PNY XLR8 GeForce 9800 GTX+ : Rivals ATI cards costing almost twice as much

PNY is company well known for their advancements in memory and graphics technology.  They have been in the business a long time.  They always use top notch components in their memory and graphics cards and it shows in the quality of their products.  The new PNY XLR8 GeForce 9800 GTX+ is another fine addition to that family.  The card performs at levels that rival cards costing nearly twice as much.  Maybe it's the 512MB of GDDR3 memory it uses or perhaps the 2.2GHz effective memory data rate.  It could be the massive cooling solution that helps keep the card running at top performance or maybe it is just because it is one of the coolest looking graphics cards on the market today.  Whatever the reason, this card performs at the top of its class and I am very happy with it.


In the Box

* NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GTX+ 512MB graphics card
* Quick installation guide
* Installation CD (includes): Detailed installation guide, NVIDIA ForceWare drivers, Microsoft DirectX 9.0c, NVIDIA GeForce demos, PNY and NVIDIA desktop wallpapers
* 1 DVI to VGA adapter
* 1 DVI to HDMI adapter
* 1 HDMI media cable
* 4-pin Molex to 6-pin power adapter
* 8-pin to 6-pin power adapter
* HD breakout pod


Minimum system requirements

* Intel or AMD PCI-Express 16X (or PCI-e 2.0) compatible motherboard
* 512MB system RAM
* Dual width graphics slot
* 2 supplementary 6-pin power connectors
* 450W or greater power supply with 12v current rating of 24A
* 50MB hard drive space
* CD or DVD drive
* Microsoft Windows 2000, XP or Vista (works with Vista x64)
* VGA or DVI compatible monitor


First Impressions

If I were to rate this card on a scale from 1 to 10 based solely on the packaging it would have to receive an 11.  The packaging is very nice, the card and all its peripherals are safely tucked into the box and held securely.  Suffice it to say the package is very eye pleasing.  Even after opening it there is a nice extra; a cardboard sheet with all the specs and information about the graphics card for easy reference.  On the reverse side is a list of other XLR8 products from PNY available for purchase.

Once you pull the card out of the box you realize that the aesthetics were not wasted solely on packaging.  The GeForce 9800 GTX is an extremely good looking video card, mostly due to the gigantic cooler attached to it bearing the XLR8 name in black and gold.  The card is pretty heavy and takes two slots on the motherboard so make sure you have room.  Installation may be slightly more difficult than other cards simply because of the girth and weight of the card but it installs just the same as any other PCI-Express card.  Installation took me less than 10 minutes and included the installation of the software drivers.

Since I am running this on a 64-bit system I installed the 64-bit driver for Windows Vista x64 that was included on the installation disk.  Unlike some older GeForce cards (that we'll leave unmentioned), the PNY GeForce 9800 GTX is fully compatible with Windows Vista, both the 32 and 64-bit versions. 

I also want to mention that the cooler used on the PNY GeForce 9800 GTX is pretty good.  It keeps the card running between 46.6° and 50.4°C at idle and between 58.5° and 64.3° C under full load but it does it almost silently.  If you have any case fans in your system you won't even notice it at all.  With that said, this card will definitely increase the heat inside your case so you should have an effective case cooling solution installed.


Performance
 
After installation we get down to the meat of the matter.  How does it perform?  The most important aspect of any graphics card is its performance in 3D applications such as games.  There are several ways to determine the performance but I used a 3D benchmark program called 3DMark06 from Futuremark.  The results were pretty decent and here they are for your scrutiny.
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3DMark06 Benchmark information and results
 
Benchmark:
3DMark06

Date:
Oct 09, 2008 09:48 CDT
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Hardware details & General information

Operating system
Microsoft Windows Vista

System type
64-bit

Motherboard manufacturer
EVGA

Motherboard model
122-CK-NF68

Hard drive model
Hitachi HDS721010KLA SCSI Disk Device

Memory
4096 MB
    Slot 1
1024 MB
    Slot 2
1024 MB
    Slot 3
1024 MB
    Slot 4
1024 MB
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Processor information

Processor
Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600

Processor clock
2400 MHz

Physical / logical processors
1 / 4

Multicore
4 Processor Cores

FSB
266 MHz
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Display information

Graphics card
NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GTX

Graphics card vendor
NVIDIA Corp

Graphics memory
512 MB

Core clock
738MHz
 
Memory clock
2.2GHz
 
Driver name
NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GTX/9800 GTX

Driver version
7.15.11.7779
 
Driver status
WHQL - Not FM Approved

Linked display adapters
No
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Benchmark settings

Program Version
3DMark06 Revision 1 Build 0
 
Resolution
1920x1200
 
Full Screen Anti-Aliasing
None

Texture Filtering
Optimal

Vertex Shader Profile
3_0

Pixel Shader Profile
3_0

Force Full Precision
No

Disable Post-processing
No

Force Software Vertex Shaders
No

Force Software FP Filtering
No

Disable Hardware Shadow Mapping
No

Colour Mipmaps
No
 
Repeat Count
Off
 
Fixed Framerate
Off
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Main test results

3DMark Score
10150 3DMarks

SM 2.0 Score
4381

SM 3.0 Score
4060

CPU Score
3341
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Test Results

Graphics Tests
    1 - Return to Proxycon: 37.79 FPS
    2 - Firefly Forest: 35.24 FPS

CPU Tests
    CPU1 - Red Valley: 1.1 FPS
    CPU2 - Red Valley: 1.63 FPS

HDR Tests
    1 - Canyon Flight (SM 3.0): 38.76 FPS
    2 - Deep Freeze (SM 3.0): 42.44 FPS

Feature Tests
    Fill Rate - Single Texturing
5955.07 MTexels/s
    Fill Rate - Multi Texturing
34826.03 MTexels/s
    Pixel Shader
303.11 FPS
    Vertex Shader - Simple
144.06 MVertices/s
    Vertex Shader - Complex
146.65 MVertices/s
    Shader Particles (SM 3.0)
89.51 FPS
    Perlin Noise (SM 3.0)
135.19 FPS

Batch Tests
    8 Triangles
7.11 MTriangles/s
    32 Triangles
27.77 MTriangles/s
    128 Triangles
103.5 MTriangles/s
    512 Triangles
243.35 MTriangles/s
    2048 Triangles
266.96 MTriangles/s
    32768 Triangles
275.29 MTriangles/s 
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As you can see the results are fairly impressive.  This $199 card performs close to the same level as other graphics cards in the $300-$400 price range.  In fact the card impressed me so much that I decided to get another one and setup an SLI configuration.  I then decided to test them again using the SLI technology.  I might also add that this is one of the few cards capable of three-way SLI on a compatible motherboard.  Here are the two-way SLI results from 3DMark06.
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3DMark06 Benchmark Results for two-way SLI
 
Main test results

3DMark Score
12653 3DMarks

SM 2.0 Score
4706
 
SM 3.0 Score
6453
 
CPU Score
3316
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Test Results

Graphics Tests
    1 - Return to Proxycon: 38.98 FPS
    2 - Firefly Forest: 39.46 FPS

CPU Tests
    CPU1 - Red Valley: 1.09 FPS
    CPU2 - Red Valley: 1.61 FPS

HDR Tests
    1 - Canyon Flight (SM 3.0): 79.29 FPS
    2 - Deep Freeze (SM 3.0): 49.76 FPS

Feature Tests
    Fill Rate - Single Texturing
11672.96 MTexels/s
    Fill Rate - Multi Texturing
64756.81 MTexels/s
    Pixel Shader
1187.6 FPS
    Vertex Shader - Simple
306.89 MVertices/s
    Vertex Shader - Complex
283.3 MVertices/s
    Shader Particles (SM 3.0)
68.32 FPS
    Perlin Noise (SM 3.0)
453.15 FPS

Batch Tests
    8 Triangles
5.86 MTriangles/s
    32 Triangles
21.66 MTriangles/s
    128 Triangles
223.62 MTriangles/s
    512 Triangles
472.07 MTriangles/s
    2048 Triangles
551.98 MTriangles/s
    32768 Triangles
588.77 MTriangles/s
 

I only listed the actual results of the SLI benchmark because it was run on the same computer with the same hardware and with the same parameters as the previous test with the only difference being that there were two cards running in SLI mode.

As you see there was a significant increase in performance resulting in higher frame rates and better fill rate.  This is quite impressive in and of itself; however, when you factor in the cost of getting this level of performance and the heat generated by two cards, you are probably better off using just a single PNY GeForce 9800 GTX+ or spending the extra $200 and getting that much more expensive card in the first place.  The XLR8 9800 GTX is a spectacular card for gaming and performs excellently but if you use two cards together you defeat the purpose of having a low-cost, high performance video card.  The two cards together will run you a minimum of $400 with any tax and/or shipping and at that price you would do better getting s single $400 video card (such as the ATI Radeon HD 4870).  The single card would generate less heat and have a greater possibility for overclocking.

Speaking of overclocking, I did not see any way to overclock the XLR8 GeForce 9800 GTX using the standard software from the installation disc.  Therefore I did not overclock the card so I can not report on the overclock abilities of this card.  However, I will note here that there are currently two versions of this card on the market.  One has a 675MHz core and the other has a 725MHz core.  I am assuming that this card is rated at 725MHz because the actual core speed is 738MHz and it's even written on the box it came in.  I believe the first two were version 1.0 and 1.0 overclocked and the version I have is 2.0.

 
Games

To get the full appreciation of the graphics card, I took it for a spin with some of my favorite games including Half-Life 2, CounterStrike: Source, Battlefield 2, FlatOut Ultimate Carnage, Black&White 2, Halo 2 and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.  In each game the card performed very well.  I had assumed it would lag a bit during Derby Bowl 3 in "FlatOut Ultimate Carnage" where there are twelve cars in a fast action environment with a lot of detailed graphics but the card sailed right through without a glitch.  I had the settings on 8x anti-aliasing and full anisotropy with 32-bit color at 1920x1200 resolution.

In "CounterStrike: Source" I was impressed to be able to up the bots to 32 without any lag what-so-ever.  The card handled everything that the HL2 graphics engine could throw at it and just laughed in its face.  Frame rates in HL2 never dropped below 70FPS in any situation with all graphics options on full.

Gamers will be totally satisfied with this video card, of that I have no doubt. 



Conclusion

The PNY XLR8 GeForce 9800 GTX is a fantastic video card for gaming in HD.  It performs on par with other HD cards costing much more and handles any game out today with excellent frame rates and stunning graphics.  If you have the cash and are willing to spend it, you can get three of these cards and hook up a 3-way SLI system for an incredible gaming machine but keep in mind it may be more cost effective to just get a more expensive card in the first place.


Thanks for reading,
Gr8ful ;-)