Nvidia unveils 6800 Ultra Extreme and GT

Santa Clara (CA) - Nvidia has added a high-end and a mid-range model to its GeForce 6800 family. The 6800 GT will we positioned in the mainstream market above the entry level 6800, the 6800 Ultra Extreme targets the enthusiast gamers group. Our benchmark results however reveal that the performance increase is not enough to outpace ATI’s X800 on all levels.

Apparently Nvidia was not quite sure, if the recently introduced 6800 would be able to keep its lead over the competition.

Coinciding with the launch of ATI’s X800, Nvidia has announced to release to two new 6800 cards in June. The 6800 GT will retail for $399 and offer 350 MHz core clock and 500 MHz memory clock (6800 : 325 and 350 respectively).

Nvidia GeForce 6800 GT

Nvidia GeForce 6800 Ultra Extreme

"The GeForce 6800 GT packs a lot of power and is a big improvement when compared to cards that currently occupy this market segment," Nvidia said in a statement. It has 16 pipes, 256 MByte GDDR3 memory (6800 : 128 DDR1), a single Molex connecter and "relaxed power supply requirements." The card also offers a single slot cooling solution.

Nvidia also announced GeForce 6800 Ultra Extreme. Companies such as Gainward and XFX are expected to demonstrate their solutions at E3, which will take place May 12 to 14 in Los Angeles. "Because of the headroom the GeForce 6800 Ultra has, our partners are able to make some of the necessary changes to increase the clock speeds," Nvidia said. Clock speeds increase to 450 MHz for the core and to 550 MHz for the memory.

First benchmark results reveal that Nvidia’s Ultra Extreme is able to surpass the performance of ATI’s new graphic cards in certain benchmarks such as Call of Duty, has trouble to keep its lead in FarCry, and is outpaced in Unreal Tournament.

Here are the benchmarks results in detail :

Review : NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Ultra Performance Leap
Review : ATi’s X800 Pulls Off Another Coup in the Graphics Performance War