GeForce - Nomenclature

Nomenclature

The company followed a naming scheme similar to that shown below for the GeForce FX series to the GeForce 9 series.

Category	Number range	Suffix1	Price range2 (USD)	Shader amount3	Memory			Outputs	Example products
Category	Number range	Suffix1	Price range2 (USD)	Shader amount3	Type	Bus width	Size	Outputs	Example products
Mainstream	000-550	SE, LE, GS, GT	≤$100	≤25%	DDR, DDR2	25%-50%	~25%	VGA/DVI	GeForce 9400GT, GeForce 9500GT
Performance	600-750	GSO, GTS, GTO	$100–$175	25%-50%	DDR2, GDDR3	50%-75%	50%-75%	VGA/DVI Two DVI	GeForce 9600GT, GeForce 9600GSO
Enthusiast	800-950	GTX, Ultra, GX2	≥$175	50%-100%	GDDR3, GDDR5	75%-100%	50%-100%	VGA/DVI Two DVI DVI/HDMI	GeForce 9800GT, GeForce 9800GTX

Since the release of the GeForce 100 series of GPUs, NVIDIA changed their product naming scheme to the one below.

Category	Prefix	Number range	Price range2 (USD)	Shader amount3	Memory			Outputs	Example products
Category	Prefix	Number range	Price range2 (USD)	Shader amount3	Type	Bus width	Size	Outputs	Example products
Business, HTPC	No prefix, G, GT	00-40	≤$100	≤25%	DDR2, (G)DDR3	25%-50%	~25%	VGA/DVI	GeForce 210, GeForce GT 220
Video Games, Multimedia	GT, GTS	40-50	$100–$175	25%-50%	(G)DDR3, GDDR5	50%-75%	50%-75%	VGA/DVI Two DVI	GeForce GT 240, GeForce GTS 250
Enthusiast	GTX	50-95	≥$175	50%-100%	GDDR3, GDDR5	75%-100%	50%-100%	VGA/DVI Two DVI DVI/HDMI	GeForce GTX 670, GeForce GTX 680

Earlier cards such as the GeForce4 follow a similar pattern.
1: Suffixes indicate its performance layer, and those listed are in order from weakest to most powerful. Suffixes from lesser categories can still be used on higher performance cards, example: 8800 GT.
2: Price range only applies to the most recent generation and is a generalization based on pricing patterns.
3: Shader amount compares the number of shaders pipelines or units in that particular model range to the highest model possible in the generation.
cf. Nvidia's Performance Graph here.