Asus EN8600GTS Top

Review Pages

1. Introduction
2. Tests and Setup
3. 3D Mark 05 - 3D Mark 06
4. F.E.A.R.
5. Prey
6. Splinter Cell Chaos Theory
7. Half Life 2 Episode 1
8. Company Of Heroes (DirectX9 & 10)
9. Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 (GRAW2)
10. Lost Planet: Extreme Condition (DirectX9 & 10)
11. Call Of Juarez (DirectX 10)
12. Overclocking
13. Conclusion

- Introduction

Asus continuing its tradition of releasing "overclocked" products, has released a Nvidia 8600GTS with higher clock speeds, aiming for the highest possible performance a user can get in this category. In this review, we will examine what you can expect from the Asus EN8600GTS Top, with both synthetic tests and real-life gaming experience. More-over, we add several new DirectX 10 games, since the 8600 series supports the upcoming titles that promise to rock your gaming world.

NVIDIA's Unified Architecture GeForce 8 Series GPUs - First to Support Microsoft DirectX 10 Games and Applications.

NVIDIA® GeForce® 8 series graphics processing units (GPUs) redefine the PC gaming experience. With a revolutionary unified architecture and full support for Microsoft® DirectX® 10 games, GeForce 8 series GPUs deliver unprecedented performance, extraordinarily detailed environments, and film quality game effects.

Below is a table that illustrates the main differences between the various GeForce 8 series GPUs:

	GeForce 8800 Ultra	GeForce 8800 GTX	GeForce 8800 GTS	GeForce 8600 GTS	GeForce 8600 GT	GeForce 8500 GT	GeForce 8400 GS
Core Clock (MHz)	612	575	500	675	540	450	450
Shader Clock (MHz)	1500	1350	1200	1450	1190	900	900
Memory Clock (MHz)	1080	900	800	1000	700	400	400
Memory Amount	768MB	768MB	640MB or 320MB	256MB	256MB	256MB	256MB
Memory Interface	384-bit	384-bit	320-bit	128-bit	128-bit	128-bit	64-bit
Memory Bandwidth (GB/sec)	103.7	86.4	64	32	22.4	12.8	6.4
Texture Fill Rate (billion/sec)	39.2	36.8	24	10.8	8.64	3.6	3.6

The GeForce 8600 GT and 8600 GTS are essentially the same product, with the only difference being the core and memory clock frequencies.

- Asus EN8600GTS Top

The ASUS Extreme N8600GTS TOP features 256MB of memory, a core clock of 745MHz and a memory frequency of 2.29GHz. That's almost 10% higher core and 14.5% higher memory frequencies compared with the "generic" 8600GTS cards.

The retail package clearly shows off the faster performance users can expect from their EN8600GTS Top. The card is available at the retail price of €250Euro (+ shipping):

The contents are carefully packaged:

There are no retail games included, only two discs with drivers and utilities.

The card is normal length, and reminds us of the Nvidia 7900GS series. The cooling system is made out of copper and covers both the GPU core and memory banks. At full load, the fan is a little noisy:

The card offers two (x2) DVI-D and one TV-out outputs. HDCP is supported and you can output HD content to your TV or monitor.

SLI is available on the EN8600GTS Top card:

6pin PCI-E power is needed for the card to work properly.

- Full specification

Graphics Engine	GeForce™ 8600GTS
Video Memory	256MB GDDR3
Engine Clock	745MHz
Memory Clock	2.290GHz (2x1145MHz DDR3)
Memory Interface	256-bit
Max Resolution	2048 X 1536
Bus Standard	PCI Express x16
HDTV Output	Yes, S-Video to HDTV Out
VGA Output	Yes, With DVI-VGA adaptor
TV Output	Yes, S-Video to Composite
Dual DVI Output	Yes
Adapter/Cable Bundled	DVI to VGA adapter HDTV-OUT adaptor Power Cable
Software Bundled	ASUS Utilities & Driver