Technical Stuff

	D-Sub(VGA) The 15-pin VGA connector is common to most monitors and high definition television.

	Dual-Link DVI Equipped with the most popular Dual Link DVI (Digital Visual Interface), this card is able to display resolutions of up to 2560 x 1600 at 60Hz.

	HDMI 1.4a HDMI 1.4a builds on previous generations of HDMI connectivity with support for Deep Color, 7.1 High Bitrate Audio, and 3D Stereoscopic support, ensuring the highest quality Blu-ray and video experience possible from your PC.

Microsoft DirectX® 11 Get intense gaming performance and unrivaled image quality with stunning 3D visual effects, realistic lighting and lifelike imagery with SAPPHIRE graphics cards supporting DirectX®11. New features in DirectX®11, such as Hardware Tesselation, HDR Texture Compression, Multi-threading support and DirectCompute bring lifelike gaming and an experience never possible on a PC before.

	OpenGL® 4.1 Supports the latest OpenGL API (Application Programming Interface) to accelerate performance of applications outside of DirectX®, i.e. Adobe Autodesk 2D/3D graphic design.

	Shader Model 5.0 Supports the latest Shader Model 5.0 feature set including VTF (Vertex Texture Fetch) which is a key feature used extensively in many of the games that ship today. Without support for this feature the game will fall back to a lesser shader path resulting in the loss of cool, lifelike effects made possible by Shader Model 5.0

	AMD Catalyst Control Center™ The AMD Catalyst Control Center™ software application gives you complete control over the performance and visual quality of your SAPPHIRE AMD Radeon™ based graphics card allowing for the best experience on your PC.

AMD PowerPlay™ Dynamically manage power efficiency and take control of your performance with AMD’s revolutionary AMD PowerPlay[tm] power management technology, delivering high performance features when needed and conserving power when the demand on the graphics processor is low. This seamless technology dramatically reduces the overall power consumption allowing for break-through energy efficiency.

	Enhanced Unified Video Decoder 3 (UVD 3) Watch the hottest Blu-ray movies or other HD content at full 1080p (and beyond !) display resolution. Enjoy a feature rich video experience with enhanced Unified Video Decoder 3 (UVD 3), offloading the bulk of the video decoding tasks from the CPU to the GPU allowing for a cooler, quieter and more balanced system.

	Enhanced Internet Browser Applications Not just for video and games, the power of your GPU can now accelerate the latest versions of some Internet browsers (IE9/Mozzilla FireFox) utilizing Direct 2D rendering for a faster and more responsive browsing experience including high quality image rendering and media playback.

	Microsoft Office 2010 Take advantage of improved picture and media editing capabilities in Office 2010 as well as edit and share your content in real time. See more, and get more done. Enhanced productivity with accelerated GPU processing for Office applications.

	Windows® 7 support WHQL (Windows Hardware Quality Labs) Certified drivers and logos are available for all SAPPHIRE HD2000, HD3000, HD4000 and HD5000 series cards ensuring compatibility and reliability with Microsoft Windows 7.

AMD App Acceleration Use the power of your AMD Radeon™ GPU to speed up everyday applications like your web browser and Microsoft Office 2010 using AMD App Acceleration. Do more, and do it faster. Watch Blu-ray movies, online streaming video and other HD content using your AMD Radeon™ GPU and get smooth – high quality playback with amazing image quality.

There is really nothing special in the package and the software is just a basic driver package with what is needed to get one up and running. Considering all the bells and whistles that the Catalyst Control Center includes the only real addition that could be considered necessary is a DVI to D-Sub adapter.

Some words from GELID themselves:

The “Rev. 2 ICY VISION” cooler contains 5 power heatpipes in a unique heatpipe constellation. The heatpipes are interlaced into 85 optimized high-quality Aluminium fins. Together with a flat stack fin soldered Copper base, they enable the most efficient heat transmission and dissipation from GPU core in its class. Besides the heatsink, two 92mm UV-reactive fans with 11 blades in S-shape generate 20% additonal air flow than traditional fans. The fan contains a high-quality ball bearing to ensure a longer lifetime in high temperature environments.

The Icy Vision is packaged in blister style packaging. The design heavily utilizes the the light green that has come to be associated with GELID. It protected the cooler well.

GeLid Icy Vision front packaging

GeLid Icy Vision rear packaging

The Belly of the beast:

The very first impression we were struck with after removing the Gelid Icy Vision Rev2 from its packaging was, “Wow, this is light.” We anticipated something much heavier considering the sheer weight of the stock coolers on high end GPUs these days.

In the photo below, you can see the 5 heatpipes of the cooler and how they disperse to the dual heatsinks.

Gelid Icy Vision underside

The top view of the cooler showcases the dual 90mm fans.

Gelid Icy Vision top view

From the side, you can see that the Gelid Icy is actually quite tall. We will discuss what this means for the clearance of the heatsink a bit later on.

Gelid Icy Vision side view

The Icy Vision Revision 2 ships with mounting hardware for over 25 different video cards. If you have pretty much any of the last three generations put out by ATI/AMD or Nvidia, they have you covered. One caveat for owners of 6900 series hardware: you’ll need to pick up an additional pack of RAMsinks, called the Enhancement Kit.

Heatsinks and Backplates

Next: Our Test Bed

Packaging:

The video card:

Specifications and features:

Next: Test System, and Overclocking

Though the packaged is a rather plain, no frills, box; the Sapphire Radeon HD6770 is anything but plain looking. Stepping away from the flashy packaging of most other Sapphire branded products this package is pure function and utility. By focusing on the product contained inside rather than marketing a pretty box Sapphire presents this card (and a few others) with a bold and different approach.

Packaging:

Looking at the card itself makes one forget about the rather plain box:

For a size comparison a GTX 465 was used to represent the more massive cards in this price range. The smaller size of the Sapphire HD6770 makes it more versatile increasing its usefulness in applications where space is at a premium.

Next: Features

Packaging:

The ASUS HD 6950:

Specifications:

Next: Test System & Overclocking

Packaging:

The GeForce GTX 560 Ti SC:

Specifications and Features:

• Free version of 3DMark 11 Advanced Edition included. Users can redeem their code when the product is registered on EVGA.com. This is a $19.99 value. For more information, please visit http://www.evga.com/articles/00594/
• Overclocked out of the box – This card offers a performance increase out of the box, attached is the product spec sheet which includes the details on clockspeeds.
• Special Edition EVGA Precision v2.0.1 – We created a special look of our popular software specifically for the EVGA GTX 560 Ti. This utility allows overclocking, monitoring and fanspeed adjustments. It is located on the DVD that ships with your card. For more information, please visit www.evga.com/precision/
• EVGA OC Scanner – EVGA OC Scanner is fully supported by the EVGA GTX 560 Ti. This utility allows you to benchmark, monitor and stress test your EVGA card. For more information, please visit www.evga.com/ocscanner/
• Voltage Tuning with EVGA ELEET– EVGA ELEET allows voltage tuning on a wide range of EVGA cards, including the GTX 560 Ti. For more information, please visit www.evga.com/eleet/
• EVGA Customer Support – EVGA’s acclaimed customer support can be contacted by support ticket, email, and phone. For more information, please visit  http://www.evga.com/support/
• EVGA Community – Active game servers, thriving forums, integrated chat and social networks allow users to ask questions or get help wherever they feel the most comfortable. For more information, please visit www.evga.com/community/
• EVGA Warranty – EVGA offers a variety of warranties to fit your needs, including our exclusive 10 year Extended Warranty. For more information, please visit www.evga.com/community/
• EVGA Advanced RMA Program – EVGA offers this service to help reduce the downtime of a customer’s system by shipping a replacement product first and lets our valued customer deal with the EVGA directly for quick and efficient service. For more information, please visit www.evga.com/ear/
• EVGA Step-Up Program – EVGA protects your investment for 90 days following your purchase. Qualifying products can be upgraded, one time only, to a select greater performing product. For more information, please visit www.evga.com/stepup/

Next: Test System & Overclocking

The GeForce GTX 590:

Specifications:

Next: Test System & Overclocking

With the new release of the GTX 550 Ti upon us, we have the ASUS factory overclocked GTX550 Ti DirectCU TOP for review today. The 550 Ti is not intended to a be top contender in the market, but rather a lower-end card with great upgrading potential via overclocking and SLI. With the ASUS 550 Ti coming with the DirectCU cooling solution, we anticipate seeing some very low temperatures. The ASUS GTX 550 also comes with SAP (Super Alloy Power) design which is said to deliver 15% performance boost over non-SAP models, 2.5 times longer lifespan, and run 35C cooler. Now let’s move on past all of the niceties and get on to why you are really here, the actual results. Read on…

Packaging:

The ASUS GTX550 Ti:

Specifications:

Next: Test System & Overclocking

The GeForce GTX 550 Ti:

Specifications and features:

Next: Test System & Overclocking

Packaging:

The Zotac 560 Ti:

Specifications & Features:

Next: Test System & Overclocking