While most of us wait.....and wait.....and continue to wait for DirectX 10 games to arrive, NVIDIA continues to saturate the market with videocards covering every price range supporting the highly anticipated graphics platform. As AMD/ATI struggle to find their way with their much hyped R600 arriving to little fanfare, NVIDIA has released their mainstream and budget graphics solutions in the form of the 8500GT, 8600GT, and 8600GTS.

With the release of the 8500GT, 8600GT, and 8600GTS, NVIDIA also unleashes a pair of new GPU cores in the G84 and G86, which, in addition to DirectX 10 and Shader Model 4.0 support, offers a refresh on NVIDIA's PureVideo Technology.

Today, HL takes a look at the Gigabyte 8600GTS, which, besides the benefits touched on above, also offers a new and improved cooling solution, the Silent Pipe III. Read on, as we take a look at the features the 8600GTS and the G84 GPU have to offer, as well as Gigabyte's third generation passive cooling solution, which left us mightily impressed.

Model	Gigabyte GeForce 8600 GTS GV-NX86S256H
Core	NVIDIA G84
Core Clock	675MHz
Memory	256MB GDDR3
Memory Speed	2000MHz
Memory Interface	128-bit
Special Features	Microsoft DirectX 10 and OpenGL 2.0 support Supports SLI and PureVideo technology Features dual DVI-I / D-sub (by adapter) / HDTV Supports Dual Dual-link @ high resolution up to dual 2560x1600 HDCP Ready

The Bundle

The Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS comes with a pretty impressive bundle. Above you'll notice the standard fare; two DVI to VGA adapters, S-video to Component adapter, manual and the manufacturer disk that includes the drivers and supporting software. What sets this bundle apart is the inclusion of Supreme Commander, in our opinion the best RTS game since the Command & Conquer series (we haven't had the chance to tackle Company of Heroes).

Although we're a little leery of the gaming experience the card will offer with something as beefy as Supreme Commander, we have little doubt that this card will satisfy those looking for an inexpensive upgrade to a DirectX 10 card.

8500GT	8600GT	8600GTS	8800GTS	8800GTX
Processor Technology	80nm	80nm	80nm	90nm	90nm
Transistors	210M	289M	289M	681M	681M
Processor Core	G86	G84	G84	G80	G80
Core Frequency	450	540	675	500	575
Stream Processors	16	32	32	96	128
Shader Clock Speed	900MHz	1.18Hz	1.45GHz	1.2GHz	1.35GHz
ROPs	4	8	8	20	24
Memory Clock	800	1400	2000	1200	1800
Memory Interface	128	128	128	320	384
Memory Type	DDR2	GDDR3	GDDR3	GDDR3	GDDR3
Frame Buffer Size (MB)	256	256	256	640	768
Memory Bandwidth (GB/s)	12.8	22.4	32	64	86.4
Texture Fill Rate (Billions/s)	3.6	8.6	10.8	24	36.8
HDCP Compatible	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes

From the chart above you can see the 8600 GT and GTS both use NVIDIA's new G84 GPU, which is built upon an 80mm process and includes 289 million transistors. The Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS specs include a GPU clock speed of 675MHz and a shader clock speed of 1.45GHz. This separates it from its little brother, the 8600GT, which offers a core clock speed of 540MHz and shader clock speed of 1.18GHz.

NVIDIA's "Stream Processors" are a technological step forward from Pixel  and Vertex Shaders used on previous generations of video cards. Instead of a fixed number of units within the GPU tasked with specific functions, the new Stream Processors are units able to perform a variety of tasks. If an application uses more pixel shaders than vertex shaders, or vise versa, the Stream Processors can organize and execute the functions, meaning the GPU works more efficiently. While previous cards were judged by the number of shaders, the newer G8X Series of GPU will incorporate the "Shader Clock Speed" as an important figure when judging a card's worth.   

The G84 (and the G86, which we'll cover in an upcoming review) GPU also includes NVIDIA's PureVideo 2 HD decoder, a feature that will make it an attractive card for those looking for an inexpensive media center or HTPC graphics card. The HD genie has been let out of his bottle, and while the HD-DVD and Blu-Ray war continues to rage on, NVIDIA's new decoder will have you sitting pretty regardless of which format wins.

Playing back HD content puts an enormous strain on even today's processors, which was alleviated somewhat with the first generation of PureVideo.  But with PureVideo 2 HD decoding, processor utilization gets cut way down, opening the door for lower end systems to enjoy a high end movie experience. That's something that was not previously possible for the budget oriented consumer.

The Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS features four Samsung K4J52324QE-BJ1A 1.0ns GDDR3 16MB/32-bit memory chips. On the surface, the memory chips are extremely impressive, considering these are the same chips used on the much more expensive 8800GTS and GTX. These chips also give the GTS its extra kick over the GT, which features 1.3-1.4ns pars operating at 700MHz (1400MHz effective clock speed) as opposed to the GTS' 1000MHz (2000MHz effective clock speed). The problem is the paltry 128-bit data bandwidth (which is somewhat overcome by the speed of the Stream Processors).

The Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS draws 43W, which should make it a very attractive upgrade to those cheap bastards who don't want to splurge on a $300-400 videocard, or those looking to upgrade older 6600GT or X1300-X1700 cards without having to invest in a monster power supply

Those of you familiar with Gigabyte's Silent Pipe Technology will be happy to know that the third generation is really a step up from an already great design, though the cooling performance does come at the price of an extremely heavy card. We'll look closer at the heat sink aspect in a moment.

Considering the weight of this card, we were actually a bit surprised to see the heat sink secured with only four screws and a plastic backplate, however we found no "play" in the heat sink, as it is securely fastened to the card.

For connections, the Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS features two DVI-I ports and an S-Video connector which support HDCP. The card is a bit of a hassle to install, not just because of the two PCI slots it will take up, but also because of the aluminum fins protruding out the back (which you'll notice in the image above).

"Based on extensive lab testing and previous graphics card development, the GIGABYTE VGA engineering group has designed a revolutionary new VGA card cooling technology which utilizes natural convection inside the chassis to disperse heat. Similar to the principle of turbulence in fluid dynamics, Silent-Pipe 3™ introduces an all-new concept of VGA card cooling ─ Inner Turbulence Fluid Mechanics Design. Utilizing a series of layered long and short fins with trapezoid punches, Silent-Pipe 3™ transforms laminar (smooth) air flow into turbulent (rough) air flow inside the heat sink, increasing the heat exchange ratio and enhancing overall thermal performance" - Gigabyte

The copper heat pipes pictured above connect a copper plate at the rear of the card to the heat sink covering the GPU.

The massive heatsink covering the copper base is of a unique design. The orientation of the fins should maximize the effect of air flow from a system's fans over the heat sink, and the fins themselves are very rough, which aids in cooling by offering more surface area than a finely polished or smooth surface.

As you can see above, the heat sink itself could possibly make for some interesting modding ideas. Although a 92mm fan is too large to fit in the indented area, it does line up perfectly with the raised section (an 80mm fan fits well in the indented area though).

On an open test bench (HSPC's Tech Station), the performance of the cooler was terrific, idling at 45C and jumping only to 58C under load. Keep in mid that this is on an open test bench with a pair of 120MM fans mounted 13.5 inches away.

To get a better indication of the cooling performance and how a fanless design affects not only the card but an entire system, we next mounted the card in a Thermaltake Armor, which uses a 200mm side panel fan. The Gigabyte 8600GTS barely flinched, idling at 48C and topping out at 61C under load. We also have to note that there was no noticeable increase in the temperatures of either the CPU or motherboard's chipset.

While the Silent Pipe III did a fantastic job of cooling the GPU during out testing, we have to note that the cooler does not make contact with the card's memory chips. The GPU temperatures during testing would indicate that the card would be capable of overclocking, we'd strongly advise against it considering there is nothing cooling the cards memory.

Overclocking

This section is going to be short and to the point; do not overclock passively cooled video cards. First, you are at the mercy of your enclosure's airflow, and second, as we touched on in our overview of the card itself, the heatsink does not make contact with the card's memory, and OCing is just asking for trouble.

Processor	INTEL Core 2 Duo E6600 (266x9 2.4GHz)
Motherboard	ECS PN2 SLI2+
RAM	2GB Crucial PC2-6400 (4-4-4-12-2T)
Hard Drive	Seagate Barracuda 80GB
Power Supply	Hiper 780W PSU
Cooling	Corsair Nautilus500 Two Evercool 120mm

All benchmarks are run on a fresh install of Windows XP with Service Pack 2, using the latest drivers and BIOS for the hardware tested. For video card testing we run the benchmarks at a variety of resolutions we feel are the more popular, including 800x600, 1024x768, 1280x1024, and 1680x1050 with all the "eye candy" cranked up, while this will vary from card to card, below you will find the settings used for the card currently tested. By doing this we hope to show what the average gamer should expect when using this card.

Those of you you browse the web reading different reviews (and if you aren't you should be, as getting as many opinions as possible before purchasing a product is the smart way to shop) have undoubtedly seen the debate when it comes to video card reviews. Our opinion is that FPS do matter, plain and simple. While they don't really show a card's worth with all the in game settings set to their minimum, the FPS with a card set to its Quality or High Quality setting and the AF and AA set accordingly (depending on the card tested) are a perfectly fine way to gauge a card's worth. We personally like "Real World Testing", and for games that don't include time demos or other benchmarking utilities like WOW or Everquest, we think it's a great way to give a subjective view on a card. 

Having said that, when benchmarking, we consider anything over 45FPS to be fine in most instances, with 55-60FPS ideal for online gaming.

Benchmarks	800x600	1024x768	1280x1024	1680x1050
Doom 3 High Quality/AFx8/AAx4	60.3	59.0	51.3	Not supported by monitor
Far Cry High Quality/AFx8/AAx4/HDRx7/Shader Model 3.0	82.33	57.63	37.87	27.20
Quake 4 High Quality/AFx8/AAx4/SMP Enabled	66	57	38	30
F.E.A.R. Maximum/AFx8/AAx4/Shaders "On" In Game Settings "Maximum"	Min: 29 Avg: 50 Max: 62	Min: 24 Avg: 39 Max: 60	Min: 14 Avg: 26 Max: 48	Not supported by monitor
Supreme Commander AFx8/AAx4/Everything Set to "High"	Not supported by monitor	Min: 6.09 Avg: 24.757 Max: 53.85	Min: 5.71 Avg: 14.040 Max: 30.74	Min: 5.09 Avg: 12.216 Max: 26.46

Subjective Testing

During our time working with the Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS Silent Pipe III Video Card, we played a variety of games, both single player, as well as online. Anything at 800x600 worked flawlessly during my testing, with 1280x1024 for the most part playing well, depending on the game, anything over that with the in game setting maxed out was simply unplayable. For the most part, the Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS Silent Pipe III Video Card performed very well at moderate settings regardless of resolution, usually in the AFx4 / AAx2 range, which is about what you'd expect from a card in this class. 

To get an idea of how the card performed during video playback, we fired up "Black Hawk Down". Unlike its predecessors (and even its bigger sibling, the G80 core), the G84 core uses its Stream Processors to reduce CPU load and handle most of the video processing. Combined wit the refinements made to PureVideo 2, this lowers the G84's CPU usage to between 18-21%, where the 7XXX Series cards ran between 59-79%.

Having regurgated all of that, we noticed no real differences in the video playback quality while watching the movie, but indeed, the CPU load dropped precipitously with the 8600GTS installed.
 
We don't consider myself a major gamer, I'm more the cannon fodder type on our CSS server, as well as an occasional game of Far Cry (we usually end up playing it after using the Far Cry benchmark when testing hardware). For users who do some light to moderate gaming and doesn't need the "eye candy" maxed out, the 8600 GTS is a more than adequate card. Also, with the new features afforded by the G84 architecture, this card would be well paired with a E4300/E4400/E6300 for a modest gaming/entertainment center PC. 

Section	Score	Comment
Stock Performance	27/30	Considering this cards target audience, the results were acceptable. Not any better than the 7900GS or X1950 XT, hopefully that will change once we see some DirectX10 titles. We'll be covering PureVideo 2 in an upcoming article
Overclocking	5/10	With passive cooling, overclocking is not this cards forte.
Cooling	16/20	On an open test bench the card idled at 46C, and was extremely manageable at 58C  Heat sink does not make contact with the cards memory, which will reduce the overclockability.
Bundle	10/10	In a day and age where most cards either come with stock clock speeds or overclocked and nothing else, we have to give mad props to a company for including a great title like Supreme Commander.
Price & Value	18/20	At under $200, this card is a decent bargain  128-bit memory interface will scare off some.
Warranty & Support	9/10	Card comes with a 3 yr limited warrant (2 yrs parts and labor, 1 yr parts). Gigabyte's website includes FAQ, Customer Support, and RMA pages.

Our Recommendation

The Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS is very nice little card....with a few small caveats.....first, lets touch on what we like.

The Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS is priced relatively cheaply, considering the other 8600 GTS' on the market and the bundle included. While the card really struggles with all the "eye candy" turned on, it performs very well with all the in game setting at low to medium settings, which is fine for the casual gamer who runs their games at lower resolutions like 800x600 or 1024x768. The G84 core offers some interesting new features, which, while they aren't readily apparent in DirectX 9 games, should make for an impressive increase in overall performance once we see DirectX 10 games hit the shelves. 

As to Gigabyte's take on the 8600GTS......we honestly have to say that the Silent Pipe III rocks, plain and simple. On the HL testbench, which is just a modified HSPC Tech Station, the card idled at 46C, and ran a impressive 58C at load during our testing.

Now on to the stuff we didn't like....................

If you are running an NVIDIA 7600GT or 7900GS, NVIDIA's previous mainstream cards, then theres really no reason to upgrade to a DX10 card until you have to. While the performance was very good given the target audience, the card really struggles with higher resolutions and in game settings set above "medium". Playing Supreme Commander, the game was unplayable at anything more than 1280x1024, (1024x768 was ideal)  with all the in game settings at default.

The Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS is also an extremely heavy card, the beefy passive cooling solution not only takes up two slots, the damned thing is almost as heavy as an 8800 GTs. Lastly, while people might look at this silent card and think its the perfect solution for an entertainment center PC or SFF system, we won't recommend it for those uses unless your case has good airflow, as the card does give off a fair amount of heat.

Overall, the Gigabyte GeForce 8600GTS is a good, but maybe not great card. This all may change with the arrival of DX10 games, and possibly as the drivers for vista mature. Right now, we would recommend against upgrading if you already have a 7800GT or 7900GS, as the results aren't tremendously different.

However, we'll heartily recommend this card to those people looking to put together a sub-$1000 system, with a simple reminder about using a case with good airflow.

Other Reviews of Note

It's always nice to have more than one opinion on a component before you spend your hard earned money. For one, we may see something others missed, or vice versa. As with all reviews published at HardwareLogic, we'll not only give you our recommendation, but also point out some reviews from some other great sites from around the web.