Introduction

In the short time that it has been on the market, NVIDIA’s GeForce 7800 GTX graphics card has been on a tear, winning the hearts and minds of many gamers and hardware enthusiasts. Not since the GeForce4 Ti 4600 has a high-end product been selling so well, so quickly.

This is due in large part to NVIDIA and their board partners’ commitment to delivering cards on time and in significant quantities. In the past, retail availability of final products has traditionally trailed the product’s initial introduction by 30 days or more in some cases (GeForce FX 5800). For GeForce 7800 GTX however, NVIDIA and their board partners had final cards available on launch day; a feat that was practically unheard of previously in the graphics industry.

NVIDIA’s $600 asking price was considered steep initially, but deals such as Dell’s 7800 GTX, which was available for less than $500 with coupon earlier last month, have made that point obsolete from time to time. And of course, the 7800 GTX’s sales have no doubt been helped by the fact that as of this writing, it has no direct competitor: ATI’s next-generation part (codenamed R520) is rumored to be delayed until early fall of this year. That gives the 7800 GTX a few more months to sit atop the throne unchallenged.

MSI NX7800GTX (bottom) and GeForce 7800 GTX reference board

The NX7800GTX and GeForce 6800 GT reference

With this in mind, NVIDIA’s board partners have been eagerly promoting their 7800 GTX cards, with early adopters quickly snapping up boards.

MSI NX7800GTX card

Another shot of the 6800 GT and NX7800GTX

SLI connector here

Complicating matters slightly for manufacturers (or not depending on your perspective) is the fact that all early 7800 GTX cards are strictly following NVIDIA’s reference specifications. This leaves little differentiation between boards. As a result, board partners have been racing to get their 7800 GTX boards to market as quickly as possible.

MSI was one of the first manufacturers to get a retail 7800 GTX card to us, their NX7800 GTX-VT2D256E. Over the years, MSI has been one of NVIDIA’s biggest board partners (enjoying Tier One board partner status), producing many of the cards that go into OEM systems from system builders such as Dell. And while they’re handicapped by the restrictions of NVIDIA’s reference design one of the ways they’ve uniquely differentiated themselves from other board partners has been one of MSI’s strongest selling points in the past: their game bundle.