While NVIDIA’s 6600 card is a relative weakling, the GT is a vastly superior offering. The core is clocked up from 300MHz to 500MHz and the memory speed is almost doubled to 500MHz. Eighteen months ago it was the undisputed king of value, with superb performance for the cost.

Now, it still costs $176 and struggled in our tests at 1280 x 1024. If you’re happy to play Far Cry and Call of Duty 2 at 1024 x 768, the two games will see 34fps and 29fps, so you’ll be able to keep some of the detail settings on high. But don’t expect playable frame rates at 1280.

The problem is the 7600 GS is only $9 more than the 6600 GT. For a few dollars more than the 6600 GT, the GS showed us an extra 3fps in Far Cry and 5fps in Call of Duty 2 at 1280 x 1024. On this evidence, it’s hard to recommend the 6600 GT for value; most of its notable features are shared by the 7600 GS too.

There’s a single-link DVI port and one D-SUB, plus an S-Video port that supports component output (via adapter). MSI’s utility suite is the only other inclusion. While the 6600 GT was unstoppable in its time, that time has now come to an end.