ASUS' TOP Dog
The recent introduction of the GeForce 7800 GT cements NVIDIA's grip on the high-end graphics segment. ATI has conceded that its equivalent chip, the R520 has been delayed to the September/October period from its initial July launch, and that its other middle to lower range products, the R515 and R530 may end up being released around the same time; this is contrary to the usual ATI practice of launching the high-end part first with a bang, before gradually scaling down for the middle and low end.
While ATI is still sweating it out with its production 'demons', there has been no lack of developments in the graphics scene. For the past few weeks, we have seen the launch of two GT-class products, ATI's Radeon X800 GT and NVIDIA's GeForce 7800 GT (Ed:- Anymore of these apparently meaningless and arbitrary model names and monikers and even we would start to get confused). We have covered the
competitive performance and price of the Radeon X800 GT
and we will be featuring the performance of the GeForce 7800 GT in a review shortly. However, we have just received an exciting product from one of the leaders in the field, ASUS, that we feel should get TOP billing instead. After all, this is none other than ASUS' highest end enthusiast level graphics card, the appropriately named ASUS Extreme 7800 GTX TOP.
As the latest in ASUS' line of factory overclocked performance edition (hence the TOP name, which means Top Overclocking Performance), the ASUS Extreme N7800 GTX TOP has quite a task to match the standards set by the previous TOP cards. ASUS claims to select only the best performing graphics processing unit (GPUs) capable of handling the stresses of overclocking for these cards. Together with the fastest memory chips and a customized cooling solution, the TOP edition is the fastest graphics card produced by ASUS for any particular GPU. Add that to the solid reputation ASUS has built up over the years with both enthusiasts and mainstream consumers alike and that says a lot of the TOP series. So does the ASUS Extreme N7800 GTX TOP truly lives up to its status? Read on as we reveal to you if this card is as good as its specifications suggest.
ASUS' Extreme N7800 GTX TOP goes all out to impress the enthusiasts.
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ASUS Extreme N7800 GTX TOP Technical Specifications
| Graphics
Engine |
- NVIDIA GeForce 7800
GTX GPU
- Stock 2D GPU clock
= 275MHz
- Stock 3D GPU
clock = 486MHz
- NVIDIA CineFX
4.0 Shading Engine
- Vertex Shaders
- Support for DX
9.0 Vertex Shader 3.0
- Displacement
Mapping
- Vertex
Frequency Stream Divider (Geometry
Instancing)
- Infinite
length vertex programs (supported in
hardware)
- Pixel Shaders
- Support for DX
9.0 Pixel Shader 3.0
- Full pixel
branching support
- Multiple
Render Targets (MRTs)
- Infinite
length pixel programs (supported in
hardware)
- Texturing Engine
Features
- Accelerated
textures access
- Up to 16
textures per rendering pass
- Support
for 16-bit and 32-bit floating point
formats
- Support for
sRGB texture format for gamma textures
- DirectX and
S3TC texture compression
- Full
128-bit FP Precision Graphics Pipeline
- Native support
for 32 / 64 / 128 bits per pixel
rendering modes
- 64-Bit Texture
Filtering and Blending
- NVIDIA UltraShadow II
Technology (accelerates
shadow computations)
- NVIDIA SLI Technology
- NVIDIA
Intellisample 4.0 Technology
- 16x Anisotropic
Filtering
- Adaptive Texture
Filtering
- Gamma-adjusted
Rotated Grid Antialiasing
- Transparent
multisampling and supersampling modes
- Fast antialiasing
and compression performance
- Loss-less Color,
Texture and Z-Data Compression
algorithms (in real time)
- Fast Z-clear
- Support for normal
map compression
- NVIDIA PureVideo
Technology
- Dedicated
programmable on-chip video processor
- MPEG-2 video
encode and decode
- High Definition
MPEG-2 and WMV9 hardware decode
acceleration (up to 1080i)
- Post Processing
Features
- Spatial-Temporal
De-Interlacing (adaptive)
- NTSC 3:2
Pulldown / Bad Edit correction
- PAL 2:2
Pulldown correction
- High quality 4x5
video scaling and filtering
- Microsoft Video
Mixing Renderer (VMR)
- Integrated HDTV
output (with HDCP support)
- Composited Desktop
Hardware Engine (for Windows Longhorn)
- Advanced Video and
Display Functionality
- Dual 400MHz
RAMDACs that support resolutions of
2048x1536@85Hz
- Dual DVO ports for
interfacing external TMDS
transmitters and external TV/HDTV encoder
- nView
Multi-display Technology
- NVIDIA Digital
Vibrance Control (DVC) 3.0
- Designed for PCI
Express x16
- Advanced thermal
monitoring and thermal management
|
| Graphics
Memory |
- 256-bit memory
interface
- 256MB Graphics DDR3
SDRAM (1.6ns)
- Default clock rate of
675MHz (effective speed of 1350MHz
DDR)
|
| Display
Capabilities |
- Dual 400MHz RAMDACs
that support resolutions of
2048x1536@85Hz
- Integrated dual TMDS
transmitters (DVI 1.0 compliant and
HDCP ready)
|
| Connectors |
- 1x mini-DIN connector
(for Video-out)
- 2x DVI-I connector
(for Digital Flat Panel displays,
compatible with analog displays with converter)
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| Drivers
& Software |
- Driver support for
Microsoft Windows 9x/ME/2000/XP/XP
MCE/XP Pro x64, Linux and Macintosh OS (including OS X)
- ASUS DVD
- CyberLink
PowerDirector 3.0DE
- CyberLink MediaShow
2.0SE
- FarStone VirtualDrive 9
- ASUS Gamepack
- Project Snowblind
- Xpand Rally
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| Other
Information |
- PCI Express x16
slot required
- 2 PCIe expansion slots
needed
- Dedicated 6-pin PCIe
Molex power connector required (not
shared or split)
- Power supply rated for
400W or higher recommended by
NVIDIA (500W PSU for SLI setup)
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