XFX GeForce 8600 GT Fatal1ty

Celebrity Endorsed

In the fledgling world of professional gaming, where players slaughter each other in virtual arenas for prize money, there is no doubt that Jonathan 'Fatal1ty' Wendel is one of its brightest stars. Not everyone will agree that he's the best player in first person shooter (FPS) games but he is extremely competitive (we personally saw him ruthlessly demolishing a hapless member of the audience at Computex 2007) and for a certainty, he is the most famous after been featured in mainstream media like Time Magazine and 60 Minutes.

This celebrity status has been assiduously translated into numerous endorsements for Wendel, with companies like Universal abit, Creative, XFX and Zalman (collectively known as Fatal1ty Brand Partners), choosing to associate their products with the Fatal1ty name so as to appeal to the gaming fraternity. Ranging from gaming peripherals like keyboards and headphones to motherboards, sound and graphics cards, all these products claim to be either co-developed or game-tested by Wendel.

With that many products involved, there have been understandably some hits and misses among them (we'll stick to our Logitech and Razer mice, thank you). However, that has not stopped graphics vendor XFX from renewing its Fatal1ty series of cards, upgrading it to the latest GPU from NVIDIA. The company had previously released a Fatal1ty branded GeForce 7600 GT graphics card and it seems that the time has come to unleash a GeForce 8600 GT version for the upcoming DirectX 10 game releases. Interestingly enough, like the older version, this new card will be both overclocked and passively cooled and is squarely targeted at the mid-range segment due to its GeForce 8600 GT core. If you had thought that an elite gamer would only be looking at the high-end cards, Fatal1ty is probably proving us all wrong. Without further ado, here's a glimpse of this attractive looking card followed by the dry technical bits.

The XFX GeForce 8600 GT Fatal1ty

XFX has kept with the design of the original GeForce 7600 GT Fatal1ty, using the same passive cooler and generally keeping with the black color scheme. It is not often that one would say this about a graphics card but we were rather impressed by the quality and finish of this card. The clean, matte black PCB looks terrific and solid capacitors were used throughout the card. A support bar at the top added weight and strength to the board while keeping the aluminum cooling fins well anchored.

Obviously, the onboard components are different, with the new version using the G84 core of the GeForce 8600 GT. This core has been overclocked to 620MHz from the default 540MHz. Samsung memory chips rated at 1.2ns were used for the 256MB local frame buffer. What's more, they were clocked at 1700MHz DDR compared to the usual 1400MHz DDR. We also checked the internal clock of the 32 stream processors within the core using a BIOS editor and found them to be at the standard 1190MHz. Nevertheless, these clock speeds are already higher than the previous Foxconn overclocked edition that we saw, not to mention that it is passively cooled unlike the Foxconn.

It was rather disappointing that the contents of the package were meager besides the handsome hardware. You'll find a CD containing the drivers and what appear to be two game demos. No actual retail game was included and the accessories were equally scarce. For a card endorsed by a celebrity gamer, that doesn't seem quite right. While we have to concede that the GeForce 8600 GT is aimed at the mainstream user where bundled games are not that common, it would have been more appropriate to include one, especially a card of this pedigree. The GeForce 8600 GT does not come with HDCP support by default and there are no indications that this Fatal1ty card has such a feature - again another little letdown. Below are the few items found in the package:

• 1 x DVI-to-VGA adaptor
• S-Video extension cable
• User Manual
• Driver CD

Test Setup

All the benchmarks were conducted on a system based on an Intel D975XBX 'Bad Axe' motherboard with an Intel Core 2 Duo E6700 (2.66GHz) processor. 2GB of Kingston low latency DDR2-800 HyperX memory modules were configured to run in dual channel mode. The operating system used was Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2. DirectX 9.0c was also installed on the Seagate 7200.7 SATA hard drive used for this system.

For the comparison, we had the XFX pitted against the overclocked Foxconn GeForce 8600 GT, which despite the overclock still had a slower core and memory of 560/1620MHz. We also included the reference GeForce 8600 GT and GTS cards. Both the XFX and Foxconn were on ForceWare 158.22 drivers while the two NVIDIA reference cards were on ForceWare 158.16. The benchmarks tested are as follows:

• Futuremark 3DMark05 (ver. 120)
• Futuremark 3DMark06 (ver. 102)
• Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory (ver 1.3)
• F.E.A.R
• Company of Heroes (ver 1.3)
• Quake 4 (ver 1.2)

Results - 3DMark05 Pro & 3DMark06

With its high clocks, it was only natural that the XFX came in first among the GeForce 8600 GT cards for all the 3DMark results. It also remained 5 to 6% behind the GeForce 8600 GTS, which all things considered is a very credible performance for a passively cooled graphics card.

Results - Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory (DirectX 9 Benchmark)

In Splinter Cell, the XFX GeForce 8600 GT Fatal1ty took down its rivals easily except for the GeForce 8600 GTS, which kept a 7% lead over the XFX. Compared to the standard GeForce 8600 GT, the XFX will give you roughly 20% performance gain over the normal card, enough perhaps to justify its Fatal1ty branding.

Results - F.E.A.R (DirectX 9 Benchmark)

The XFX was easily the fastest GeForce 8600 GT we have tested. However, as the resolutions and settings got more intensive, the differences between the various cards including the gap between the XFX and the GeForce 8600 GTS, grew narrower. At 1600 x 1200 with anti-aliasing, the benchmark scores for the two cards were practically identical in F.E.A.R.

Results - Quake 4 & Company of Heroes (SM2.0+ Benchmarks)

Again, due to the higher clocks, there were significant gaps between the XFX and the other GeForce 8600 GT cards. The difference between the XFX and the typical GeForce 8600 GTS was also quite marginal at around 5% and in Company of Heroes, the XFX almost hit the magical frame rate of 30 per second at the resolution of 1600x1200. Not a bad performer for a mainstream graphics card.

Temperature Testing

Without a cooler fan, temperatures on the XFX were obviously going to be higher than the standard GeForce 8600 GT. That was the case for the core and memory chips, which were covered by the large heatsink but the other components were on par with similar GeForce 8600 GT cards. Although the core temperatures approached 60 degrees Celsius, we felt that it was an acceptable compromise for having a completely silent graphics card. And need we say again that this card is well overclocked?

Overclocking

The XFX continued to surprise us in the overclocking segment, where it managed to reach a high of 770/1820MHz, greatly surpassing what we had gotten out of the Foxconn. At these clock speeds, the XFX even overtook the reference GeForce 8600 GTS by around 7%, a very commendable feat especially since the XFX relies on passive cooling through its heatsink. XFX is definitely keeping to its enthusiast roots by turning this mainstream graphics card into a decent gaming contender. Beware though, this card relies on a system with good ventilation to help it function without issues and this is more so if you intend to overclock it.

Conclusion

Having a celebrity endorse a product may not be a surefire way of success but it has been shown to raise the profile of the company tremendously, hence the enormous amount of endorsement deals nowadays. Of course in the case of Jonathan 'Fatal1ty' Wendel, his field of professional gaming is only in its infancy so there is understandably some skepticism over whether it can become the next major sports and entertainment outlet for the masses. Nevertheless, Wendel has already staked a name for himself as a pioneer in the short history of the sport, from being the first full time professional gamer to his remarkable success in channeling his gaming prowess into building a brand name with multiple endorsement deals with hardware manufacturers.

As some marketing experts will tell you, lending your name to the right product is crucial to avoid diluting or damaging the brand name. Although there are some Fatal1ty branded products that we won't touch at all, XFX's Fatal1ty GeForce 8600 GT is thankfully not one of those. XFX has long cultivated an enthusiast image with extreme, overclocked editions bundled with some of the latest, popular games, making it a good fit with the Fatal1ty branding. Though we were initially surprised by the decision to brand a mid-range card (the original GeForce 7600 GT Fatal1ty) instead of the typical high-end products one would associate with a top gamer, we have to admit that the implementation has been very well done.

And this has carried over to the updated GeForce 8600 GT version, which looks unchanged outwardly due to the reuse of the same passive cooler and the matte black PCB. This is a card that doesn't need to be hidden within the chassis while its raw performance too will earn it a place among enthusiasts who are not gunning for the high-end GeForce 8800 series (which can be due to their high price, power and physical size). Due to its overclocked frequencies, the XFX approaches the performance level of a GeForce 8600 GTS in our benchmarks and even surpassed that once we jumped in with our own overclock. No doubt the temperatures will likely be higher in such cases but the XFX has been stable in our testing so far and the higher temperatures should still be acceptable for most users, considering its speed and more important, the silent passive cooling onboard.

So what's not to like about this celebrity endorsed superstar GeForce 8600 GT? For one, the package is almost non-existent; there are no games and the accessories will surely rank among the most minimal we have seen. For a premium edition card, we wished that XFX had bundled something more so that consumers could really feel that they are getting their money's worth. As it is, the XFX GeForce 8600 GT Fatal1ty already commands a higher price in retail compared to the vanilla GeForce 8600 GT, with prices estimated to be around US$169. That is at least US$20 more than the recommended retail price of the GeForce 8600 GT at launch and with some vendors discounting their cards to around US$125, the price margin may be greater than the overclocking or the passive cooling advantages. Meanwhile, a typical GeForce 8600 GTS could be had for around US$189 and some less frilled versions costing even less than the XFX! This places the XFX in close competition from the faster card. In short, this is a graphics card with the performance to match its nice exterior and Fatal1ty branding but we can't help thinking that it could have been much more with a better package to justify its higher price.

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