Boad specs

Top of the MSI NX6800

Back of the card

The board design of the NX6800 itself is fairly standard for a GeForce 6800 card. Unlike the high-end GeForce 6800 Ultra boards, GeForce 6800 board partners are free to deviate from NVIDIA’s reference board design, but most chose not to stray too far from reference. This allows them to get their boards to market more quickly, which can be important for getting an early edge on your competitors.

Thanks to their slower graphics core and memory (and reduced number of pipelines), PCI Express GeForce 6800 cards don’t require an external power source for operation. In fact, we’ve found that AGP boards based on this chip tend to run fairly cool, a high-end cooling solution isn’t necessary.

Memory module orientation

Hynix memory modules

256MB of memory

Not only is MSI’s NX6800 the first PCI-E GeForce 6800 card to hit the market, it’s also the first to ship with 256MB of memory. Typically most manufacturers outfit their GeForce 6800 cards with 128MB in order to save costs; keeping their price as low as possible in comparison to other board manufacturers. This is good for consumers looking to save a few bucks, but we’ve found that next generation titles such as Half-Life 2 really like the larger memory footprint a card with 256MB of memory provides, especially once you crank up the AA and AF. By providing more memory on their GeForce 6800 board, MSI’s NX6800 is better designed for these titles. As far as we know, MSI has no plans for a 128MB GeForce 6800 PCI-E SKU.

The fan MSI uses on their NX6800 is fairly standard, in fact it looks quite similar to the cooling unit NVIDIA features on their reference GeForce 6600 GT cards. Some previous MSI cards we’ve tested were equipped with MSI’s unique T.O.P. Tech cooling solutions, which feature copper heatsinks for added cooling and are often so quiet you can hardly hear them.

External power is not required

The SLI connector

Another shot of the NX6800 cooling fan

In operation the fan on the NX6800 runs fairly well, fortunately it doesn’t run too loud and does a decent job of keeping the graphics core (and card) cool, and while this is more than enough for the GeForce 6800 we can’t help but wonder what a little copper cooling would do for the card.

Software and accessories

Like all MSI graphics cards we’ve evaluated lately, MSI equips their NX6800 board with an excellent software bundle. Included in the box are copies of Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow, Ubi: Ages Beyond Myst, XIII, a 14-in-1 CD of assorted game demos, MSI’s Media Center Deluxe 2 software, Virtual Drive 7 Professional version, Restore It 3, Photoshop Album SE, 3D Album SE, and 5.1 channel DVD playback software. MSI also includes a DVI adapter and S-Video cable for hooking the card up to a TV.