BFG Tech GeForce 6800 Ultra OC

Introduction

Every time I hear the name BFG, two things come to mind: the gun from Doom/Quake and a company that makes great video cards.  BFG has been making video cards based on NVIDIA GPU’s since the days of the GeForce Ti4600, and after talking with their marketing folks, it sounds like they plan on staying with just NVIDIA for the foreseeable future.  This is a good move for BFG because NVIDIA is smart enough to make sure they take care of their loyal AIBs (AIB= Add-In-Board manufacturer).

The GeForce 6800 Ultra OC I am looking at today uses an NVIDIA stock reference cooler, because currently all the 6800U boards are being supplied to AIBs directly from NVIDIA. So what exactly does BFG do to make their product different from everyone else’s 6800U?  The first thing they do is take off the reference heatsink, which uses thermal pads, and clean the cooler, GPU and RAM.  They then use Artic Silver Thermal compound and reattach the heatsink.  Then, the boards are all tested running at a GPU clock rate of 425MHz!  Finally, they are packaged and sold with the 25MHz overclock (default is 400MHz for the 6800U), hence the name 6800U OC.

Features and Specifications

Features at a Glance

•  Superscalar GPU architecture
•  NVIDIA® CineFX(TM) 3.0 engine
•  On-chip video processor
•  High-speed GDDR3 memory interface
•  NVIDIA® UltraShadow(TM) II technology
•  64-bit texture filtering and blending
•  NVIDIA® Intellisample(TM) 3.0 technology
•  NVIDIA® ForceWare(TM) Unified Driver Architecture (UDA)
•  NVIDIA® nView(TM) multi-display technology
•  NVIDIA® Digital Vibrance Control(TM) 3.0
•  AGP 8X
•  Microsoft® DirectX® 9.0 Shader Model 3.0 support
•  Tech support available 24 hours, 7 days a week
•  Lifetime warranty

Specifications

•  GPU NVIDIA® GeForce 6800 Ultra
•  Bus Type AGP
•  Memory 256MB GDDR3
•  Core Clock 425 (vs. 400MHZ standard)
•  Memory Clock 1100MHz (effective)
•  RAMDAC Dual 400MHz
•  API Support Microsoft® DirectX® 9.0, OpenGL for Microsoft® Windows®
•  Connectors DVI, DVI, S-Video-Out
•  638 million vertices/sec setup
•  35.2GB/second memory bandwidth
•  Minimum 480W PSU

The Card, Package Contents and Installation

The card I received came in an OEM white box.  At this time, BFG is selling the 6800U OC online only and does not have a fancy retail box for it.  So what comes in the BFG box? 

Package Contents

•  BFG GeForce 6800U OC graphics card
•  Quick install manual
•  2 DVI-I to VGA connector
•  2 "Y" power cable
•  NVIDIA® Unified Drivers
•  Full installation manual .pdf
•  NVIDIA® NVDVD 2.0 multimedia software
•  Windowblinds BFG / NVIDIA® skins
•  Game Demos - Painkiller, Silent Storm and Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow

Installation

Installing the card was pretty straightforward.  You do need to have the AGP and the PCI slot next to it free, since the card uses both slots like past NVIDIA flagship products. Although NVIDIA strongly recommends using two dedicated Molex power leads to power the 6800U, especially for overclocking, BFG has found that each independent Molex connector on their card should be connected to its own power cable, but those individual power cables can be in line with other components, such as a hard drive or CD/DVD drive. If you do decide to use two dedicated lines and not use any other connectors off those lines, then you'll be happy to see that BFG includes two Y-Cables to let you use your other power leads to feed more devices.