Gigabyte GeForce GTX 680 OC 2 GB GDDR5 DVI-I/DVI-D/HDMI/Display port PCI-Express 3.0 Graphics Card (GV-N680OC-2GD)

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Price: $519.99    

Product Feature

• WINDFORCE 3X Anti-Turbulence Cooling Solution with Triangle Cool Technology
• Ultra Durable VGA Components: GPU Temperature 5%-10% Down - Overclocking Capability 10%-30% Up - Power Switching Loss 10% - 30% Down
• Core Clock: 1071MHz - Memory Clock: 6008MHz
• Features DVI-I/DVI-D/HDMI/Display port outputs with HDCP protection
• Minimum Recommended Power Supply 550W with 2x 6-Pin PCI-E power connectors

Product Description

Powered by NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 GPU and integrated with industry's best 2048 MB GDDR5 memory and 256-bit memory interface.

Gigabyte GeForce GTX 680 OC 2 GB GDDR5 DVI-I/DVI-D/HDMI/Display port PCI-Express 3.0 Graphics Card (GV-N680OC-2GD) Review

So I'm upgrading from my old stock EVGA GTX 260 and I have to say the difference between the two is staggering. The Gigabyte GTX 680 is quieter, cooler, more energy efficient and powerful compared to my old GTX 260.

There were many other brands to choose from, but I went with Gigabyte for three reasons. Smaller size as compared to the large ASUS DCII OC 680, the memory chips have heat sinks attach to them that allows direct cooling and their Ultra Durability technology.

I initially bought the ASUS DCII OC 680 card, but later return it because I was having issues with the size of the card as it was interfering with adjacent cards. The ASUS DCII OC 680 did run cooler due to their larger fins to dissapate heat better (8 degrees cooler). The noise level for both Gigabyte and ASUS 680 seems about the same to me, I can't hear them all when playing games. Gigabyte's WindoForce 3x cooling Technology sounds like a good idea, but I don't see it being very effective versus ASUS humongous heatsinks fins. If maybe Gigabyte include larger heatsink fins along with their WindoForce tech then maybe it'll be even better at cooling. My idle tempterature is at 28C while when stress testing with Uningine Heaven it was 69C.

The real main reason why I choose Gigabytes card over most of the others is that they have actually heatsinks attach to the memory chips to allow for direct cooling compared to the ASUS DCII OC where it only relies on the active fans above the heatsink to cool the memory chips.

Lastly, I want my card to last a long time and be tough because I am overclocking it pretty hard plus I don't really plan on buying another card for good long time. Gigabyte's Ultra Durable technology is what exactly what I am looking for so I went with it.

The only game I have in my possession that is graphically intensive is Splinter Cell: Conviction. I set all the graphic settings to high and the game ran smoothly with my new Gigabyte GTX 680 at 112FPS. Temperature was at 58C for the most part when I was playing the game for an hour.

******Misc Information******
While the ASUS DCII OC card that I once had did run cooler than the Gigabyte one, it wasn't very overclock-able. With the ASUS card I was able to overclock it to 1224mhz for the core and 3200mhz for the memory. The Gigabyte card, I could overclock it to 1280mhz for the core and 3524mhz for the memory.

Gigabyte's WindForce 3x by design blows hot air into the case, FYI so make sure you get a case with good air flow.

********Update 06/22/2012********
I decided take apart my new card and apply some aftermarket thermal paste on it to see if it will lower the temperatures even further. Upon removing the heatsink off the card, I found that Gigabyte did a ok job on the application on the paste however, IMO, they still added too much. I used some electronic safe alchohol to clean off the OEM paste stuck on the heatsink and GPU until it was mirror clean. I bought the Arctic MX4 thermal paste and applied it ever so carefully and evenly. I then ran Unigine Heaven Benchmark for 1 hour and this is what I got.

***OEM Paste***
Idle Temp: 28C
Full Load (Unigine Heaven Benchmark, Max Settings): 69C

***Aftermarket Paste (Artic MX4)***
Idle Temp: 28C
Full Load (Unigine Heaven Benchmark, Max Settings): 66C

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