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[Mrbob]

Dual 6600 with 256 MB ram and a 256 bit bus all on one card! I think this is pretty cool!

http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20041216_115811.html

The card integrates two Nvidia GeForce 6600 GT graphics processors and is the first 6600 GT card on the market to offer a total of 256 MByte DDR 3 memory and 256 Mbit of memory bandwidth, according to the manufacturer. The card is cooled by two on-board fans.

The 3D1's two processors communicate through Nvidia's SLI interface and achieved 14,293 points in 3DMark2003, sources at Gigabyte said. This would not only be almost twice the performance of a regular 6600 GT card, but also more than ATI's Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition, which achieved in Gigabyte's test environment 13,271 points and Nvidia's GeForce 6800 Ultra, which posted 12,680 points.

Will be interesting to see what the final price is on such a card! Now I want dual 6800 with 512MB ram on one card next!

 

[Mrbob]

More about the price:

While Gigabyte claims that the 3D1 will trump the performance of Radeon X850 XT Platinum Edition and the GeForce 6800 Ultra cards, it says that the card will be offered in combination with the mainboard GA-K8NXP-SLI for less money than ATI's and Nvidia's single-GPU graphics cards alone. These high end cards current carry suggested retail prices between $500 and $600.

!!!!!!

 

[AntoneM]

I think I'm going to cry (tears of joy that is)

 

[BenT]

Hooray. PC game graphics hardware is finally getting interesting again.

I wonder if that mobo would fit in this Dell case.

 

[Zaptruder]

Oh... Oh... OHHHhhh~

That's so mine.

 

[FightyF]

Tom's Hardware Guide's test lab staff will run the 3D1 through its benchmark track, as soon as the card becomes available. According to sources, will be available in samples at the end of this month and will be sold as "luxury solution" for gamers by mid of January.

I wonder what they mean by luxury solution...anyone know?

I'm ready to plop $600 Cdn on a new Mobo, CPU, 512 RAM and a decent vid card. Getting a mobo and awesome vidcard for $620 Cdn (assuming that the bundle will cost $499.99 US) would be worth it considering the performance I'd get from it.

I just don't know if I can wait another 2 months!

BTW, thanks for posting this Mrbob!

 

[Mrbob]

I wonder if you could possibly SLI two of these cards together for quadruple GPU action?!?!

 

[FightyF]

I'm still giddy over this news.

AFAIK NVIDIA did say that you'd have to have 2 of the exact same cards to do this. They've also said that 2 GPUs is not the limit, but currently how it's going to work (in a master slave relationship).

Maybe there is no available bridge for the link card.

I wonder how this will affect the next generation of games...not because of this technology (which has existed for a while) but the fact that it's turning out cheaper to use 2 older GPUs to outperform the latest one...and ending up cheaper in the end.

 

[COCKLES]

HL2 will still load every 30 seconds.

 

[FightyF]

There is no bridge on the card.

Secondly, there is some concern that AA enabled will cause it to chug.

Which means, as usual, that we should wait for some 3rd party scores. Regardless it looks like it will be a great card for the price. How great, we'll have to see.

 

[rastex]

For something this expensive and high-end, why use an old benchmarking tool and not the latest one? Because that'll be representative of the performance you'll get in future games where a card of this level is actually important. A normal 6600GT can play pretty much any game at max settings at a decent level at 1280x1024.

 

[marsomega]

There is no bridge on the card.

Secondly, there is some concern that AA enabled will cause it to chug.

Which means, as usual, that we should wait for some 3rd party scores. Regardless it looks like it will be a great card for the price. How great, we'll have to see.

It's 128bit bus will bite it in the ass.
Also keep in mind that NVIDIA's "SLI" may not the best way to get Dual GPU performance. There is a leak on the net, word is that they hacked a ATI sample RS200 board or what not to run two NVIDIA boards with ATI's AMR technology, word is that they are faster then when paired up using SLI.

 

[Mrbob]

I think this card is some sort of special design because the article says the card is a 256 bit bus card. Have things changed?

 

[BigJonsson]

Why would you need that kind of power?

 

[Rabid Wolverine]

How will Drivers come into play ?

Will the standard Nvidia Drivers work or will Gigabyte have to specifically customize the drivers ?

 

[marsomega]

I think this card is some sort of special design because the article says the card is a 256 bit bus card. Have things changed?

Just picked it up about the 256-bit bus from tomshardware. I went by NVIDIA's 6600 GPU's specs though.

 

[Suikoguy]

Any update on this?
I'm going to be building a new computer to replace my hurricane damaged one,
this was very interesting.

 

[Culex]

Any update on this?
I'm going to be building a new computer to replace my hurricane damaged one,
this was very interesting.

Disappointing to say the least. It performs slower than the 6800GT and costs nearly 200 dollars more. Yuck!


Firingsquad

As of right now, it requires you have a Gigabyte board which supports this card

 

[Mrbob]

Ahhh, boo. That is disappointing.

With those you results, you are better buying a PCI-E enabled mobo with a PCI-E 6800GT that you could SLI down the road.

 

[GXAlan]

Welcome to last year

 

[BenT]

Oh well. I was excited for awhile, anyway.

 

[Mrbob]

You're late firing squad boy.