Today, NVIDIA is announcing their new GeForce 6800 GS Graphics Processing Unit (GPU). GeForce 6800 GS based graphics cards will debut with a suggested retail price of $249 and will be replacing the GeForce 6800 in the upper mid-range sector. Various products from NVIDIA's add-in card partners will also be announced today and are expected to be available to purchase.
The GeForce 6800 GS is designed around the NV42 core and utilizes the PCI-Express interface. The 110nm fabricated GPU operates at a reference clock speed of 425MHz while add-in graphics cards will be outfitted with 256MB of GDDR3 frame buffer memory running at a frequency of 500MHz.
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS
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SPECIFICATIONS
Although the GeForce 6800 GS is replacing the GeForce 6800, its specifications are closer to that of the GeForce 6800 GT, which currently ranges in price from $275 to $300. The GeForce 6800 GS has fewer pipelines and vertex processors than the GeForce 6800 GT, but it matches and exceeds the GeForce 6800 GT in memory bandwidth and geometry processing, which is partially the result of a 21% increase in the GPU clock speed.
GeForce 6800 Series Specifications
Having been on the market for 18 months, it is likely that production of the GeForce 6800 GT will gradually begin to decline in favor of producing the economical GeForce 6800 GS.
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS
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The maximum power draw of the GeForce 6800 GS is 75W. A 350W power supply is recommended for systems with a single card and at least a 420W power supply for systems with an SLI configuration (two cards).
FEATURES
The following items summarize the key features of the GeForce 6800 GS.
Microsoft DirectX 9.0c Shader Model 3.0 Support
PCI Express Certified
High-Speed GDDR3 Memory Interface
256-Bit Memory Interface with Advanced Memory Control
64-Bit Floating Point Texture Filtering and Blending
