nVidia GeForce 8800 GTX- sexy as hell

When nVidia released the GeForce 8800 GTX, I almost wet myself with excitement. This graphics card has it all: fast, steller graphics, top of the line, and, to sweeten the deal, it probably won't become obsolete for a while. Label me impressed.

This 8800 is revolutionary for graphics cards everywhere. It has a new design and architecture, thus making it difficult to compare it to previous cards. But it's still got the basics: core clock speed of 575 MHz, 768 MB of DDR3 RAM that clocks to 900 MHz with a 1800 MHz data rate, 128 stream processors, and power. Oh so much power.

Unlike other graphics cards, the 8800 GTX doesn't assign any pipes to a particular task, which in turn allows rapid, efficient processing of whatever information you throw its way. In other words, it can focus all it's resources at a certain task instead of capping out at 48 pipes. I would put money on game designers taking advantage of the abilities of this card in future games, knowing that more proccessing power can be used.

Ok, now an overview of the power of this baby. The transistor count is 681 million on a 90 nm process chip. Reccomended power supply to fuel this monster? 450-watts with a high-end duel-core processor. In other words, while you can probably make this card work in your SLI-rig, it's gonna be hard. There are two power connectors on the back of the card, yada yada yada, instillation shit, ok, next.

nVidia reccomends pairing this sexy piece of gaming graphics capability with a moniter that can handle it. Apparently the 8800 gets a little bored if you can't play at high-resolutions and can have CPU bottlenecks. But that's not really a big deal, and if you have a top of the line moniter, the graphics are orgasmic and unprecidented. Yes, that sexy. I promise.

The main problem with the 8800 GTX is it's fucking huge and runs extremely hot. There's no way in hell you can put it in a shuttle, and unless you have the most massive case you can find, you probably won't get it into your tower, either. Power supply has also proved to be an issue, as there are a few cases where you simply cannot have that much power, as well as cooling systems. Do yourself a favor and don't spend the money for this card if you don't have a spectacular cooling system, as frying a paycheck is probably cheaper. High customer reviews (I only found one bad review, and the guy appeared to be a blubbering idiot (yes, I checked his background) so I discredited him) and new hardware coming out that will make coupling this baby with bigger, better motherboards and processors possible, thus increasing the sexy factor, make me say that this is the graphics card to get if you're planning on upgrading anytime soon.

I will say that I don't reccomend upgrading to the 8800 GTX if you are planning on replacing your computer anytime soon. Actually, I'd just build a new system around this baby (ok, so maybe I'm just looking for an excuse to get a new computer). Killer graphics, top of the line (ATI has nothing that can come close to this) and lots of potential... yeah, I'm sold.