cheaper and offers more bang for the buck. The 8600gt and gts perform similar to the 7800gt/7900gs which isnt saying much considering they are next gen cards. The 128bit memory shit hurts the cards. only overclocking will save them

That would be nice.

I wonder if/when one of the partners will release a 8600GT with a PCI-e power connector? I wonder if NV will allow them to do so. Could be a nice OC'er, but of course probably end up being an overpriced version because of it.

That hardwarezone 8600GTS review is down and I don't have it cached.
http://hardwarezone.com/articles/v [...] =3&id=2231

The 8600GTS isn't a good card to be honest. Let me find the benchmarks I had.

http://sg.vr-zone.com/?i=4883

As you can see, it's neck and neck with a 7900GT. But how about a 7950GT? A 7950GT can be had for roughly the same price as an 8600GTS after the initial price hikes.

And what games would really require the gaming power of DX10 anyway? Crysis in September and that's it? Not only is Crysis the only DX10 game in the near future that's worth playing, it's the only DX10 game in the next year that's even a big title.

The 8600GTS is going to launch at roughly $249 almost everywhere, yet it can't match even 60-70% of the 8800GTS 320.

It's a big time flop. The whole "Mid range should be better than last year's high range" plan doesn't work this time. Why? Because last year's high range from Nvidia got stomped by ATI really badly and ATI kept closing the gap between high and mid range because of the G80 releasing. It's like... Yeah pay $250 for an 8600GTS for only one DX10 game, or pay $150 for an ATI 1950 Pro that matches the performance?

Which would be a huge mistake if you ask me. The 7900GS is a value a lot of consumers enjoy. If they remove it, they won't have sales at all if consumers are informed lol.

FSX in my opinion isn't really the 8600GTS' forte either. The reason for that is because even if FSX supports DX10, it's such a poorly coded game, it'll run like crap on an 8600GTS anyway. So why bother with the DX10 hoo-ha when you can't even find a DX10 title that's worth playing on it?

It seems like software is at a virtual stand still right now. The only DX10 titles worth mentioning are only playable by the $300 range of video-cards and higher and Nvidia is trying to milk the Vista using, DX10 hungry consumers by releasing a completely cut down and neutered G80 core.

I think both companies are making their fair share of mistakes, with ATI planning on only releasing the R600XT and holding off the XTX until 2 months from now, and Nvidia lowering their guard right when their opponent is about to start throwing haymakers, it seems like in the midst of this battle, both companies decided instead of going heads up against each other and throwing out all the fire power, they both decided, "Hey let's just throw big retard haymakers with our eyes closed and see who lands one first". The real victims end up being us, the consumers.

But hey, let's pitch in $100 each of us and buy an 8800 Ultra for $1000.

sadly, how well this thing sells will probably be down to how much big manufacturers hype it up and how many people see the words DX10 without actually thinking what that means and buy it on that basis alone.

i personally do not see DX10 as a selling point as at least to me it means so little unless you are talking about playing DX10 games and making use of whatever new features comes with it. this card i doubt will have the power to play those games at decent settings.

then again, i will wait until some proper reviews turn up using proper drivers before making final judgement. either way this kind of product does not affect me and hopefully won't be bought by anyone looking to play tomorrows games.

i will however, wait for people appearing on the forums asking why their new card won't play games well even though it is dx10 capable

Yeah Pauldh and I were talking about that in the other GF8600 thread the other day, that alot of people will upgrade and wonder why the card they bought for $250 isn't outperforming the card they bought 6-9 months before for less.

It's far from beinf an FX, but it is one of those things where people will get drawn in by checkboxes and model numbers more than knowing what they are buying, the same thing happend to many people who bought an X1600.

sorry, i fail to see any logic behind your decision to buy the card that you did.

ATI might be in a heap of trouble, but I'm sure they will come out with cards that work. As TheGreatGrapeApe said, waiting until they came out would have lowered the price of that card a little.

While the x850XT might be a high end AGP card, it isn't close to the top of the heap overall. As shown here, my aging x1800XT beats your card in every test. (the x1950pro is similar in performance to the x1800xt) But if it plays well enough for you, then you don't need anything higher.

What I found laughable however is your defense of the 8600. If you bought this only for DX10 support, you're an idiot. (I mean that in the nicest way.) Personally, I wouldn't bother trying to get ANYTHING for DX10 support. I'm not moving to vista until it runs games as fast as XP can. I also wouldn't buy a card until there is a DX10 game that comes out that I want to play. In the 6months that it might be before there are any DX10 games out, AMD and Nvidia might be in an all out price war and the 8600/HD2600 will be a lot lower in price then they are/will be now.

It seems to me (and more importantly others) that you jumped the gun on this. Had you bought a motherboard with onboard graphics, or bought a cheap $45-60 card and waited for DX10 to arrive, then I would understand your choice. But to spend $200+ for something that underperforms the competition while probably being a lot cheaper 6months down the line when you could actually use it isn't something I understand at all.