With ASUS officially announcing that it's set to release a card based on NVIDIA's GeForce 8600 a couple of days ago, PNY has followed this by revealing that it is about to do the same. Unfortunately though, there are not as many details about PNY's card as there were about ASUS's, other than that it will be an 8600GTS with 256MB of GDDR3 memory. Possibly more interestingly though, PNY has also let slip that the 8600 itself will be launched tomorrow - the company confirmed that its card will go on sale in PC World stores in the UK on April 17th, whilst also commenting that "graphics card will be immediately available to consumers from the date of launch of the product by NVIDIA," essentially confirming that NVIDIA is launching the new GPU tomorrow (as previously rumoured). This will be the first of the mid-range DirectX 10 cards to be released to consumers.

The new ASUS EN8600GTS/HTDP/256M is a high-end graphics card that will be released and bundled with the much anticipated first person shooter game S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadows of Chernobyl. Equipped with 256MB of DDR3 memory and able to support NVIDIA's SLI technology, the EN8600GTS is designed with the gamer's graphics expectations in mind. With such high-end specifications, this graphics card has earned the accolade of being the official global bundle partner of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. In line with this, ASUS's G1 gaming series notebook - testament to its gaming-oriented design, also features in the S.T.A.L.K.E.R game itself.

On last Sunday we reported about PCOnline who were showing the worlds first 8600GTS benchmark figures. A few guys nicknamed 'kemo6600' and 'Gam3Ra' over at the XtremeSystems (scroll down to post 15) point out there is something wrong with these figures and the pictures. Admittedly there is something wrong with the pictures in question. There are 4 of them in the thread at XtremeSystems and all of them have a ACDSee EXIF-tag in it (probably for some cropping reasons) besides one! Coincidentally this one picture is the one that states the 3DMark 06 score. If you look carefully at the provided picture you will see the different sub-category scores at the front center and the right window at the back. Look at the picture at the end of this post where I enframed the parts in red.
Anyway there is another way to bust this picture as a fake even if the numbers weren't manipulated. Check out the 3Dmark2006 Score Calculator by M3kk which calculates the final '06 score based on given SM02, SM03 and CPU scores in the same way the real deal arithmetics behind 3DMark06 are doing it. If you enter SM2.0 3249, SM3.0 2070 and CPU 937 you will get 5212 3DMarks only. Now if you calculate using the other values (SM2.0 2356, SM3.0 N/A, CPU 940) it comes up with 3902 3DMarks. The last picture I added show what happens when you combine the most convincing scores (SM2.0 2837, SM3.0 2070, CPU 940) - the 3DMark2006 Calculator v1.2 now renders 4598 3DMarks which is in fact nowhere close to the stated 5488 3DMarks.
You might wonder why I didn't link to the pictures of the source story. That is because the PCOnline is down at the moment and I would really be astounded if the story is still up by the time they go online again. The other reason is that our own picture-upload engine get's rid of the EXIF tags so our own article doesn't give any evidence.

Forum user sdscsv from the PCOnline forum has posted pictures of his 8600 GTS card, as well as some benchmarks:

According to several of NVIDIA's partners, NVIDIA is planning to release their GeForce 8800 Ultra together with the soon to be released GeForce 8600 series. The word in the halls is saying that NVIDIA is planning to release several GPU's on the same day. The 8300 GS, 8400 GS, 8500 GT, 8600 GT, 8600 GTS and the new 'monster', the 8800 Ultra. According to the same sources, the GeForce 8800 Ultra will be an overclocked version of the 8800 GTX aimed to deal with the upcoming threat from ATI's R600. The exact specification and technical details are still unknown at this stage. It is known that many of NVIDIA's partners are preparing for a hard launch.

NVIDIA is set to launch the mainstream 8600GTS (G84-400) and 8600GT (G84-300), as well as the 8500GT (G86-300), on the 17th of April. The GeForce 8600GTS and 8600GT will have 256MB GDDR3 memories onboard each, both sporting a 128-bit memory interface but no HDMI yet. The GeForce 8600GTS is meant to replace the 7950GT and 7900GS, while the latter will replace the 7600GT. The 8500GT aims to replace the 7600GS.

The 8600GTS will be clocked at 700MHz core / 2GHz memory and comes with dual D-DVI, HDTV, HDCP, but requires external power. Price is estimated between US$199-$249. Another mainstream model, the 8600GT, will be clocked at 600MHz core / 1.4GHz memory and has 2 variants; one with HDCP (G84-300) and the other without (G84-305). This model doesn't requires any external power. It will be priced between US$149-$169.

The last model meant for the budget segment is actually a G84 core but downgraded to meet the value segment pricing structure. The 8500GT will be clocked at 450MHz core / 800MHz 256MB DDR2 memory and comes in 2 variants; one with HDCP (G86-300) and the other without HDCP (G86-305). The 8500GT should see a retail price between US$79 to US$99. The 8300GS, which will be released towards the end of April, is expected to replace the current 7300 series.

The NVIDIA 80nm G84 and G86 line-up will meet head on with ATi's DX10 65nm offerings, where the mainstream RV630 is slated to arrive in May and the value RV610 is slated to arrive earlier in April.

NVIDIA is preparing to launch a series of GeForce 8600 cards in the middled of the second quarter 2007 to help satisfy the increasing demand for DirectX 10 supporting graphics cards caused by Windows Vista. According to the release plan several versions priced to target mainstream markets are currently being prepared. The GeForce 8600 GT with 512MB memory will be priced between US$219 and US$229, while a 256MB version will be available at US$199. Additionally, targeting an even lower price point will be the GeForce 8600GS at between US$159 and US$165, according to DigiTimes. DirectX 10 graphics cards will be the main focus for both NVIDIA and AMD-ATI at the upcoming CeBIT trade show to be held from March 15 to 21, 2007. That's also the date when the above mentioned cards from NVIDIA are expected to be shown alongside the company's already released GeForce 8800 series.

Nordic Hardware has posted some very detailed lists of hardware details regarding what will be entry-level and midrange DX10 cards from the green camp (NVIDIA).

• The 8600 Ultra card will come with 64 Shaders, clocked at 500MHz. It will also have up to 512MB of 256 bit memory clocked at 1400MHz DDR. It is expected to retail for around $179.
• The 8600 GT will come with 48 shaders, clocked at 350MHz. It will have up to 256MB of 256-bit memory, clocked at 1200MHz DDR. It should retail for $129.
• The 8300 GT will have 32 shaders at 500MHz, along with no more than 256MB of 128-bit memory clocked at 1200MHz DDR. It is expected to cost around $99.
• The 8300 GS will "only" have 24 shaders, clocked around 500MHz. It will have up to 256MB of 128 bit memory, clocked at 1000MHz DDR. The card shouldn't cost much more than $79.