Price Guide, November 2005: Video Cards

We would like to welcome you to another edition of our video card price guide. With the holiday season approaching quickly around the corner, there are a few new options for this week as well as some significant price reductions.

You'll find the newly released GeForce 6800 GS cards in stock at a few vendors. Also, the new high-end X1800XT series was recently released since our last price guide. The new GeForce 7800 series is something we suggest you take a look into if you have the money to splurge for ultra high-end graphics. And like always, SLI is something we do not recommend you invest your hard earned cash into.

Be sure to check out our RTPE system at http://labs.anandtech.com. Surely a valuable source for all your computer hardware buying needs!

Ultra High End Graphics

Now these cards are not something we would recommend you purchasing, but if you're the type who wants the "latest and greatest" hardware, then these ultra high-end graphics cards are for you. Bringing you the best performance possible yet, these cards would be sure to amaze you. But at these outrageous prices, we'll pass.

We're not noticing many significant price reductions this week with the GeForce 7800GTX cards. If anything, many of the cards are going up in price. Leading the pack this week is the XFX 7800GTX 256MB [RTPE: PV-T70F-UNF] at $457.00 shipped. Nothing spectacular, but this card went down $11 -- definitely better than nothing. Over the course of the past couple weeks, it has begun to stabilize at about $460.00.

XFX GeForce 7800GTX 256MB

The card with the "largest" reduction in price will have to go to the eVGA 7800GT 256MB [RTPE: 256-P2-N515] now at $315.00 after a $40 MIR. Astute readers will also notice the introduction of NVIDIA's new 7800 GTX 512MB cards at a couple places. Coming in at a whopping $699 for now, the cards definitely aren't cheap. You'll have to check back later this week to find out how they actually perform.

If you are going to go for one of these ultra high end cards, we would recommend you go with a 7800 series card rather than a 6800 series. A single GeForce 7800 performs better and is cheaper than going with a 6800 Ultra in SLI.

There have been some major fluctuations in 6800 Ultra prices lately, indicating that they're nearing EOL. Going forward, the 6800 GS is supposed to replace both the GT and Ultra in the mid-range market, so we may already be picking up shortages on the cards. Down about $177.00 this week - after jumping up $150 the week before! - the BFG GeForce 6800 Ultra OC 256MB (PCI-E) [RTPE: BFGW68256UOCX] leads the 6800U market at $385.00.

The R520 cards are on sale now and definitely something we would recommend over the X850XT. The best price we were able to find this week, was on the Sapphire X1800XL 256MB [RTPE: 100133] on sale for $374 shipped. It competes well with the 7800 GT cards, although it's more expensive. We've also picked up at least one X1800 XT 512MB, for just over $600.