The
high end graphics arena has shown some very impressive cards in
the past few years (well, after the 5800 that is) but huge leaps
in performance have started to give way to supporting more features.
That changed with the 7800GTX which offered a big increase in
performance as it's most shining feature. Now while the 7800GTX
is without a doubt a great card, it is a lot of cash to lay down.
Luckily, the 7800GTX has a smaller brother in the 7800GT, a card
which offers a nice performance increase without asking for your
first born (second born is usually easier to get hold of anyway,
since the first born is usually a nice child sent to confuse parents
into thinking they like children, the second child showing you
how wrong that is).
We’ve
looked at Club-3D
hardware at Viperlair before and will be doing so again in this
review of their 7800GT
256MB offering.
The
packaging design that Club-3D uses is not the usual fare you
see from other game directed hardware; Club-3D have opted for
a more reserved exclusive look which is still bold enough to
stand out without getting in your face like a bad night club
flyer. The rear of the box gives you all of the pertinent information
on the hardware and inside everything is nicely packed.
Included
with the card are two DVI-VGA adapters (for the two DVI ports
on the card), 4 CD’s - Club-3D’s driver install
CD, Colin McRae Rally 05, WWF Panda Junior in Africa, Cyberlink
programs including PowerDVD - an HDTV VIVO dongle and a 4pin
Molex to 6pin VGA power adapter. The overall package isn’t
extensive, but it is very complete. It’s nice to see two
DVI-VGA adapters with a card that has two DVI ports, but I would
have liked to have seen a better choice for displaying your
graphics power than the demo’s on the Club-3D Driver CD
or the two games included. Still, it’s the card that most
buyers are interested in.
The
card itself follows the reference design with only the label
on the HSF making a change. A green PCB is not going to stand
out among the sea of colourful cards you can get, but this is
reflected in the price. At the rear of the card are the multitude
of capacitors and diodes used for regulating power. Speaking
of which, this is a hungry item, and can consume around 100w
fully loaded.
Of
course the Club-3D 7800GT is SLI capable which should make for
a very nice gaming system. The rear of the card is completely
uneventful, with the full 256MB being on the front side of the
card under the HSF. The IO plate features two DVI ports with
a VIVO din style port center.
One
thing that should be apparent is that this is a single slot solution,
and what this will do for temperatures we shall see during testing.
Test
Setup
Albatron
PX925X Pro, Intel Pentium 4 520 (3.2GHz), 2 x 512MB Kingston HyperX
PC2-5400 (4-4-4-12), 2x 80GB Maxtor 7200 SATA's, Windows XP w/SP2
We'll
be using FRAPS to record framerates in all our tests, playing
the game as anybody would (trying to stay alive), firing weapons,
dodging attacks and so on. Unlike our past video game tests, all
benchmarks will be done with the audio "on", as we're
trying to illustrate real gaming experiences, and I doubt any
of our readers mute the audio during gameplay. A 6800GT will be
used to compare the previous generation with this one and a Dell
Ultrasharp 2005FPW 20" Widescreen LCD will be used for display
(hence the widescreen resolutions chosen for some games).
Test
Software will be:
Doom
3 - Making good use of the BFG, rocket launcher and plasma
gun (the most graphically intense weapons), we'll be kicking ass
on the Caverns Area 1 level, specifically the part right after
reaching the bottom in the cargo lift.
Half
Life 2: Lost Coast – A short 10 minute game demo utilizing
HDR in the Source engine, Lost Coast requires you to have a recent
card to see all the visual goodness. Starting at the bottom of
the stairs, we worked our way up to the chapel above, shooting
the combine on the way and admiring the view.
F.E.A.R.
– Certainly not the prettiest game in the bunch used here,
but if you want a good scare then this game can provide it. The
lighting and shadows (if you have a machine capable of it) all
add to the atmosphere. We ran around part of interval 03, after
escaping the fire in the warehouse.
Battlefield
2 - We tested the gameplay on the Songhua Stalemate map with
15 bots. This map features a lot of greenery and water areas,
as well as lots of hills and buildings which makes the fighting
tight and the views expansive, all of which gives your graphics
card a challenge.
Need
for Speed: Most Wanted – NFS: MW features a lot of
particle effects and reflective surfaces, along with an HDR filtering
effect that provides some very nice visuals. We tricked an RX-8
and went for a blast around town avoiding the traffic and police.
The
driver settings were manually configured for AntiAliasing and
Anisotropic Filtering (on or off), and set to "Quality".
All games were set to their highest playable game settings for
best possible image quality unless otherwise stated.
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