Foxconn 8600GTS-256 OC 700/2200 Videocard ReviewJuly 23rd, 2007
While Vista continues to struggle to find widespread acceptance among XP owners, users in the market for a new videocard are preparing themselves for upcoming DirectX 10 titles, and the popularity of DX9 GPUs has begun to wane. It's not that yesterday's videocards don't pack enough muscle for today's, or even tomorrow's games, but when that 'must-have' groundbreaking DX10 title inevitably ships, DIYers don't want to look back at regret for not having thought ahead. This posed a problem for budget and mainstream shoppers when nVidia unveiled their first batch of next-gen cards, which focused exclusively on the high end with their 8800GTX line. Even the 8800GTS, while priced comparatively more friendly, remains out of reach for the casual gamer. This is where the 8600GTS steps in, filling the gap between the high end, and those cards at the bottom of the barrel that are best served for HTPC duties and little else. Today, we look at Foxconn's iteration, with their overclocked 8600GTS-256 OC700/2200 videocard. Boasting DirectX 10 support with a price tag that's sure to please your wallet, can it also satisfy a modest gaming experience, or will you be left craving a more fulfilling GPU? Armed with a copy of Windows Vista and a gamut of games, we aim to find out!
| Model |
- Foxconn 8600GTS-256 OC700/2200
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| Core |
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| Memory |
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Memory Speed
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Core Clockspeed
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Memory Interface
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Dual Link DVI
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Vista / DX10 Ready?
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HDCP Ready?
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Minus the gamepad, our Foxconn 8600GTS came bundled with the same accessories as the last Foxconn videocard we reviewed, the 8800GTS. Included is a Molex to PCI-E splitter cable, two DVI to VGA/D-Sub adapters, an HDTV cable, user's manual, installation CD, and a software suite that consists of RestoreIT and VirtualDrive Pro. With videocards from different manufacturers generally performing on par with each other in any given series, one way a manufacturer can differentiate themselves is through the bundle, and here we'd like to see Foxconn throw in a game or two.
Ahhh, the money shot! In the event you've already forgotten how much loot you saved by not purchasing a top tier DX10 videocard, Foxconn's 8600GTS takes the minimalist approach to remind you this is geared towards the budget conscious shopper. There's no beefy card-covering heatsink (making this a single slot card), and as such, no snazzy artwork to, uh, NOT show off once it's installed upside down in your chassis, and the PCB comes in the familiar green prevalent of value priced silicon. But it's not for aesthetics that you purchase a videocard (that's crazy talk, man!). No, it's for the game playing capabilities, and the 8600GTS utilizes nVidia's 80nm G84 core. Putting on our technobabble hats for a moment, let's expand upon what this means. In the world of GPU processing, Stream Processors are good, mmkay, and the more you have, the faster the card. NVidia chose to outfit the 8600GTS with 32 of them, and by comparison, the 8800GTS ships with 96, and both the 8800 GTX and Ultra videocards sport 128 of them. The 8600GTS also comes with a 128-bit memory bus, compared to 320-bit on the 8800GTS and 384 for the 8800 GTX and Ultra. As we saw in last generation's 7600GT videocard, a 128-bit bus doesn't necessarily mean the kiss of death in gaming performance, but it does mean that some of last generation's higher end cards (now attractively priced) should be able to outpace the 8600GTS in today's games, albeit without DX10 support. Had nVidia chosen a 256-bit memory bus and a few more Stream Processors (64, for example), they could have put a strangle hold on the budget market, which would have been interesting in light of AMD/ATI's shift in focus out of the high end arena and towards the mid and low end.
Today's videocards continue draw more power, pushing the market for increasingly beefier power supplies. Some of the higher end models, such as the 8800 GTX and Ultra, even require two power cables, putting the suck on your PSU's +12V rail(s). One advantage lower cards have over their brawny brethren is that they don't require a ton of wattage (or more specifically, +12V amperage), eliminating the necessity to factor in a new power supply for all but the most ancient setups. The 8600GTS requires a 6-pin PCI-E connector, and nVidia rates the card for a maximum power draw of 71w at reference clockspeeds, which should equate to around 75w or so for our OC'd Foxconn, or just over six +12V amps.
Ports ahoy! The Foxconn 8600GTS comes with a port for the provided HDTV cable, along with a pair of DVI ports. But the more interesting feature to do with these ports is nVidia's Pure HD technology, a feature advantage nVidia interestingly chose to bestow upon the 8600GTS, but not their higher end cards. What this technology does is completely unbound the CPU from processing Blu-Ray and HD-DVD H.264 video encoding, allowing the GPU to do all of the grunt work. One advantage of this is the ability to continue and run background applications during a movie (that's not thunder you hear, that's HarwareLogic's modest Folding at Home devotees slapping each other high fives), the benefit of which will vary from user to user. But even if it ultimately remains a marketing bullet, IN YOUR FACE 8800GTX/Ultra!
There's no massive card-covering heatsink found on the single slot Foxconn 8600GTS, and instead cooling duties are tackled with a circular all copper sink with 45 fins by our count, plus four blocky corners. A clear fan provides active airflow over the heatsink, with the fins directing some of the air over the RAM chips.
And the RAM chips are really our only major gripe regarding the cooling. While some air does get whisked over them, we'd rather see the RAM receive the benefit of a sink or plate, rather than sit naked and unseductive out in the open. But other than the RAM, the cooling solution did an adequate job during testing, remaining fairly quiet and turning in good temperatures, both at idle and load.
OverclockingThe videocard Foxconn sent us comes pre-overclocked, with the core chugging along at 700MHz and the memory sprinting along at 2200MHz. With the reference clocks for the 8600GTS set at 675MHz and 2000MHz respectively, Foxconn isn't pushing the overclocking envelope, nor should they. Remember that the RAM comes with no cooling whatsoever, active or passive, and pushing these naked chips is just asking for trouble. Because we're not keen on killing or encouraging our readers to kill their new purchase right off the bat, we're not going to be pushing the RAM today, but we did up the core clockspeed a tad. Again, the cooling solution didn't have us comfortable enough to shoot for any record breaking clocks, but we did manage to nudge the core up to 750MHz and run stable throughout our gamut of benchmarks. While nothing spectacular, when compared to the reference specifications, our card running at 750/2200MHz represents a modest OC for a modest card.
Benchmarks
HardwareLogic's GPU testing includes the following benchmarks:
- Doom 3 - Doom 3 is an "older" game that is still makes for a good benchmarking tool. For benchmarking the 8600GTS videocard, we use TimeDemo1 with the graphics settings on MEDIUM.
- Far Cry - The HardwareOC FarCry Benchmark is an easy-to-use tool, that makes Far Cry videocard benchmarking fast, easy, and accurate. In 2004 Far Cry earned the "Best Game of the Year" award because of its awesome graphics and gameplay. We run Far Cry's 'Regulator' benchmark.
- F.E.A.R. - One of the punishing games when it comes to stressing hardware, F.E.A.R has been said to be a "Graphical Masterpiece". Its use of High-Dynamic-Range-Lighting (HDR), and shadows pushes visual effects to an entirely new level. To give our 8600GTS card a kick in the teeth and a a chopshot to the groin, we set F.E.A.R. to MEDIUM settings with both volumetric lighting and soft shadows enabled, and ran it up to 1600x1200 at 4xAA/16AF.
- Supreme Commander - Along with revitalizing the RTS genre, Supreme Commander manages to push high end systems, giving both the processor and videocard a workout. Because of the demands this game puts on a PC's subsystem, we've recently added it to our collection of gamin benchmarks. We use the built-in benchmark as outlined by ExtremeTech.
- 3DMark06 - The only synthetic benchmark in our bunch, Futuremark's 3DMark06 pushes every aspect of 3D performance to give users an idea of how a videocard will perform. We run the full version of 3DMark06 with all tests selected.
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1280x1024, 4xAA, 4xAF
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1280x1024, 4xAA, 16xAF
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1600x1200, 4X, 4X
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1600x1200, 4X, 16X
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1600x1200, 4x, 16x, OC'd
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3DMark06
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4040
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3927
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3070
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2904
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2988
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Doom 3
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60
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15
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46.7
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*WNR
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*WNR
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Far Cry
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64.93
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65.05
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48.52
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48.03
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49.84
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FEAR
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50
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51
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36
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36
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38
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SupCom
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23.610 (Med Settings)
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20.332 (High Settings)
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18.042 (Med Settings)
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17.092 (High Settings)
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15.641 (High Settings)
| *Would Not RunWe were surprised to see the 8600GTS hang around at 1600x1200, managing to pull in playable frame rates in most benches, at least until we cranked up the anisotropic filtering. With the AF set to 16x, the card struggled, flat out refusing to run Doom 3 at the higher resolution, and still unplayable at 1280x1024. But once we dropped it down, the card let out a sigh of relief and continued chugging through our benches. In short, the 8600GTS just doesn't have the architecture to pump out high end gaming pixels, but it can deliver a very good gaming experience with a little bit of tweaking.
| Section |
Score |
Comment |
| Stock Performance |
25/30 |
- Card fared surprisingly well, even at higher resolutions (1600x1200)
- Sweet spot appears to be 1280x1024 with pumped up VQ settings
- Doesn't handle higher AA and AF settings very well at higher resolutions
- DX10 capable
- For those not interested in DX10 preparedness, there are faster DX9 cards out there for the money
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| Overclocking |
7/10 |
- Comes pre-overclocked over nVidia's reference specifications for the 8600GTS
- We pushed the core even higher, stopping at 750MHz
- We'd score this higher if we felt the cooling was sufficient to attempt it, particularly with the naked RAM chips, and we'd score this lower if it didn't already come OC'd and allow us to still push the core
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| Cooling |
16/20 |
- One-slot cooling solution
- Utilizes copper
- Temps fared very well for both idle and load measurements
- Naked RAM - eek!
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| Bundle |
8/10 |
- Decent bundle of cables and adapters
- We'd trade the RestoreIt and Virtual Drive Pro software for a game or two
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| Price / Value |
17/20 |
- Streets for around $190 on Newegg, with rebates sometimes available
- Overall a decent value, it's a bit higher than we'd like considering the hack and slash nVidia did to the Stream Processors and memory bus (32 and 128-bit, respectively)
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| Warranty & Support |
8/10 |
- Foxconn's support section includes everything from RMA forms to contact info, and even a page outlining (with pics) what constitutes a voided warranty
- Foxconn backs their cards with a 3-year warranty, enough time to keep you covered until you're ready to upgrade
- Would be nice to see Foxconn jump on the Lifetime Warranty bandwagon
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Our RecommendationFoxconn did a decent job with the 8600GTS, overclocking it above reference and slapping on a decent all copper cooler (though we're miffed at the naked RAM). Still, we feel nVidia dropped the ball somewhat with regards to the mid and lower mid range market. AMD/ATI continues to be in shambles, with revenue losses, CPU performance crown losses, and as it pertains to the world of videocards, disappointing GPU releases. We were all waiting for ATI's counter to the 8800GTX, and months later, we're still waiting. Whether they're having problems behind closed doors with the technology (likely) or you believe the press releases (unlikely), ATI's focus has shifted to the mainstream and budget market, and nVidia could have really issued a market beat down had they been less ambitious with the gimping they put on the 8600GTS. Instead of dropping the Stream Processors all the way down to 32, they could have settled on 64, and made it a 256-bit card rather than 128-bit. That would surely detract some of the attention away from the 8800GTS crowd, but there still would have been enough of a performance gap to entice would-be buyers with extra jingle in their pockets to buy the faster card, and the 8600GTS would have been poised to slap around the competition in the mid to lower mid arena. As it stands, users not concerned with DX10 (and there may be more than you think, thanks to Vista's lackluster popularity) can pick up a higher end DX9 videocard for roughly the same price. But lest we focus on what nVidia (and by association, Foxconn) didn't do, let's look at what you do get. Foxconn's 8600GTS put on a very respectable showing, able to handle a 1600x1200 screen resolution with modest visual quality settings. The card didn't care much for 16xAF, but dropping down to 4xAF kept most games playable at that resolution, with the sweet spot appearing to be in the vicinity of 1280x1024 with a bit higher VQ. And on top of decent gaming performance, you get DX10 ready hardware, along with a card capable of using nVidia's PureVideo HD technology. So the short of it is you can purchase DirectX10 hardware without shattering the piggybank, and still maintain respectable gaming performance in today's titles. But as with all DX10 hardware, the real impact of upcoming games remains to be seen, so we'll reserve judgment on that front until the anticipated titles start shipping. How important DX10 capabilities plays in your purchasing decision is not something we can answer for you. Foxconn's overclocked 8600GTS OC turned in good benchmarks, and does so at an easy to swallow price point, while ensuring DX10 compliance for tomorrow's games. But whether you prefer to buy with an eye towards the future, or focus solely on today, that's up to you.
Other Reviews of NoteIt'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. PCStatsBjorn3D
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