Leadtek WinFast PX6800 Ultra TDH 512MB Review --- TheThirdMedia Hardware

Pumped Up to 512MB

The Leadtek WinFast PX6800 Ultra TDH 512MB is a rather hefty card with a cooler that takes up the space of another expansion slot (which is pretty much expected) and the entire card is longer than the normal 256MB version due to the extra power circuitry involved to feed double the memory ICs present. As it uses the PCI Express interface, you can also run a pair of Leadtek WinFast PX6800 Ultra in a SLI system for a 'total' frame buffer of 1GB, which would probably be enough to get another full system. However, there are some differences that should be noted. First, the normal NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Ultra 256MB version is clocked at 400MHz for its GPU and 1100MHz DDR for its memory. Similarly, the Leadtek WinFast PX6800 Ultra has a GPU speed of 400MHz but a slower memory speed of 1050MHz DDR. Unlike the normal reference board, the large cooler used for the Leadtek is made of better heat conducting copper instead of aluminum, which would also explain why the Leadtek card is heavier.

The faster the card, the larger the cooler.

As the backview shows, only a few memory chips are cooled by the black heatsink. The rest are left bare to fend for themselves.

The memory chips used are from Samsung and are rated at 1.6ns. While the 256MB reference design featured a curved heat-pipe based RAMsink solution that surrounded the GPU heatsink and cooled all the RAM chips, this was found lacking on the Leadtek. Instead, only a portion of the RAM chips found on the Leadtek card is passively cooled with the aid of a normal heatsink. The rest are subjected to conventional heat radiation to the surrounding environment and as we found out later, the temperatures were predictably quite warmer than the reference 256MB version. The cooler does a decent job at keeping the GPU portion cool but unlike the reference board, the air intake is faster than we would have liked, resulting in an increased noise output.

A 6-pin power connector is required as more power is needed for the extra circuitry found on the Leadtek WinFast PX6800 Ultra TDH 512MB.

An even closer look at the copper based cooler.

These Samsung memory chips rely only on passive cooling.

Even the power transistors have their own heatsink and its in black too.

The Leadtek WinFast PX6800 Ultra TDH 512MB takes up two expansion slots. You will also find two DVI-I connectors and a S-Video output. A pair of DVI-to-VGA adaptors are included in case you are wondering.

The accessories found in the package certainly fit the class of cards that the Leadtek WinFast PX6800 Ultra belongs. Two full decent 3D games are also included, presumably to demonstrate the graphics performance of the Leadtek WinFast PX6800 Ultra, but obviously both the titles don't even come close to taxing this powerhouse card. Overall, the package is good but we were expecting far newer game titles for such an expensive card, hence we weren't particularly excited about the entire bundle which comprises of the following:-

2 x DVI-to-VGA adaptor

S-Video to Composite cable

S-Video extension cable

6-pin ATX power cable

Composite extension cable

WinFast DVD

Prince of Persia: Warrior Within

Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow

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