X-bit labs

GTX on Bargain: MSI GeForce NX8800GT-T2D512E-OC Review (page 10)

Category: Video

by Alexey Stepin , Yaroslav Lyssenko

[ 12/13/2007 | 04:23 PM ]

F.E.A.R. Perseus Mandate

Like Battlefield 2142, this game does not support resolutions of 16:10 format. So, we use 1920x1440 (4:3 format) instead of 1920x1200 in this test.

Perseus Mandate brings a number of innovations into the gameplay but does not affect the technical aspect, so the performance of the cards remains the same with the new add-on pack. All the three versions of GeForce 8800 GT included into this review show an acceptable speed at resolutions up to 1920x1200 inclusive. The pre-overclocked version from Leadtek is ahead of the MSI card, but the gap is really negligible.

For some reason the Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX feels diffident in comparison with the GeForce 8800 GT at 1920x1200 although it should be otherwise. The ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT 512MB has a good average frame rate but its minimum of speed is much lower than that of Nvidia’s solutions. That’s why we don’t think that the game is really playable on that card at resolutions above 1280x1024.

Half-Life 2: Episode Two

The MSI NX8800GT-T2D512E-OC is slower than the Leadtek WinFast PX8800 GT Extreme by 0.9-1.5fps. This negligible difference can be disregarded since both cards deliver about the same performance as the Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX. There is no difference between the GeForce 8800 GT and 8800 GTX when it comes to playing this game. The same goes for the reference card since you can overclock it to the same level as the cards from MSI and Leadtek.

Episode Two is much more demanding than Episode One, and the average frame rate of the pre-overclocked cards is higher than 60fps at 1280x1024 only. At a resolution of 1600x1200 it is close to 50fps. Subjectively, the game is playable in the latter case, but we don’t recommend you to turn FSAA on for playing at 1920x1200.