[W1zzard]

Introduction

A few weeks back NVIDIA announced their GeForce GTX 200 series consisting of the GeForce GTX 280 and the GeForce GTX 260. The GTX 280 is without doubt the fastest graphics card on the market, but will also rip the biggest hole in your wallet. The GTX 260 is a cut down version of the GTX 280, which comes at a cheaper price point.
Compared to its big brother, the GTX 260 features only 192 shaders (240 on the GTX 280), 28 ROPs (GTX 280: 32) and 896 MB of graphics memory (GTX 280: 1024 MB). Also the clock speeds have been reduced a bit. Overall these changes result in a $200 cheaper card, which is about the price of a single HD 4850.

Point of View's GeForce GTX 260 is a complete implementation of the NVIDIA reference design. One highlight however is the included Assassin's Creed Full Game in the package, which is one of the top titles at the moment.

	Radeon HD 3850	Radeon HD 3870	GeForce 9600 GT	GeForce 8800 GT	Radeon HD 4850	GeForce 8800 GTS	Radeon HD 4870	GeForce 8800 GTX	GeForce GTX 260	GeForce 8800 Ultra	GeForce GTX 280
Shader units	320	320	64	112	800	128	800	128	192	128	240
ROPs	16	16	16	16	16	16	16	24	28	24	32
GPU	RV670	RV670	G94	G92	RV770	G92	RV770	G80	GT200	G80	GT200
Transistors	666M	666M	505M	754M	956M	754M	956M	681M	1400M	681M	1400M
Memory Size	256 MB	512 MB	512 MB	512 MB	512 MB	512 MB	512 MB	768 MB	896 MB	768 MB	1024 MB
Memory Bus Width	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	384 bit	448 bit	384 bit	512 bit
Core Clock	670 MHz	777 MHz	650 MHz	600 MHz	625 MHz	650 MHz	750 MHz	575 MHz	576 MHz	612 MHz	602 MHz
Memory Clock	828 MHz	1126 MHz	900 MHz	900 MHz	993 MHz	970 MHz	900 MHz	900 MHz	999 MHz	1080 MHz	1107 MHz
Price	$120	$150	$140	$160	$199	$210	$299	$390	$400	$520	$619

Packaging & Contents

The package definitely highlights the included Assassin's Creed Game, but when looking at the box in a rush you will barely make out that the product inside is a GTX 260 made my Point of View. A carrying handle on the package will let you carry your new card back to your lair from the shop.



You will receive:

• Graphics card
• Manual + Driver CD + Assassin's Creed full game
• DVI Adapter + HDMI Adapter
• PCI-Express power adapter
• SPDIF audio cable

The Card

Point of View's GTX 260 looks exactly like their GTX 280, only a small print on the bottom will reveal the different model name. Just like the GTX 280, the GTX 260 uses a dual slot cooler.


The card has two DVI ports, basically the most common output configuration these days. In case you need an analog VGA port you can use the included DVI adapter. When using an HDMI adapter (also included), you will also have access to HDMI+HDCP+Audio, which allows easy setup of a media PC. For the HDMI audio feature you have to connect the included SPDIF cable from your on-board audio or sound card to the input on the GTX 260.


Here are the front and the back of the card, high-res versions are also available (front, back). If you choose to use these images for voltmods etc, please include a link back to this site or let us post your article.

A Closer Look

Like on all recent high-end cards from NVIDIA, the cooler is a quite complex piece of technology. The main cooling assembly (first picture) uses a copper base to move the heat away from the GPU as fast as possible. If you look closely you can see the missing memory cooling pad on the front and the back.


The SLI connector is hidden behind a rubber cover. You can combine up to three GeForce GTX 280 cards in SLI to get even more performance.


Power to the card is supplied via 2x 6-pin PCI-Express power connectors. Both are required for operation. Further to the right you see the SPDIF audio input, covered by another rubber cap.


Just like on the G80 (GeForce 8800 GTX/Ultra), the output logic has been moved outside of the GPU and resides in this small chip called NVIO. Compared to the G80's NVIO, this one is a new version called NVIO2. This design approach removes all the analog signals and high frequencies of the TMDS link from the GPU silicon, resulting in (a bit) simplified GPU design.
On the other hand this extra part adds cost to the PCB design. Another advantage becomes apparent if you think "GPGPU/ CUDA" - in pure calculation board designs the display output logic is not needed, which allows a cost advantage when built without.


The GDDR3 chips are made by Hynix and have the model number H5RS5223CFR-N0C. Hynix rates those chips at 1000 MHz (= 1.0 ns cycle time). On the GTX 280 the faster 1200 MHz chips are used, but in our overclocking tests the memory on our sample easily passed the 1200 MHz mark.


This is NVIDIA's massive GT200 GPU, it comes with 1.4 billion transistors in a 65 nm process. Its die size of 576 mm² makes it the biggest and most expensive GPU produced to date. Please note that the metal you see is not the GPU die, but the heatspreader on top of it. As you can see the GTX 260 uses the "-100" variant of the GT200 graphics processor, while the GTX 280 uses the "-300". Now what could "-200" be used for?

Test System

Test System
CPU:	Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 @ 3.6 GHz (Wolfdale, 6144 KB Cache)
Motherboard:	Gigabyte P35C-DS3R Intel P35
Memory:	2x 1024MB A.DATA DDR2 1066+ CL4
Harddisk:	WD Raptor 740ADFD 74 GB
Power Supply:	OCZ GameXStream 700W
Software:	Windows XP SP2
Drivers:	NVIDIA: 175.16, GTX 280 & 260: 177.34 ATI: Catalyst 8.5, 4850 & 4870: 8.6

• All video card results were obtained on this exact system with the exact same configuration.
• All games were set to their highest quality setting

Each benchmark was tested at the following settings and resolution:

• 1024 x 768, No Anti-aliasing, No anisotropic filtering. This is a standard resolution without demanding display settings.
• 1280 x 1024, 2x Anti-aliasing, 8x anisotropic filtering. Common resolution for most gamer flatscreens today. A bit of eye candy turned on in the drivers.
• 1600 x 1200, 4x Anti-aliasing, 16x anisotropic filter. Highest non-widescreen resolution available to a wide range of users. Very good looking driver graphics settings.
• 2048 x 1536, 4x Anti-aliasing, 16x anisotropic filter. Highest non-widescreen resolution available to any consumer video card. Very good looking driver graphics settings.

Call of Duty 4

Call of Duty 4 is a first-person shooter that is built on the award winning Call of Duty Series. It is the first version to play in modern times. In a near-future conflict between the United States, Europe and Russia you get to play as a United States Marine and a British SAS operative. The engine is Infinity Ward's own creation and has true dynamic lighting, depth of field, dynamic shadows and HDR. Even though the game plot is scripted you will find yourself in intense battles, often working together with computer controlled team mates.

Company Of Heroes

The real-time strategy game Company of Heroes is set during World War II where you take two American companies through several fights all over France to liberate the country from German occupation. Company of Heroes is the first game to use Relic's next-generation engine "Essence Engine" which includes support for HDR lighting, Shader Model 3.0, normal mapping, dynamic lighting and shadows. You are able to zoom in from the tactical view of the battle field to see the individual units fighting. Often you catch yourself admiring the detailed animations of the soldiers while the fight around you is raging. We tested the DX9 version of the game at maximum details.

Crysis

After the tremendous success of Far Cry, the German game studio Crytek released their latest shooter Crysis in 2007. The game was by far the most hyped and anticipated game in 2007, the forums were full of "Can my system run Crysis?" threads because of the high hardware requirements of this game. Just like in Far Cry the plot evolves on a small island with a thick and richly detailed jungle world. A lot of attention has been given to small details like correct physics. For example when you fire on a tree trunk, it will shatter and the tree will fall over leaving a stump behind. Enemies in a car can be stopped by shooting the tire of the car. The game graphics are by far the best ever seen in a PC game so far, yet the game still runs well on most computers. We tested the DX9 version with graphics set to "High", which is the highest non-DX10 setting in the game.

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars

The first-person shooter Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is set in the science-fiction universe of Quake and requires several classes to work together to achieve certain goals on a map. In the campaign mode you gain experience which you can use to buy upgrades for your class. The player gets to pick from five classes of either the Global Defense Force or the Strogg faction. As underlying game engine, the successful id Software Doom 3 engine has been licensed, but several features like MegaTextures have been added, giving the outdoor world a much more detailed appearance. We tested the DX9 version of the game at maximum details.

Far Cry

Far Cry was released in early 2004 by the new development studio Crytek. It quickly became a massive success because it was one of the first titles to take you in a beautiful 3D outdoor world. Far Cry was one of the most demanding games at its time. Even with today's video cards you can still see big differences in frame rates, especially at the higher resolutions.

FEAR

The first person shooter F.E.A.R, developed by Monolith Game Studios, was released in Fall 2005 and has a great 3D engine that uses a large number of shading and shadow effects to accurately model the game world. In addition to that it features a realistic physics engine that lets you interact with many objects in the game world. The game was voted game of the year by several publications.

Prey

Prey is based on a highly modified 3D engine made by id Software. This first person shooter brought a completely new way of gaming to the genre. In many levels you find yourself walking upside down or on the walls. This adds a completely new aspect to the gaming experience in this genre.

Quake 4

The Quake titles are among the most successful first person games. Developed by id Software, the famous game studio that brought you DOOM, you find yourself in a scifi world that is full of aliens and shocking effects. The main focus of the game is the single player story line. Quake 4 puts you on the home planet of the Strogg. In a number of missions you and your fellow marines will encounter all sorts of enemies, including some really huge aliens.

Splinter Cell 3: Chaos Theory

The Splinter Cell Series is endorsed by popular book author Tom Clancy. In the 2005 title Splinter Cell 3: Chaos Theory you play the NSA agent Sam Fisher who has to use stealth and finesse to make his way through a number of levels mainly set in eastern Asia. The game is based on a modified Unreal 2 engine with support for HDR, normal mapping, parallax mapping and soft shadows. A patch added Shader Model 2.0 support for ATI in addition to the Shader Model 3.0 support which was already part of the original shipping game.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

Before its release in 2007, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl was one of the most hyped games of the last years. This RPG/FPS hybrid game is set a few years in the future, after a nuclear disaster occurs at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. The release of radiation causes strange things like mutations in the nearby area. You take the role of a Stalker who seeks fame and riches in the contaminated area around Chernobyl. The game engine features all the latest buzzwords like HDR, bullet physics, skeletal animation, soft shadows and weather effects. Stalker's vast outside world is richly modeled, you can interact with a large number of objects in the game thanks to the physics engine.

Supreme Commander

If you hear people talk about a real-time strategy game with "massive numbers of units fighting" you can be sure they are talking about Supreme Commander. The unofficial successor to the Total Annihilation Series completely redefined some aspects of the RTS genre. In Supreme Commander you can zoom out so far that you can see the whole map on your screen and units are just little blips. This is much needed in fights when several hundred units go at each other. Supreme Commander is also one of the most demanding RTS games with support for up to four CPU cores - a dual-core system with high-end graphics is recommended for optimum game play.

Unreal Tournament 3

The fourth game in Epic's highly successful Unreal Tournament Series is simply called Unreal Tournament 3. It is based on the all-new Unreal 3 engine which is a major step forward from the previous engine. The game principle is centered about an arena style gameplay where several contestants try to reach a certain kill count or capture a flag for example. As you would expect from a new 2007 title, the graphics are top notch, with large and detailed textures. One major drawback of the way the engine is designed is that there is no support for Anti-Aliasing. While video card vendors like ATI have found ways to force this in their drivers we did all our testing with AA disabled in DX9 at maximum settings.

3DMark03

Futuremark Corporation is the number one player in the world of synthetic benchmarking. The 3DMark series is the most popular test suite for video card testing and is used by gamers, overclockers and manufacturers alike to determine how fast their hardware is. Even though it is a few years old, 3DMark03 can easily stress today's video cards.

3DMark05

Another benchmark from Futuremark is 3DMark05 which comes with four completely new game tests that make massive use of shaders and lighting effects. 3DMark05 is a great test for modern video card architectures - in some tests you are often close to the 30 fps mark, below which your games will feel sluggish.

3DMark06

Even though it's based on Futuremark's 3DMark05, the new 3DMark06 adds new tests for Shader Model 3.0 and HDR rendering. It is also the first 3DMark to incorporate a CPU score into the final 3DMark score. All tests have received an overhaul, for example in the Canyon Flight test you can now see beautiful sun glare effects with the help of High Dynamic Range rendering.

Power Consumption

Cooling modern video cards is becoming more and more difficult, especially when users are asking for quiet cooling solutions. That's why the engineers are now paying much more attention to power consumption of new video card designs.

Test System
CPU:	Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 @ 3.6 GHz (Wolfdale, 6144 KB Cache)
Motherboard:	Gigabyte P35C-DS3R Intel P35
Memory:	2x 1024MB A.DATA DDR2 1066+ CL4
Harddisk:	WD Raptor 740ADFD 74 GB
Power Supply:	OCZ GameXStream 700W
Software:	Windows XP SP2

In order to characterize a video card's power consumption, the whole system's mains power draw was measured. This means that these numbers include CPU, Memory, HDD, Video card and PSU inefficiency.

The three result values are as following:

• Idle: Windows sitting at the desktop (1024x768 32-bit) all windows closed, drivers installed.
• Average: 3DMark03 Nature at 1280x1024, 6xAA, 16xAF. This results in the highest power consumption. Average of all readings (two per second) while the test was rendering (no title screen).
• Peak: 3DMark03 Nature at 1280x1024, 6xAA, 16xAF. This results in the highest power consumption. Highest single reading

NVIDIA has implemented a load of power saving features in the GT200 graphics processor:

• Hybrid Power: When used with certain nForce motherboards the graphics card can be fully disabled with 2D graphics output coming from the onboard graphics chip. When switching to 3D, the GPU will be turned on seamlessly.
• Clock Gating: Certain unused parts of the chip can be turned off until they are needed.
• GPU Load detect which switches clocks and voltage on the fly. Yes you read correctly, the 2D/3D clocks are back. The following table describes the different settings the card can run at.
  
  
  

  	2D Idle	Video Playback	3D Performance
  Core Clock	300 MHz	400 MHz	576 MHz
  Memory Clock	100 MHz	300 MHz	999 MHz
  Shader Clock	600 MHz	800 MHz	1242 MHz
  GPU Voltage	1.03 V	1.06 V	1.12 V

  
  The load detection is not dependant on 3D fullscreen, but on actual GPU usage. Some earlier products had the problem that they would run in 2D mode only even when a windowed 3D application was active. This is not a problem on the GTX 260.

Overall NVIDIA has achieved great idle power consumption, together with the GTX 280 these cards set new standards for high-performance cards in idle, look at how far ATI's HD 4870 is away. Under load the GTX 260 can also show its efficient design, claiming performance per watt leadership as we will see on the summary graphs a bit later on.

Fan Noise

In the past years users would accept everything just to get more performance. Nowadays this has changed with people being more aware of the fan noise and power consumption of their graphic cards.
In order to properly test the fan noise a card emits we are using a Bruel & Kjaer 2236 sound level meter (~$4,000) which has the measurement range and accuracy we are looking for.


The tested graphics card is installed in a system that is completely passively cooled. That is passive PSU, passive CPU cooler, passive cooling on the motherboard and Solid-State HDD.
This setup allows us to eliminate secondary noise sources and test only the video card. To be more compliant with standards like DIN 45635 (we are not claiming to be fully DIN 45635 certified) the measurement is conducted at 100 cm distance and 160 cm over the floor. The ambient background noise level in the room is well below 20 dbA for all measurements. Please note that the dbA scale is not linear, it is logarithmic. 40 dbA is not twice as loud as 20 dbA. A 3 dbA increase results in double the sound pressure. The human hearing is a bit different and it is generally accepted that a 10 dbA increase doubles the perceived sound level.

When I first tested this card's fan noise I noticed that the fan would run at 100% when the card was fully loaded. As I confirmed with Point of View, the GTX 260 uses the exact same cooler as the GTX 280. Since I suspected an issue with the cooler I swapped the cooler to use my Point of View GTX280's cooler. After that change the fan noise under load went down a lot. The results below represent the measurements after the cooler was changed.

Under load the card is rather quiet, even though there seems to be some headroom left to slow down the fan even more. When running some intense 3D applications the fan ramps up quite a bit to reach a maximum noise level slightly below the GTX 280. Overall the noise levels are acceptable. ATI's HD 4870 however has the same performance, higher power consumption, yet the fan is considerably quiter. One reason is that ATI allows the card to reach higher temperatures, so the fan can run slower overall because it doesn't have to achieve an as low temperature.

Performance Summary

To create this graph we took all performance results of all benchmarks and all resolutions, threw them together and calculated the relative performance of each card, compared to our review sample.

Performance per Watt

This graph was created by taking the relative performance numbers and putting them in contrast to the average power consumption results. To offset power consumption of the rest of the system we subtracted 50W from the average consumption.

Performance per Dollar

If you are looking for the best bang for the buck, then you will love this graph. We looked up the current USD price of each card on the online shop Newegg and used it and the relative performance numbers to calculate the Performance per Dollar Index.

Overclocking

To find the maximum overclock of our card we used a combination of ATITool's successor (work in progress) and our benchmarking suite.



The final overclocks of our card are 715 MHz core (24 % overclock) and 1254 MHz Memory (26% overclock). Both overclocks are absolutely stunning. It seems that the GTX 260 can easily handle running at GTX 280 clock speeds (602 / 1107). So if you are willing to do some overclocking you can buy one of these cards and overclock them to GTX 280 performance levels. You will miss 48 shaders and 128 MB of memory, but this could be offset by going beyond the GTX 280's default clock. Compared to ATI's latest offerings overclocking is easy and widely supported by overclocking utilities.

Please note that due to the PLL design and clock frequency relationships overclocking the GTX 280 is not completely trivial.

• The core clock can not be higher than shader clock / 2. If the core clock goes beyond that it will be set to 1/10th of what is requested. For example if you set 600 MHz with a shader clock of 1200 MHz it will work. But if you set 601 MHz with 1200 MHz Shader, the actual operating core frequency will be a mere 60 MHz.
• I also noticed that if the shader frequency is too high in relation to the core frequency, the card will instantly render artifacts.
• Last but not least, changing the PCI-Express clock frequency, causes the card to change clocks as outlined in this article.

Temperatures

The temperatures look fine, even with heavy overclocking the card only reaches 90°C.

Value and Conclusion

	Point of View's GeForce GTX 260 Assassin's Creed Edition will set you back around $400.
	Huge overclocking potential Game "Assassin's Creed" included Great performance Can do CUDA and PhysX HDMI+HDCP+Audio PCI-Express 2.0 support Hybrid Power supported Triple SLI support Good accessory package Very low idle power consumption
	Similar performance as HD 4870 Much more expensive than HD 4870 Noisy cooler, had to be exchanged
8.8	Even though the Point of View GeForce is a great card offering plenty of performance its success will be limited by AMD's Radeon HD 4870. At this time the HD 4870 is $100 cheaper while offering very similar performance. The only scenario where I could see the GTX 260 gain an advantage over the HD 4870 is when more than 512 MB graphics memory is used, which may be the case when running 2560x1600 resolutions. Another advantage of NVIDIA's GPUs are that they have full support for CUDA's GPU accelerated computation and also NVIDIA PhysX. However, at this time there are not many applications for CUDA/PhysX but rest assured, NVIDIA will make sure this changes. Point of View's GTX 260 includes a unique game bundle with Assassin's Creed, a recently released top title. In order to fight ATI's products, NVIDIA will most probably reduce the price of the GTX 260 and GTX 280 in the near future, so holding off for a bit with your purchase might be a good idea. Our GTX 260 sample showed amazing overclocking potential, easily reaching GeForce GTX 280 levels, and this is something most ATI HD 4870 cards won't achieve, at least not with stock voltage and cooling. Also the overclocking software support on ATI side is rather limited while on NVIDIA everything just works.