Article Index Review: Gigabyte Geforce GTS 450 OC (1Gb GDDR5) Specifications and Features Photo Gallery and A Closer Look Installation and Test Setup GPU-Z and Everest 3DMark Vantage and Unigine Heaven DX11 AvP and Stone Giant DX11 Verdict and Conclusion

Introduction

Last month we looked at several Geforce GTS 450 graphic cards including one from Zotac and one from MSI. Both cards produced good performance, which was more than adequate for most DX 11 gaming. The both graphic cards featured a slightly overclocked GPU (default clock is 783Mhz), which makes it compete very well against the Radeon HD 5770. The GPU on the MSI Cyclone GTS 450 runs at a nippy 850Mhz, while the GPU on the Zotac Geforce GTS 450 ran at slightly slower 810Mhz. In today's competitive market, it seems that everyone's is trying to outdo each other, by introducing faster overclocked versions of the same graphic cards, or should I say graphic cards using the same GPU.

Gigabyte is no stranger when it comes to overclocking. They've dominated the overclocking scene with their spectacular motherboards, so it's only natural for them to take this knowledge, and apply it to their graphic cards. The market is flooded with pre-clocked or factory overclock graphic cards, and we've already seen plenty of these cards from numerous manufacturers. So what will Gigabyte do, to make their graphic cards different? ... The answer is simple, by producing the fastest Geforce GTS 450 available on the market. This time ... overclocking really does rule!

It's interesting to see that Gigabyte have taken this route with their graphic cards, as it would directly compete against some of heavy weights out there, which includes XFX, Sapphire and of course Asus and MSI. Oh, by the way ... just to let you guys know, according to our source in Taiwan, Gigabyte may well include the overclocking of their graphic cards during their next GOOC (Gigabyte Open Overclocking Championships) in 2011. Boy! what an event that would be ... CPU and GPU overclocking at the same time!

We'll be taking a look at the Gigabyte Geforce GTS 450 Extreme Overclock (GV-N450 OC2-1GI). It features a Geforce GTS 450 GPU that's overclocked to whopping @ 930Mhz (default is 783Mhz). Furthermore, it uses a standard 128-bit memory interface and comes with 1Gb of GDDR5 ram, which runs at an effective speed of 4000 MHz. As I've described before, the Geforce GTS 450 GPU offers all of the innovative features found on their higher-end GTX models, such as support for 2-way SLI, CUDA, DX11, OpenGL 4.0, PhysX, Nvidia's 3D Vision, as well as HD hardware video decode acceleration.

So what else have Gigabyte done, to make their version of the Geforce GTS 450 more attractive? Well for starters, Gigabyte have included their Ultra Durable VGA technology with most of their graphic cards, which includes the use of a 2oz Copper PCB, Japanese solid capacitors, 1st-Tier memory, ferrite core choke and lower RDS(on) mosfets. These great features gives their graphic cards better power efficiency, good stability and extra longevity.

For cooling, the graphics card features Gigabyte's a new anti-turbulence cooling system called Windforce 2x, which reduces the build up of dust by alternating the spinning of the twin fans. Each fan spins for 4 minutes and then cycle repeats. If the GPUs reaches 65 degrees Celsius or above, both fans automatically spin to prevent overheating. To enable this feature, there is a switch on the PCB itself which you can turn on or off. See the video clip above.

As we all know, the Nvidia's Geforce GTS 450 is primarily aimed at the mainstream gamer. It won't be as good as a Gefoce GTX 460, but will have a very attractive price of around USD $150.00. As long as it can handle most DX11 gaming at decent resolution/details ... then I'm all for it. We'll find the answer soon enough.

It will be interesting to see how the Gigabyte Geforce GTS 450 would compare it against the MSI and Zotac. I'm expecting good results, especially when you have an overclocked GPU running @ 930Mhz ... it's one of the fastest Geforce GTS 450 available on the market, but will it be enough?

We'll be testing the Gigabyte Geforce GTS 450 Extreme Overclock on our test rig, which consists of the following ... Intel Core i5 - 650 (LGA 1156), Gigabyte P55 USB3 motherboard, 4Gb Crucial Ballistix Tracer, Noctua NH-D14 CPU cooler and a Silverpower 650w power supply. It's the same system we've been using to test all our graphic cards.

OK, let's not waste any more time and take a closer look at the specifications and features of the Gigabyte Geforce GTS 450 Extreme Overclock (1Gb GDDR5) ...

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