The Card
With the GeForceFX, the look of graphics cards has been re-defined. This reference card is a real monster! Through its large cooler, the card weighs in at 610 grams/1.32 lbs - that's about three times the weight of a GeForce4 Ti4800 or a Radeon 9700 PRO (approx. 200 grams/0.49 lbs). But more about the cooler later.
The GeForceFX (NV30) is being introduced in two formats. Apart from the card that we look at in this review, the GeForceFX 5800 Ultra (500 MHz core, 1000 MHz DDR-II), there will also be a "normal" FX 5800 that will run at slower clock speeds (400 MHz core, 800 MHz DDR-II). Some time later, NVIDIA will launch the N31 and NV34 variants, the details of which are not yet known.
The chip runs on an extravagant 12-layer board. Rumors have been going around that NVIDIA will only have complete cards available to card manufacturers and not, as is typical, the individual components - these rumors are incorrect. Although NVIDIA will be delivering a few complete cards in the beginning, so that the manufacturers can quickly introduce cards to the market, the usual kits (chips, memory, cooler) will also be made available. The manufacturers are also free to choose the cooler, as long as it meets the cooling requirements set down by NVIDIA.
| Header Cell - Column 0 | ATI Radeon 9700 PRO | NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti4800 | NVIDIA GeForceFX 5800 | NVIDIA GeForceFX 5800 Ultra |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chip Technology | 256 bit | 256 bit | 256 bit | 256 bit |
| Process | 0.15 Micron | 0.15 Micron | 0.13 Micron | 0.13 Micron |
| Transistors | ~107 Million | 63 Million | 125 Million | 125 Million |
| Memory Bus | 256 bit DDR | 128 bit DDR | 128 bit DDR2 | 128 bit DDR2 |
| Memory Bandwidth | 19.8 GB/s | 10.4 GB/s | 12.8 GB/s | 16 GB/s |
| Pixel Fillrate | 2.6 Gigapixel/s | 1.24 Gigapixel/s | ~3.2 Gigapixel/s | ~4 Gigapixel/s |
| Anti Aliased Fillrate | 15.6 Billion AA Samples/s | 4.8 Billion AA Samples/s | ~12.8 Billion AA Samples/s | ~16 Billion AA Samples/s |
| Max FSAA Mode | 6x | 4x | 8x | 8x |
| Triangle Transform Rate | 325 M Triangles/s | 69 M Triangles/s | 280 M Triangles/s | 350 M Triangles/s |
| AGP Bus | 1x/2x/4x/8x | 1x/2x/4x/8x | 1x/2x/4x/8x | 1x/2x/4x/8x |
| Memory | 128/256 MB | 128 MB | 128/256 MB | 128/256 MB |
| GPU Clock | 325 MHz | 300 MHz | ~400 MHz | ~500 MHz |
| Memory Clock | 310 MHz (620 DDR) | 325 MHz (650 DDR) | 400 MHz (800 DDR2) | 500 MHz (1000 DDR2) |
| Memory | BGA 2.9 ns | BGA 2.8ns | ? | BGA 2.0ns |
| Vertex Shader | 4 | 2 | FP Array | FP Array |
| Pixel Pipelines | 8 | 4 | 8 | 8 |
| Texture Units Per Pipe | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 |
| Textures per Texture Unit | 8 | 4 | 16 | 16 |
| Vertex S. Version | 2 | 1.1 | 2.0+ | 2.0+ |
| Pixel S. Version | 2 | 1.3 | 2.0+ | 2.0+ |
| DirectX Generation | 9 | 8 | 9.0 (+) | 9.0 (+) |
| FSAA Modi | MultiSampling | MultiSampling | MultiSampling | MultiSampling |
| Memory Optmizations | Hyper Z III | LMA II | LMA II OptimizedColor Compression | LMA II OptimizedColor Compression |
| Display Outputs | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| Chip Internal Ramdacs | 2 x 450 MHz | 2 x 350 MHz | 2 x 400 MHz | 2 x 400 MHz |
| Chip External Ramdacs | - | - | - | - |
| Bits per Color Channel | 10 | 8 | 10 | 10 |
| Special | TV Encoder On-Chip; FullStreamAdaptive Filtering | - | TV Encoder On-ChipExtended ProgammabilityAdaptive Filtering | TV Encoder On-ChipExtended ProgammabilityAdaptive Filtering |
| Estimated Price | $399 | ~ $200-300 | Not specified | $399 |