BFG Tech hits the ground running with its overclocked GPU. Having an engine that stretches past the 425MHz mark definitely helps this card push the envelope. The proof: BFG Tech earned the fastest 3DMark05 scores of the roundup, flat-out dusting the competition. This card chews through Doom 3 and Far Cry frames like they were a can of Pringles. However, it choked slightly during Splinter Cell Chaos Theory, which greatly affected the card’s overall 3DGG Lite score. Throw in FarStone’s fantastic Game Drive utility in the box and this is a no-brainer.

However, this is the most expensive of the five cards reviewed. But with BFG Tech’s lifetime warranty, nifty online gaming portal, and 24-hour technical support, shelling out a little more dough for performance is not that hard to swallow. It’s not like any of these cards are cheap.

3D GameGauge Lite

BFGR78256GTX: 105.2

BFGR78256GTX $599

A bit more moola, but a solid card.

Verdict: 4.5

Revamped and Upgraded: 3d Gamegauge Lite V2.0

Since our 3DGG Lite benchmarking suite was getting to retirement age, we dumped Halo in favor of Doom 3: Resurrection of Evil and Splinter Cell Chaos Theory. Chaos Theory pushes videocards to the limit with its cutting-edge DirectX 9.0 game engine and sports high dynamic range (HDR) rendering mode improvements via Shader Model 3.0.

When testing our videocards in SLI, each GPU goes through an exhaustive series of benchmark tests to determine overall frame-rate performance, raw speed values, and DirectX 9.0 support. Benchmarks consist of the industry’s undisputed reference-quality synthetic benchmark utility, 3DMark05, and our own real-world game-test suite, 3D GameGauge Lite v2.0. 3DGG Lite consists of A-list action games such as Far Cry, Unreal Tournament 2004, and Painkiller. Video test resolutions are configured at 1280x1024, with 2x antialiasing and 4x anisotropic filtering enabled.

Final scores are tabulated from raw scores. It’s that simple.

MANUFACTURER: BFG Tech PRODUCT: BFGR78256GTX GeForce 7800 GTX OC 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express GPU

Copyright © 2005 Ziff Davis Media Inc. All Rights Reserved. Originally appearing in Computer Gaming World.