BFG Tech GeForce 8800 GTS OC 512MB

BFG Tech GeForce 8800 GTS OC 512MB

Manufacturer: BFG Tech
UK Price (as reviewed): £205.50 (inc. VAT)
US Price (as reviewed): $299.99 (ex. Tax)

Core Clock: 675MHz
Shader Clock: 1,674MHz
Memory Clock: 1,940MHz
Warranty: Ten years (Europe), Lifetime (North America)

Right before the Christmas break, Nvidia—a company not willing to loosen its hold on the high-end graphics market—decided that it was time to drop the GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB onto the market. We were reasonably impressed with the card but, aside from the horrible naming scheme, we complained about the price point.

Indeed, at the time of launch, many of the cards on the market were sitting well above Nvidia’s expected £220 retail price and were encroaching on GeForce 8800 GTX territory. In the majority of the scenarios we tested, the GeForce 8800 GTX was a faster card, but there were definitely occasions where the new GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB certainly gave the old dog a run for its money.


We ended up deciding that the price that the GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB managed to hit would determine whether or not the product would be a success. Today, we’ve got BFG Tech’s GeForce 8800 GTS OC 512MB on the table for a round or two of benchmarking, so the question is – does this card deliver enough performance at a price that’s attractive enough to make it a good buy? Let’s get on and find out...

Box and Bundle

BFG Tech has used a similar box design as the one it used on the recently reviewed GeForce 8800 GT OC 512MB – it’s a design that I’m quite fond of because the information that’s shown on it is displayed in a more intuitive manner than any of the company’s previous box designs we’ve seen. The performance indicator on the bottom shows that this card is the equivalent of one notch better than the 8800 GT OC, which is about right I guess based on the numbers from our original GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB review.


However, this time, the company has decided to replace what I thought was quite a useful shield (with a bunch of easy-to-decipher information) with the character that has been featured on BFG Tech boxes since the launch of the GeForce 8800 GTX. This time he’s a kind of lime green, but that doesn’t make him look any less evil. This time, BFG felt that the shield could be put to better use on the back of the box, where there are explanations for what the card scores in each of the three categories.

As is typical with BFG Tech graphics cards, the bundle isn’t anything special – there are no games in the box, but what little there is in the box is all pretty useful. There are a pair of DVI-to-VGA converters, a component-out dongle that connects to the card’s HDTV-out connector, a 2x4-pin Molex to 6-pin PCI-Express cable (for those that don’t have one on their PSU). Rounding the bundle off there are some case stickers (not pictured), a driver CD and a quick install guide.

All in all, there’s a pretty typical package that comes with BFG’s 8800 GTS OC 512MB card.