GeForce 7 Series

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The GeForce 7 Series is the seventh generation of NVIDIA's GeForce graphics cards.

NVIDIA GeForce 7 Series
Codename	G70+
Created	June 2005
Entry-level GPU	GeForce 7100, GeForce 7300
Mid-Range GPU	GeForce 7600
High-end GPU	GeForce 7800, GeForce 7900
DirectX version	9.0c

Contents 1 GeForce 7100 series 1.1 GeForce 7100 GS 2 GeForce 7300 series 2.1 GeForce 7300 SE 2.2 GeForce 7300 LE 2.3 GeForce 7300 GS 2.4 GeForce 7300 GT 3 GeForce 7600 Series 3.1 GeForce 7600 GS 3.2 GeForce 7600 GT 4 GeForce 7800 Series 4.1 GeForce 7800 GT 4.2 GeForce 7800 GS AGP 4.3 GeForce 7800 GTX 5 GeForce 7900 Series 5.1 GeForce 7900 GS 5.2 GeForce 7900 GT 5.3 GeForce 7950 GT 5.4 GeForce 7900 GTO 5.5 GeForce 7900 GTX 5.6 GeForce 7900 GX2 5.7 GeForce 7950 GX2 6 See also 7 References 8 External links

[edit] GeForce 7100 series

The 7100 series was introduced August 30, 2006, with little notice or attention from the media. It has a PCI Express-only interface, and lacks High dynamic range rendering support. The only available model is the 7100GS. [1] The chip is based on GeForce 6200 with TurboCache, but supports Intellisample 4.0 multisampling (without gamma correction) and SLI multiprocessing using Forceware 91.47 driver. [2] These features can be enabled with other GeForce 6 series video cards.

[edit] GeForce 7100 GS

Although the 7300LE series (below) was originally intended to be the "budget" series from the GeForce 7 lineup, the 7100GS has now taken its place. As it is little more than a revamped version of the GeForce 6200TC, it is designed as a basic PCI-e solution for OEMs to use if the chipset does not have integrated video capabilities.

[edit] GeForce 7300 series

NVIDIA designed the 7300 series to be entry level video cards. They are currently available in four versions: the 7300 GT, the 7300 GS, the 7300 LE, and the 7300 SE. (see here). They were released to replace the Geforce 6200 series of video cards. The 7300 series is not meant for hardcore gaming, but instead is meant to serve as a good graphics card for home theater PCs.

[edit] GeForce 7300 SE

Another model that NVIDIA seemed to quietly release is the new 7300 SE. It uses the same core frequency and memory speed as the 7300 LE, but has only half the fill rate and 2/3 of vertex setup rate, which means it has only 2 vertex and pixel shaders. In many ways, this card is actually inferior to the new 7100 GS, although it still retains the HDR support of its bigger brothers. 5

[edit] GeForce 7300 LE

The 7300 LE ( LE stands for light edition ) is a scaled-down version of the 7300 GS. It has DDR2 memory, and a slightly lower core clock speed (450 MHz vs. 550 MHz) according to Anandtech. It is only available in the PCI Express interface. With good performance/price, the 7300 LE serves as a budget video card, though most consider it too inferior for the relatively small difference in price from the GS version.

[edit] GeForce 7300 GS

On January 18, 2006, NVIDIA officially announced the immediate release of the GeForce 7300 GS graphics card. Like most of the GeForce 7 series, the 7300 GS is currently only available with a PCI Express interface. The RAMDAC is still at 400 MHz like the original 7800 GT, but NVIDIA has scaled the memory interface down to 64-bit. The 7300 utilizes an nVidia technology called turbocache with which the card is able to effectively "share" RAM Memory to speed-up performance on low-end desktop machines.

The 7300 GS (G72) series was designed to replace the 6200 TC (NV44) series. With the same improved pipelines and pixel/vertex shading power inherited from its bigger brother, the 7800 series, albeit scaled down to fit budget market needs, the 7300 GS should have around double the performance of the 6200 TC. The 7300 GS also has the same Transparency AA feature and now supports FP16 Blending & Filtering, neither of which was in the 6200 TC.

[edit] GeForce 7300 GT

The 7300 GT was quietly slipped out the door sometime April/May 2006. It has 8 pixel pipelines, 4 vertex units, and uses either a 64-bit or 128-bit memory interface. Technically, it is a more advanced part than the 6600 DDR2, although the clock speeds of 350 MHz Core and 666 MHz GDDR2 prevent it from competing directly. However, later models incorporated DDR3 memory making it capable of beating the 7600GS (and retailing at a higher price than the 7600GS). The only thing it shares in common with its lower powered brothers, is the 90nm process. Even though it is named a 7300 series part, it's based on the same core utilized by the 7600 series.

The real advantage of the 7300GT^{[citation needed]} is many manufacturers tend to produce the DDR3 version of the card with added factory overclock settings. This certainly proves to be a successful formula^{[citation needed]}, with some 7300GT's reaching core clocks up to 600 MHz and memory up to 1600 MHz with little or no hassle. To go beyond this speed is also available via pencil-mod. The ability of the 7300GT to reach higher clock speeds and the affordable price tag proves to be a mix that leads to success.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] GeForce 7600 Series

NVIDIA announced immediate availability of the GeForce 7600 series on March 9, 2006. Models currently available are GeForce 7600GT & 7600GS. See here.

[edit] GeForce 7600 GS

On March 22, 2006, NVIDIA announced the immediate availability of the GeForce 7600 GS GPU targeted at the low-mid end. This new GPU will officially assume the place of the GeForce 6600GT which has been around for quite some time.

As of July 21, 2006, there is now an AGP version of the 7600GS as well. According to NVIDIA, this card is identical to the PCI-e version other than the interface. In addition the AGP version uses NVIDIA's AGP-PCIe bridge chip.

Some quick specifications:

• PCIe native, but AGP 8x cards are also available
• 400 MHz Core frequency
• 128-bit memory interface
• 12.8 GB/s memory bandwidth
• 3.2 billion pixel/s fill rate
• 4.8 billion texel/s fill rate
• 500 million vertice/s
• SLI support (Only for the PCI-e version)
• passively cooled (NVIDIA reference)

Preliminary testing showed that the GeForce 7600 GS outperforms a GeForce 6600 GT and Ati's counterpart, the ATI Radeon X1600 Pro.[3]

[edit] GeForce 7600 GT

This is the high-mid range product in the 7 Series family.

Quick specifications for GeForce 7600GT from NVIDIA documents:

• PCIe native, but AGP 8x cards are also available
• 560 MHz core frequency
• 128-bit memory interface
• 22.4 GB/s memory bandwidth
• 4.48 Billion pixel/s fill rate
• 6.72 Billion texel/s fill rate
• 700 Million vertice/s
• SLI Support
• 12 pixels per cycle
• Built in dual-link DVI support for 2560x1600 resolution

The 7600 contains all the features of the GeForce 7 family, and is priced rather low for the mainstream market. It was made to provide a Geforce 7 series card to the mass market. By using the same PCB and GPU socket as the 6600, manufacturing costs should be lower due to available parts left over; and the fact it is built on a smaller wafer. When benchmarks revealed that the 7600GT seriously outperformed its original market opponent, the ATI Radeon X1600 XT, ATI reduced prices of its Radeon X850XT PE (the fastest video card of its previous-generation product line) and introduced the X1800 GTO, which was slightly more expensive than the 7600GT but marginally faster thanks to its 256 bit memory bus, higher peak pixel fill rate and more raw shading power. However, the memory speeds in the 7600GT are underclocked, leaving quite a lot of headroom for overclocking. Card manufacturer Leadtek introduced an AGP version of the card in August 2006.[4]

[edit] GeForce 7800 Series

The 7800 series was the GeForce 7 series' high-end cards. They were discontinued and replaced with the 7900 series in early 2006.

[edit] GeForce 7800 GT

The GeForce 7800 GT is the second GPU in the series, launched on August 11, 2005 with immediate retail availability. It has 20 pixel pipelines, 7 vertex shaders, 16 ROPs and a 400 MHz core clock, 500 MHz memory clock (1 GHz effective) using GDDR3 memory.

The GeForce 7800 GT had been introduced as a more affordable alternative to the 7800 GTX. At the time it was considered the performance/cost champion of video cards.

There has been speculation by some gamers that CPU limits and the potential for unlocking/overclocking may imply that the 7800 GT has the potential to perform at the same level as the 7800 GTX.

Efforts to enable the unlocking of the last "quad" (NVIDIA's name for groups of four pipelines) and the remaining vertex shader have been unsuccessful because NVIDIA uses a new technology called laser locking, which severs the internal connections to the quad and renders it impossible for any software to unlock it.

[edit] GeForce 7800 GS AGP

On February 2, 2006, NVIDIA announced the 7800 GS as the first (and the only high-end) AGP video card in the GeForce 7 series lineup, an AGP version of the high-end Geforce 7 Series.[5]

This card was promoted by several hardware enthusiasts as "the last high-ended AGP card in existence". It has 16 pipelines instead of the 20 that the 7800 GT has, but still benefits from the optimizations of the other 7-series GPUs enjoy. Clock speeds are 375 MHz for the GPU and 1200 MHz for the (GDDR3) memory. According to all benchmark tests, the performance of this card is above and beyond both the GeForce 6800 GT and GeForce 6800 Ultra. Different vendors may deviate from the stated specification. It serves to provide a great upgrade path for those with high-end AGP systems who don't want to switch to a new high-end PCI-Express system. [6]

There was a special "Golden Sample" release from Gainward that was called "7800 GS+" or officially "Bliss 7800 GS 512 MB GS+" that had default clock speeds of 450 MHz core and 1250 MHz memory. Unlike a standard 7800 GS, the 7800 GS+ actually used a 7900 GT GPU that had the full 24 pipelines instead of the regular 16 pipelines that are normally found on a 7800 GS video card.

Gainward had previously released a "Bliss 7800 GS 512MB GS" card that was based on a 7800GT but utilized the AGP bus. Its external appearance and name make it nearly indistinguishable from the 7900 GT-based Bliss 7800 GS 512MB GS+. Leadtek produced a similar card with 256MB memory.

In late 2006 Gainward released a third '7800 GS' card with 20 pixel pipelines running at 500 MHz core and 1400 MHz memory called the "BLISS GS-GLH" [7]. This card is also based on the 7900GS core.

There are no aftermarket cooling systems for the 7800 GS, as the stock cooling in the GeForce 7800 GS AGP is adequate.

[edit] GeForce 7800 GTX

The GeForce 7800 GTX (codenamed G70, and previously NV47) is the first GPU in the series, launched on June 22, 2005 with immediate retail availability. The GeForce 7800 GTX supports the highest specification Direct X 9 vertex and pixel shaders, currently at 3.0. It is a natively PCI Express chip, but use of a bridge chip could allow an AGP version to be produced (early versions of the GeForce 6800 series were natively AGP and used a bridge chip to convert to PCI Express). SLI support has been retained and even improved.

A 512 MB version of the GeForce 7800 GTX was released on November 14, 2005. The card features more than simply an increased frame buffer from 256 MB to 512 MB. The card features a much improved core clock speed of 550 MHz vs. 430 MHz (27.9% increase) and fast 1.1 ns GDDR3 memory clocked at 1.7 GHz vs. 1.2 GHz (41.7% increase), when compared to the original version. Like ATI's X1800XT, the addition of another 256 MB of memory, and to a lesser extent, the increased clock speeds, have raised the heat and power output significantly. To combat this, the GeForce 7800 GTX 512 sports a much larger yet quieter dual slot cooling solution when compared to the original 256 MB version.^[1]

According to PC World, the 7800 GTX is "one of the most complex processors ever designed". The GPU has 300 million transistors (the Athlon 64 X2 4800+ CPU has 233.2 million transistors), along with 24 pixel and 8 vertex pipelines.^[2] This card includes new standard features, such as subsurface scattering, HDR lighting, and radiosity, to name a few. It was outdated by the 7900GTX on March 9, 2006

Here is how the released versions of the "GeForce 7" series family compare to NVIDIA's previous flagship GPU, the GeForce 6800 Ultra, and ATI's Radeon X1800 XT:

	GeForce 6800 Ultra	GeForce 7300 LE	GeForce 7600 GS	GeForce 7600 GT	GeForce 7800 GTX	GeForce 7900 GTX	ATI Radeon X1800 XT	ATI Radeon X1900 XTX
Transistor count	222 million	112 million	178 million	178 million	302 million	278 million	321 million	384 million
Manufacturing process	0.13 µm	90 nm	90 nm	90 nm	0.11 µm	90 nm	90 nm	90 nm
Die Area	288 mm²	77 mm²	125 mm²	125 mm²	333 mm²	196 mm²	288 mm²	352 mm²
Core clock speed	400 MHz	400 MHz	400 MHz	560 MHz	430 MHz	650 MHz	625 MHz	650 MHz
Number of pixel shader processors	16	4	12	12	24	24	16	48
Number of ROPs	16	4	8	8	16	16	16	16
Number of TMUs	16	4	12	12	24	24	16	16
Number of vertex pipelines	6	3	5	5	8	8	8	8
Peak pixel fill rate (theoretical)	6.4 Gigapixel/s	1.1 Gigapixel/s	3.2 Gigapixel/s	4.48 Gigapixel/s	6.88 Gigapixel/s	10.4 Gigapixel/s	10.0 Gigapixel/s	10.4 Gigapixel/s
Peak texture fill rate (theoretical)	6.4 Gigatexel/s	2.2 Gigatexel/s	4.8 Gigatexel/s	6.72 Gigatexel/s	10.32 Gigatexel/s	15.6 Gigatexel/s	10.0 Gigatexel/s	10.4 Gigatexel/s
Memory interface	256-bit	64-bit	128-bit	128-bit	256-bit	256-bit	256-bit ext (512-bit int)	256-bit ext (512-bit int)
Memory clock speed	1.1 GHz GDDR3	810 MHz GDDR2	800 MHz GDDR2	1.4 GHz GDDR3	1.2 GHz GDDR3	1.6 GHz GDDR3	1.5 GHz GDDR3	1.55 GHz GDDR3
Peak memory bandwidth	35.2 GB/s	6.5 GB/s	12.8 GB/s	22.4 GB/s	38.4 GB/s	51.2 GB/s	48.0 GB/s	49.6 GB/s

[edit] GeForce 7900 Series

NVIDIA officially announced availability of the GeForce 7900 series on March 9, 2006. See here.

NVIDIA's 7900 series is a product refresh and not a new generation of NVIDIA's GPU, running at 650 MHz.

[edit] GeForce 7900 GS

Introduced during the fall of 2006, At a MSRP of $199 ^[3], the 7900 GS filled the gap between the mid-end GeForce 7600 GT and the high-end GeForce 7900 GT. The card was unofficially launched August 23 by woot! as a white box OEM. Although, the product's company, MSI, made claims that these cards were stolen from MSI during transportation and sold to woot!.^[4] The referenced MSI customer notice has been changed to remove explicit references to woot!. As of March 2007, NVidia discontinued production of a number of Geforce6/7 series products, including the 7900 GS.

The GeForce 7900 GS has 20 pixel processors, 7 vertex processors, 256-bit memory bus, and comes clocked at approximately 450 MHz/1320 MHz for core/memory, which should provide slightly lower performance than the 7900 GT. The GeForce 7900 GS is powered by the latest graphics chip code-named G71, thus, shares the same advantages as the G71 did over its immediate predecessor G70: dual-link DVI outputs, reduced power consumption, higher performance.^[5]

[edit] GeForce 7900 GT

This video card was released on 9 March 2006. Like the 7900 GTX, it is a revised version of the G70 GPU(G71) that is produced at 90 nm. It too offers all the features of the 7800 series as well as an attractive performance-to-price ratio.

Featuring 24 pixel pipelines, it is actually faster than the 256 MB version of the GeForce 7800 GTX, yet has an MSRP of $299 USD (for the base clockrate). The overclocked versions are priced up to $349 USD.

[edit] GeForce 7950 GT

On 14 September 2006 NVIDIA released the 7950GT. Announced with a 550 MHz core clock, 700 MHz (1400 MHz effective) memory clock, 24 pixel shader units, standard configurations come equipped with both 512 MB GDDR3 memory and HDCP support. At an introductory price of $300 USD, the GeForce 7950 GT replaces the older GeForce 7900 GT and improves performance: the GeForce 7950 GT has a fillrate of 13,200 Megatexels/s and a memory bandwidth of 44.8 GB/s (versus 10800 Megatexels/s and 940 Megavertices/s for the 7900 GT.)

[edit] GeForce 7900 GTO

The 7900 GTO is a close cousin of the 7900 GTX. The GTO first arrived at a handful of retailers around October 1, 2006. At the time of launch GTO boards sold for around $250, compared to 7900GTX boards which cost in excess of $400 at the time. The GTO was essentially identical to the GTX, with the exception that it lacked HDCP and VIVO support, had underclocked memory running at 1320 MHz, and used tighter memory timings. Other than that, the two boards were identical: same PCB, same cooler, same GPU. The GTO used extremely fast 1.1ns Samsung BJ11 GDDR3 memory running at 1.8v, as opposed to the 2.1v it is rated at. Clock speeds on the two cards are identical, at 650 MHz. At stock memory speeds, most comparisons found the GTO to lag behind the GTX by roughly a 5-10% margin. The majority of owners find that their GTO will overclock to 1600 MHz memory speeds, despite the under-volted RAM. Many flash to a GTX BIOS to officially make it a GTX. GTO owners having trouble reaching GTX speeds with BIOS version 5.71.22.39.13 or newer are advised to simply flash to an older BIOS version such as 5.71.22.39.08, this seems to solve overclocking problems for most users. The GTO was an extremely popular card among enthusiasts as it offered near GTX performance at a considerably lower price. It was a limited production card aimed at cleaning out G70 inventories before the release of the G80, and only spent about a month in retail channels before selling out.

[edit] GeForce 7900 GTX

The GeForce 7900 GTX is the latest revision of the G70 Core, this 90 nm produced G70 (named G71) features all the same features as its older brother the 7800 GTX but is built upon the smaller manufacturing process.

Featuring a clock speed of 650 MHz, opposed to the 550 MHz speed of the 512 GTX, this card offers up to an 8 - 15% performance increase. It features a new 24-pixel pipeline superscalar GPU model, much like the 512 MB 7800 GTX, but offers faster performance due to "improved pipeline design". "We changed the ROP performance as well as reconfigured some of the pipelines to make sure the card was more optimized over G70," NVIDIA said (see [8]).

Due to shortages of memory modules for the 512 MB GTX, NVIDIA decided to use the more readily available 1600 MHz memory. This also allows the card to be priced very competitively, giving ATI Technologies a harder time. In turn, ATI made a massive price slash in its current lineup.

It was released on March 9, 2006.

[edit] GeForce 7900 GX2

The GeForce 7900 GX2 is two videocards stacked to fit as a dual slot solution. This is not like products such as the ASUS Dual GeForce 7800 GT or nVidia's own 7950 GX2, where two GPUs are on the same card. This enables quad-SLI on two PCI Express x16 slots. Other OEM companies have access to the GX2 and it is now available from numerous vendors.

The card features a 500 MHz GPU and 1200 MHz effective RAM speed. Although the power of the GX2 is less than the 7900 GTX, each card is more powerful than the 7900 GT.

Many issues in this implementation of a dual-GPU unit convinced NVIDIA to restrict its sale to OEM companies. The card is extremely long, with only the largest e-ATX cases being able to hold it. Two of the cards operating in quad-SLI also required extremely well designed airflow to function, and demanded a 1000 watt power supply unit.

[edit] GeForce 7950 GX2

This is essentially a dual-GPU video card that takes up only a single PCIe x16 slot, allowing for 4 GPUs to run with only two PCIe x16 slots, in standard SLI motherboards. Unlike the 7900 GX2 before it, this version is available to consumers directly.^[6]

The 7950GX2 was released to retail on June 5, 2006, and shares similar specs to the GeForce 7900 GX2, with 500 MHz GPU clock, and 1200 MHz effective RAM speed. 512 MB of memory per GPU, for a total of 1 GB, however total performance is more in line with 512 MB since each GPU can only access its own memory and not the memory of the other one. It does not offer any advantages over single gpu cards with 512 MB, memory wise.

This card is designed for the DIY market; it addresses many problems which the previous 7900 GX2 had suffered from, such as noise, size, power consumption, and price. The 7950 GX2 requires only a single PCIe power connector, in contrast to the twin-connectors of its predecessor, and is much shorter, fitting easily in the same space as a 7900 GTX. Superior board layout and the addition of cooling vents on the bracket have greatly improved cooling, allowing the fans to run at a lower speed, thereby lowering noise. As of September 2006, the board can be found for $499, half the cost of a 7900 GX2.

In contrast to the twin-SLI connectors of the 7900 GX2, the 7950 only has one, shared for both GPUs. Technically, this is understandable, as there is no need for a ring bus configuration - frames need only be passed on to the primary GPU.

According to some review sites (such as Toms Hardware - see above), a single 7950GX2 draws less power than a single ATI Radeon X1900XT - some consider this an amazing feat considering the GX2 employs a pair of GPUs, when the Radeon uses only one. Other review sites say that a GX2 is quieter than the aforementioned Radeon^[7], despite the GX2 boasting a pair of identical GPU coolers - however 'loudness' is highly subjective without the proper tools and testing conditions. If true, this would make a pair of GX2s cooler, quieter, and less power hungry than a pair of X1900XTs in Crossfire. However, there is no appreciable performance gain from pairing two 7950GX2s in most applications, while dual X1900XTs see large performance boosts in Crossfire mode.

On August 9, 2006, NVIDIA released official drivers which support Quad-SLI. They can be found here.

[edit] See also

• Comparison of NVIDIA Graphics Processing Units (GPUs only shown by general category, i.e. NV40 NV30)
• PCI Express
• PlayStation 3, which has a NVIDIA G70 series GPU.

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• NVIDIA Website
• GeForce 7 Series Product Overview
• techPowerUp! GPU Database

NVIDIA Gaming Graphics Processors Early Chips: NV1 • NV2 Direct3D 5/6: RIVA 128 • RIVA TNT • RIVA TNT2 Direct3D 7.0: GeForce 256 • GeForce 2 Direct3D 8.0: GeForce 3 • GeForce 4 Direct3D 9.0: GeForce FX • GeForce 6 • GeForce 7 Direct3D 10: GeForce 8

Other NVIDIA Technologies nForce: 220/415/420 • 2 • SoundStorm • 3 • 4 • 500 • 600 Professional Graphics: Quadro • Quadro Plex Graphics Card Related: TurboCache • SLI Software: Gelato • Cg • PureVideo Consumer Electronics: GoForce Game Consoles: Xbox (NV2A) • PlayStation 3 (RSX)