now, low end cards with half a gig or more of ram are another matter,
but I can't say it's a bad idea on anything that's north of the
performance line of the 8800GT or so.
-JB
GB vs. 512MB on an 8800 GT
The big question was does having 1GB of video RAM really make a
difference on a GeForce 8800 GT GPU based video card? We tested this
by comparing the Palit GeForce 8800 GT Super+1GB to a reference
NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT with 512MB of RAM, both of which had the exact
same clock frequencies. What we found was that there basically wasn't
any gameplay differences at all. In only one game did we even detect
a slight performance advantage, and that was UT3 in an SLI configuration.
The simple reason is that in some instances the GeForce 8800 GT is
just not a fast enough GPU to realize the potential of 1GB of RAM. It
doesn't have the performance needed to push high settings in today's
games that will benefit with 1GB of RAM. Crysis is the new kid on the
block, the one by which all gamers are judging video card
performance. This game puts every video card to shame. The GeForce
8800 GT by no means is the fastest GPU out there, and in this game it
just can't push the game fast enough to utilize the full 1GB of
memory available. With SLI performance currently underperforming in
Crysis, the potential there is also not realized.
UT3 was the only game to really show us any raw performance
advantages with 1GB of RAM on an 8800 GT, and that was only in an SLI
configuration. Even then, it wasn't enough to allow a higher gameplay
experience. Call of Duty 4 also showed no advantages with 1GB of
video RAM. We must remember that the GeForce 8800 GT utilizes a
256-bit memory bus, and no matter how much RAM you stick on it, that
memory bus is not going to change. When you start running games at
the resolutions, settings and AA levels needed to push a 1GB
framebuffer, you really also need to have a high amount of memory
bandwidth available, and the 8800 GT just doesn't have it.
1GB of video RAM on the new 8800 GTS would even be iffy, even though
the GPU is much faster, it too utilizes a 256-bit memory bus and
might simply choke at those extreme settings in current games. 1GB of
video RAM seems appealing on paper, but if it doesn't have the GPU
performance and memory bandwidth to properly support the resolutions
and settings needed to push that amount of storage space, it really
is pointless.
The Price & Value
Palit has a suggested price of $299 for this video card. While the
Palit GeForce 8800 GT Super+1GB is currently not available at Newegg
(they do have plans to make that happen), you can find it online at
<http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3525668&CatId=2306>Tigerdirect
for the suggested price of $299. Searching Newegg the cheapest 512MB
8800 GT we can find is
<http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150259>this
one at $279.99. That is a difference of only $20. However, if you
plan on purchasing two, then the difference of $40 can definitely
make an impact. $20 more buys you 512MB more RAM, but in our
evaluation here today it really doesn't buy you a higher gameplay
experience, even in SLI. But with that said, you are getting a much
better cooling solution that has already been installed for you.
