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The MSI R7850 Power Edition OC graphics card has 2GB of DDR5 memory and it is equiped with the latest TwinFrozr IV heatsink and cooler. The reference Radeon HD 7850 cards are clocked at a 860 MHz core frequency and the GDDR5 memory runs at 4.8 Gbps (effective data rate as GDDR5 has a quad data-rate, so effectively that quadruples that number), the memory bus is 256-bit.
The MSI R7850 Power Edition OC with TwinFrozr IV cards are however clocked at 950 MHz. The memory clock remains reference though.
The board's overall power consumption from idle to load is slightly higher than reference. Expect an idle wattage of roughly 10 Watts and, when the monitor goes into power save mode, the card throttles down even lower to 3 Watts. We measured the TDP for the 7850 at roughly 100~110 Watts.
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MSI Radeon HD7850, 2GB GDDR5, Mini DisplayPortx2, DVI-I, HDMI, PCI Express 3.0 Graphics Card R7850 Twin Frozr 2GD5/OC
Price $219.99
The new Sapphire HD7970 OC graphics card features switchable dual BIOS chips and dual cooling fans all on one PCB for maximum cooling and overclock stability. The SAPPHIRE HD7970 OC Edition features Sapphire’s new dual-extractor technology called Dual-X, which is a highly efficient multi-heatpipe cooler with dual fans providing quiet and very cool operation during normal operating conditions, and superb cooling performance even under extreme load due to superb its cooling features.
The Sapphire HD7970 OC Edition 3GB DDR5 graphics card ships with a raised core clock speed of 950MHz and 1425MHz for the memory.
The HD 7970 is currently the top of the line flagship card for AMD’s 7 series of cards and it comes equipped with 2GB of GDDR5 memory, which allows for better Multi-Monitor performance and for High-resolutions of 2560X1600 to play much better than previous generation graphics cards.
Superior cooling and instant overclocking make the Sapphire Dual-X HD 7970 a step above the usual reference based cards and having the protection of its dual BIOS makes it very overclocker friendly.
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Price $439.99
The ASUS GTX 560 Ti 448 cores DirectCU II is an excellent, almost perfect, product. We started our overclocking experiment from Samsung’s 0.4ns memory chips and found them capable of working at 4700 MHz. There were occasional image artifacts, however, so we had to roll back to 4660 MHz. The memory frequency grew by 22.6% from the default 3800 MHz, which is quite good for an Nvidia-based card with a 320-bit memory bus.
The GPU could only be stable at 810/1620 MHz (+10.7%) if we didn’t change its default voltage of 0.975 volts, so we had to increase the latter. The top stable GPU clock rate turned out to be directly proportional to GPU voltage. Unfortunately, the maximum voltage we could select was 1.1 volts, so we stopped at 930/1860 MHz. This is 27% above the default GPU clock rate. Although such a number can hardly impress the user of a 28nm Tahiti GPU, it is indeed an excellent result for Nvidia’s current 40nm chips with air cooling. The overclocked ASUS GTX 560 Ti 448 cores DirectCU II outperforms the more expensive opponents at the Performance settings. It is also ahead of the GeForce GTX 580 and almost as fast as the Radeon HD 7950 in the Extreme mode.
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Price $292.05
The XFX DD R7950 is perhaps the best looking GPU we have tested to date. The memory used on the R7950 are the very overclocking friendly HYNIX H5GQ2H24MFA T2C modules. Overclocking graphics cards has never been easier.
There are a variety of overclocking tools available on the internet and some included with the actual driver, in this case, the AMD 'Overdrive' Utility. Our favourite overclocking utility though is the excellent Afterburner from MSI. A 1.1GHz overclock (28%) on the core is a fantastic achievement made all the more impressive by the fact it needed less voltage to do so than our best overclocking card. Overall it was a mighty impressive showing from XFX who have once again shown everyone how to make a GPU. Great cooling, magnificent overclocking ability and sublime packaging.
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Price $398.99
With the age of the GTX 580 designs, Gigabyte had plenty of time to perfect their PCB and cooler design. This model, the Super Overclock (GV-N580SO-15I), comes in well ahead of the standard reference speeds of the GTX 580 but sticks to the same 1.5 GB frame buffer.
The clock speed is set at 855 MHz core and 1025 MHz memory, compared to the 772 MHz core speed and 1002 MHz clock rate of the reference design. That is a very healthy 10% clock rate difference that should equate to nearly that big of a gap in gaming performance where the GPU is the real bottleneck.
Gigabyte should be proud of its GTX 580 Super Overclock card as it is one of the last and best NVIDIA GF110 graphics cards on the market.
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Price $459.99
The IdeaPad U400 is a sleek laptop, understated from top to bottom and aimed at mid-range buyers who have never had so many options. You can't really call this an Ultrabook, but it's still super slick. And in its roomier 14-inch weight class, you actually have fewer options to pick from.
The U400 is machined from a single slab of aluminum. This unibody approach has become more and more popular in recent years, but Lenovo has truly exceeded in producing a stunner in design. As far as PC notebooks go, there may be none more stunning than this on the market. As for internals, it offers mid-to-high range specifications, utilizing Intel's Core i5-2430M CPU @ 2.4GHz, 6GB of DDR3 memory and AMD Radeon HD6470M GPU.
Performance-wise, the U400 is a solid option, speeding through basic Windows 7 chores without too much lag. Multi-tasking is a fairly smooth affair as well, but expect a few seconds of load lag during the initial boots of heavier apps. When it comes to gaming, though, there isn't much to write home about. You'll need to use lower resolutions and image quality settings in order to get newer titles to be playable. Of course, Lenovo doesn't market this machine as one that gamers should take interest in. Looking deeper, the trackpad performance was a mixed bag. We loved having support for multi-gesture input, and the sizable pad was great to work with, but the response was definitely lagged from time to time. Finally, we can't finish this section without mention the thermals. Lenovo's new cooling system kept fan noise at a minimum, and it kept the palm rest and underside as cool as a cucumber even after hours of benchmarking. Impressive.
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Price $899.99
The new GTX 560 Ti has a GF110 core rather than the GF114 used before. Two stream multiprocessor clusters have been disabled out of 16 available meaning the card has 448 CUDA cores (14 clusters with 32 processors in each). This core is also used on the GTX 570 which has one cluster disabled and the GTX 580 with all 16 enabled. Consumers may find it frustrating figuring out which card is which since NVIDIA seems to enjoy mixing things up but this lineup is supposedly a limited run for enthusiasts. Some will appreciate that this card supports 3-way SLI versus the original GTX 560 Ti which could only do 2-way. This GTX 560 Ti 448 should be better than the GTX 560 Ti 384 and both are better than the GTX 560 performance-wise. Since the core is now a GF110 performance should be very close to the level of a GTX 570. Memory and memory bus size has been increased to 1280MB and 320bit just like the GTX 570 while the prior GTX 560 Ti had 1024MB memory and a 256bit memory bus.
MSI has taken this new revision and overclocked it on a custom PCB with 2 extra PWM phases for the core. As well as a total of 6+1 phase PWM and military grade components. Reference clocks are 732 MHz core and 950 MHz memory while the MSI is at 750 MHz core and 975 MHz memory clock speeds. This design is named the Power Edition for the upgraded power delivery methods. The Military Class II components include Super Ferrite Chokes, Solid Capacitors, and High-Conductivity Capacitors. The card is cooled by the MSI Twin Frozr III high density heat sink which has five heat pipes and two 80mm fans equipped. The copper base of the heat sink is nickel coated to improve conductivity and prevent corrosion.
Reference GTX 560 Ti 448s have a stock core clock of 732 MHz and a memory clock of 950 MHz, the MSI came overclocked to 750 MHz core and 975 MHz memory. In the end we have the core at 945 MHz and the memory at 1130 MHz, both are remarkable gains of ~29% and ~19% over reference speeds!
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Price $279.99
With next generation graphics architectures still a good ways off, we’ve seen a steady stream of manufacturers introducing custom versions of current GPUs. Unfortunately these cards are meant as flagship products that make a bold statement so they are usually reserved for certain well-heeled consumers. This has led MSI, ASUS, Zotac and many others to introduced high performance versions of the GTX 580 while less expensive alternatives have -for the most part- maintained the status quo. Gigabyte on the other hand has broadened the reach of their Super Overclock series so it touches products at almost every single price point. In this review we will be looking at their GTX 570 Super Overclock which is meant to appeal to the large number of people who want high performance but just can’t justify spending more than $400 to get it.
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Price $400.97
The Radeon HD 6870 is still considered one of the best sub-$200 US GPUs (Graphics Processing Unit) and it certainly gave HIS a lot to work with. Codenamed “Barts XT” the GPU consists of some 1700 million transistors in a die that measures just 255mm2, made even more impressive by the fact that it is designed using the 40nm process. Despite sticking with the 40nm process, the Radeon HD 6870 still proved to be an efficient graphics card, using roughly the same amount of power as the GeForce GTX 550 Ti and considerably less than the GTX 560 Ti. That said, based on more than a dozen games we found that the Radeon HD 6870 was on average just 5% slower than GeForce GTX 560 Ti at 1920x1200, while it was 3% faster than the GTX 460. Keeping that in mind, todays pricing makes the Radeon HD 6870 the better value product, as the heavily modified HIS Radeon HD 6870 IceQ is still 15% cheaper than your typical GeForce GTX 560 Ti.
Another advantage to the HIS Radeon HD 6870 IceQ comes when overclocking. With the GPU overclocked to 985MHz and the VRAM at MHz 1205MHz (GDDR 4820MHz) the HIS Radeon HD 6870 IceQ wasn’t even audible when stress testing.
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Price $221.39
Today we test the video card side of things a bit more and see what goes on when we start to make use of CrossFireX on the 990FX platform. The 990FX chipset shows some good potential and it's going to be interesting to see what happens when we start to make use of all those PCIe lanes that are on offer.
The approach we've taken here today is pretty simple; we've got our two CPUs, the Intel i7 2600k and AMD FX-8150. We've thrown three Sapphire HD 6970 video cards in our Maximus IV Extreme-Z and Crosshair V Formula. Then we've benched them in our standard video card line-up with both CPUs running at what their maximum OC is i.e. we're using our i7 2600k @ 5.2GHz vs the FX-8150 @ 4.76GHz.
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Price $249.99
Intel Core i7-2600 Processor 3.4GHz 8 MB Cache Socket LGA1155
Price $295.98
While the ASUS GTX 560Ti (model ENGTX560 Ti DCII/2DI/1GD5) has all of the features to be expected on a Nvidia GTX 560Ti based video card, including PhysX, GeForce CUDA, Nvidia 3D Vision, and 1GB GDDR5 memory, they did not stop with just reference design offerings. They have implemented their DirectCU II cooling system, which integrates copper heatpipes and places them in direct contact with the GPU, while using dual 80mm fans for adequate airflow. In addition, the GPU is factory overclocked to a modest 830MHz, which doesn't seem like much, but every little boost can help.
An enthusiast can spend hours getting the best overclock possible by adjusting different settings. However, I'm not an expert at overclocking and prefer to do minimal tweaking to see what the average person can do to get the most out of their hardware.
Using ASUS's Smart Doctor a user can adjust the voltage, clock speed, and memory speed in varying degrees. The GPU runs at 830MHz by default, while the memory runs at 1000MHz.
To obtain the highest stable overclock, the program would adjust the GPU Clock by 10MHz increments. At the same time, the voltage would be increased very slightly by 0.001V, and the memory would be increased at varying intervals. Both the voltage tweaks and memory speed are arbitrary amounts with no obvious basis. After each adjustment, Futuremark 3DMark Vantage was run to verify stability.
After many adjustments, the test system froze at 960MHz and 1.013V. Increasing the voltage by 0.005V did not allow a successful run of PCMark Vantage. The clock speed needed to be lowered by 1MHz until a successful run was finished. At 949MHz, 3DMark Vantage finally ran successfully, with a voltage adjustment of .012V.
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Price $189.99
The reference GeForce GTX 570 runs at 732 MHz core, 950 MHz memory, and 1464 MHz shader. The EVGA GeForce GTX 570 Classified version has been pushed to 823 MHz core, 975.5 MHz memory, and 1645 MHz shader clocks. This is good for a boost of 12% on the core and shader clocks with additional 3% on memory clock. This is an additional 16% above what EVGA had the core and shaders set to when it left their factory and a 9% bump in the memory clocks. This also is a whopping 31% above the NVIDIA reference specifications for a GeForce GTX 570 card!
If you want an enthusiast grade graphics card under $400.00 that can overclock like mad, EVGA makes your choice simple. The GeForce GTX 570 HD Classified is absolutely the version to buy.
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Price $329.99
The Radeon HD 6450 (the GPU's codenamed "Caicos") has an engine clock between 625~750MHz, 512MB or 1GB of DDR3/GDDR5 memory, 200~240 GFLOPS of single-precision compute power, PCI Express 2.1 x16 interface, 160 Stream processing units, OpenGL 4.1 / DirectX 11 support, AMD Eyefinity support, OpenCL 1.1 compliance, PowerPlay, and other standard Radeon HD 6000 series features. The Radeon HD 6450 graphics card being tested in this review is the PowerColor "Go Green!" AX6450. The PowerColor Radeon HD 6450 has a 625MHz core clock and 1GB of DDR3 video memory clocked at 667MHz. This low-profile card has HDMI, VGA D-Sub, and DVI outputs.
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Price $60.53
With the new Galaxy GeForce GTX 560Ti MDT X5 video card it is possible to output to 5 displays even though this is a single GPU video card. Enjoy NVIDIA multi-display spanned resolution gaming without the need for two cards! Can this GTX 560 Ti based video card stand up in the latest games when spanned across three displays?
Overclocking was made simple with Galaxy's Xtreme Tuner HD software program. To our surprise, and delight, core voltage adjustment is able to be raised from 1000mv up to 1150mV so that we were able to overclock the GPU as high as it could possibly go.
By default the Galaxy GeForce GTX 560Ti MDT X5 runs at 822MHz GPU frequency and 1645MHz shader frequency with 4GHz memory.
We also upped the voltage as high as we could, in this case 1150mV. Lo and behold, this allowed us to gain 50MHz more on the GPU, taking it up to 950MHz stable! At this clock speed the shaders are at 1900MHz. This is an above average overclock, considering this video card was not designed with the goal of the fastest core overclock out there. The fact we can boost the GPU from 822MHz to 950MHz with software is a substantial overclock. The memory maxed out at 4.2GHz, and there were no voltage options to change it. On this video card, GPU core clock is more important than memory anyway.
Given everything we've experienced, the Galaxy GeForce GTX 560 Ti MDT X5 is not only a display-flexible video card for desktop productivity, but also a capable video card that lets you enjoy today's latest games from a very widescreen perspective. Certainly this is not a video card for everyone, but it is great to see companies like Galaxy pushing into new enthusiast frontiers in the world of the GPU. Galaxy has produced a great product in the GTX 560 Ti MDT X5.
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Price $329.99
We examine the PNY GTX 580 XLR8 Liquid Cooled graphics cards in greater detail. You may be shocked at how cool these run and how simple they are to operate.
The GTX 580 XLR8 Liquid Cooled posts results that are 40°C cooler than the reference air cooler. That's nothing short of outstanding. The PNY GTX 580 Liquid Cooled manages to beat the vaunted Noctua NH-D14 and claim the top spot for CPU cooling.
The PNY card already comes with a good factory overclock, but we decided to push things further. We finished with a final overclock of 970/1170MHz, which is one of the best overclock results we've achieved on any GTX 580 model.
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Price $559.99
The Gigabyte HD6770 Silent Cell has a completely passive cooling solution. This HD6770 addition to Gigabyte’s Silent Cell series claims even lower temperatures compared to the traditional actively cooled reference designs. Since the HD 6770 Silent Cell carries Gigabyte’s Ultra Durable VGA technology, it is equipped with a 2 oz. copper PCB, Tier 1 memory chips, 100% Japanese solid capacitors, Ferrite core chokes and Low RDS (on) MOSFET. For display connectivity, the Gigabyte HD 6770 Silent Cell video cards have a DVI, HDMI and a DispayPort for 3-way Eyefinity gaming. Users looking for a quiet gaming experience without compromising thermal performance need look no further than Gigabyte’s HD 6770 1GB GDDR5 DirectX11 Silent Cell video card.
For overclocking, we used AMD's built-in Overdrive software inside the Catalyst Control Center. This program also doubles as a temperature monitor and has a quick OC test feature. For complete stability, the final overclock used in this review was stress tested in OCCT for an hour. Since there is no active cooling, the memory couldn’t be pushed too high, despite the fact that these are very good quality Tier 1 memory chips. It was still very good, all things considered, and reached 1300MHz. The core, however, overclocked very well, as expected of a Juniper chip, and the first goal was to reach the HD 6770 factory OC levels at 880MHz, which is 30MHz more, and the HD 6770 Silent Cell did so with ease.
Even though we are not applying voltages to overclock, temperature was still a concern because of the passive cooling design. The temperature was monitored throughout, as the core clock was bumped incrementally, but the thermal levels remained surprisingly manageable. In fact, it was a lot lower than I expected.
The final core overclock of 930MHz was reached and anything higher led to artifacts in OCCT. The core temperature increase was very minimal, at only 3C more under OCCT load, although the Silent Cell heatsink itself was very hot to the touch. Real-world temperature performance was even better as it only peaked in the mid-60s running the latest DirectX11 games.
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GIGABYTE ATI Radeon HD6770 1 GB DDR5 DVI/HDMI/DisplayPort PCI-Express Video Card GV-R677SL-1GD
Price $144.99
The ASUS HD6870 DirectCU graphics card brings a very refined aspect to video cards. In addition to the Radeon HD 6870 GPU overclocked to 915MHz, the ASUS HD6870 DirectCU brings a slew of ASUS exclusive features and technologies. Naturally, the card is fitted with ASUS’ DirectCU cooling system, complete with three direct contact copper heat pipes and aluminum fin array, dust repellant shroud and variable speed fan. Under the shroud, you will find ASUS’ exclusive Super Alloy design featuring the highest quality capacitors, MOSFETs and chokes for improved performance, lower heat and longer life. It also needs to be noted that the stronger nature of Super Alloy technology certainly helps in overclocking, especially with the HD6870 DirectCU’s unlocked voltage in the BIOS. To aid in overclocking ASUS includes their Smart Doctor software to assist you in easily and safely overclocking your GPU. The HD6870 DirectCU implements an electronics design that ASUS has dubbed “Super Alloy Power”. Developed by ASUS, this technology uses highly magnetic, heat resistant super alloy materials in capacitors, chokes and MOSFETs allowing for greater durability, performance and lowered temperatures. ASUS has been able to achieve 15% performance increases and 35% temperature drops through this technology. This type of high quality components also plays a large part in the HD6870 DirectCU’s ability to up GPU voltage and still maintain cooler temperatures. The HD6870 DirectCU’s unlocked BIOS and VoltageTweak allows overvolting of the GPU for serious overclocking.
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Price $189.99
ASUS has a good history of producing quality products that don't skimp on quality while still pushing them at competitive prices. With this ENGTX570 DirectCU II Edition card, ASUS has brought to the table a card with a completely original cooling system at nearly the same price as the reference design, but with a pay off. This card is huge. At three expansion slots, some may have to forget their dreams of a slick SLI setup unless they're planning on picking up an extended motherboard with roomier PCI-E configurations. On the upside, the temperatures were rock bottom at stock speeds and, when I cranked the fan up to 100%, the card idled a whopping three degrees over room temperature. That's a testament to the effectiveness of the system that I couldn't hope to best. Better yet, on stock testing, the fans never once cranked up above 20%. If the graph is no longer in your memory, this card STILL had the lowest temperature of the pack under both idle conditions and loaded conditions. That is extremely impressive.
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Price $377.05
The full product name is 'Twin Frozr III Power Edition', which represents a couple of things. First, it utilizes a robust cooler that sets out to be as efficient as it is quiet. Yes, those claims are touted about pretty much every non-reference card, but as our testing has proved, we can see this card means it.
"Power Edition" refers to the fact that the entire power circuitry has been taken into consideration for the ultimate in efficiency. It features voltage control, a 6+2 power phase design and improved stability. Great for the clocks given, and effective at handling your overclocks.
According to MSI, the Twin Frozr III cooler makes this card about 11°C cooler than the reference design (we found it to be even better), and 13.9dB quieter. It's a high-end card that could be shoved into a SFF chassis, essentially, and in using the card that way, you shouldn't have to worry about anything while enjoying your high-end gaming experiences.
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Price $387.01
EVGA has also entered the heightened bandwidth market with their own GTX 580 3GB. This new GTX 580 forgoes the custom cooling and component choices of some competitors and instead focuses upon a better buying experience through the inclusion of a lifetime warranty and EVGA’s always excellent customer support. Its accessory package also continues down the no frills route with the usual power and video adaptors though a mini HDMI to HDMI dongle is included.
You may have noticed this card’s name doesn’t include EVGA’s usual catch phrases like “Superclocked”, “SSC” and “FTW”. That’s because their 3GB GTX 580 retains reference speeds instead of being overclocked like much of the competition it its price range.
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Price $569.99
