Introduction

First launched in May 2007, the GeForce 8800 Ultra is still the fastest single GPU on the planet over one year after its original release. At the time we were pretty under whelmed by the 8800 Ultra. Its clocks weren’t much higher than the GeForce 8800 GTX, in fact, factory OC’ed 8800 GTX boards were capable of running within a few frames per second of the Ultra, as the card was only 6-13% faster than a bone stock GeForce 8800 GTX running at NVIDIA’s factory speeds. We even wondered aloud if the GPU was worthy of its “Ultra” designation. Ultimately we suggested it wasn’t. Boy if we only knew how the next 12 months would pan out…

The high-end graphics market, once known for its brutal competition, became brutally boring. Despite its jaw-dropping specs, AMD’s R600 GPU never lived up to its potential, instead it competed one notch below the GeForce 8800 GTX and Ultra in the sub-$400 performance graphics segment. This left the enthusiast space all alone to NVIDIA, and they summarily did nothing, shoring up their position in the mainstream market instead with the launch of the GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB, 8800 GT, and 9600 GT. These GPUs were all terrific upgrades for the price segments they competed in, but enthusiasts looking for a GPU that would truly displace the GeForce 8800 GTX or Ultra were left out in the cold.

Then came the GeForce 9800s.

As their name implied, these GPUs were supposed to be the answer that so many enthusiasts wanted, but they each had their share of flaws.

GeForce GTX 280 reference board

GeForce GTX 260 reference board

Bottom of GTX 280...

The GeForce 9800 GTX was a complete miss. Overall the 9800 GTX was slightly slower than the 8800 GTX, much less an 8800 Ultra in 3D gaming performance (the only exception to this rule was Company of Heroes). Fortunately the 9800 GTX delivered lower power consumption than the 8800 GTX/Ultra, and its VP2 video processor delivered better video playback; but this card wasn’t an upgrade if you already owned an 8800 GTX or Ultra.

The 9800 GX2 was a little better – it actually outperformed a single GeForce 8800 Ultra by a factor of 1.5X – but it needs two GPUs to accomplish this. Two GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB cards combined together for SLI are actually capable of outrunning the 9800 GX2, and are also priced lower than the GX2 as well. The GeForce 9800 GX2 is a fine card, especially if your motherboard only has one PCI Express graphics slot, but it just wasn’t the head turner that the GeForce 8800 GTX was when it launched.

...Looks similar to GTX 260

GTX 280 SLI

GTX 260

This brings us to today’s launch of the GeForce GTX 200 family. The GTX 200 is NVIDIA’s second generation unified shading architecture, building on the foundation first established with the GeForce 8800 GTX in November 2006. NVIDIA has incorporated a number of tweaks designed to improve performance over the GeForce 8800 GTX. Here it’s important to stress again that the bar NVIDIA was shooting for was the GeForce 8800 GTX and not the 9800 GX2. Work on this GPU began years before the 9800 GX2 came to market. In fact, NVIDIA’s design goal was to deliver up to twice the performance of the 8800 GTX.

But did they deliver? That’s what we’re here to find out!