Not at all, the 8600 GT is a joke in my opinion and does not deserve to be part of the x600 GT series. If anything, what we have see here today should have been performance delivered by the 8500 GT, not the 8600 GT. The results really spoke for themselves, as the GeForce 8600 GT was 12% slower in Far Cry, 17% slower in F.E.A.R, 7% slower in X3: Reunion and 19.5% slower in Company of Heroes. The only two games that the 8600 GT came out on top in was Prey (15.5%) and Supreme Commander (27.5%), making a two out of six effort very poor indeed.
Making matters worse is the glaring fact that the new GeForce 8600 GT currently costs $170 US where as the 7600 GT can easily be had for $110 US. This means for the extra $60 US you only get Direct X10 support, which is pretty much useless at this point in time. In fact, it will be a while before quality DX10 games out weigh DX9 games, so what is the point of the 8600 GT? As far as we can see there is no point, it’s a dud! There is little to no reason for anyone to invest $170 US into a mid-range DX10 graphics card now. Especially given by the time quality DX10 games are out, mid-range supporting graphics cards will be much faster and even cheaper!
