GeForce 7800 GT is the latest graphics chip released by nVidia and it is a cheaper version of their fastest (and most expensive) video chip, GeForce 7800 GTX. We’ve got a reference board from nVidia using this new chip. Video cards manufactured based on the reference design should get a performance similar to the board we are reviewing.

This new chip runs at 400 MHz, while GeForce 7800 GTX runs at 430 MHz. Its memory is access at a 1 GHz rate, while GeForce 7800 GTX memory clock is 1.2 GHz. Another difference between these two chips is the number of pixels that can be processed per clock cycle, which are 20 on the new GeForce 7800 GT and 24 on GeForce 7800 GTX.

You can see in our tutorial “nVidia Chips Comparison Table” the difference between this new chip and the other chips from nVidia, while on our tutorial “ATI Chips Comparison table” you can compare it to its competitors from ATI. It is very important to keep in mind that nVidia chips from series 6 and 7 use a Shader 3.0 engine (DirectX 9.0c), while ATI chips still use Shader 2.0 (DirectX 9.0).

It is always important to remember that the “memory clock” column from these tables informs the chip manufacturer (ATI or nVidia) recommended clock. In some cases, specially on cheaper video cards, the card manufacturer uses simpler memory chips (in order to cut the board price) and lower memory clocks (compatible with the memory chip used), making the board to achieve a lower performance compared to boards that use the same graphics chip but with their memory chips running at the chip manufacturer recommended clock. Because of that, we always run <a href=http://www.entechtaiwan.com/ target=_blank>PowerStrip</a> software in order to check if the video card memory is running at the standard clock set by the chip manufacturer or running at a lower clock rate.

The reviewed reference model from nVidia runs at 400 MHz for the chip and 1 GHz for the memory.

This video card is targeted to the PCI Express bus, so in our review we will compare it only to other PCI Express video cards.