Advantages: high performance at low price Disadvantages: Instructions not clear
Not being too sure on the quality of Gainward I was hesitant in buying this card but was swayed by the price and performance ratings.
This time I won't go into the basics and history and go straight in to the review of the card.
~ The Package ~
Mine came in the exact box next to the title, it's a large box and the card is then encased within another box so I would say is well protected.
In the box came the card and all the cables you need for standard monitor or digital and power.
~ The Card ~
At first sight I was quite impressed, it has a red PCB and black heat sink and fan with a large mesh type casing around it. Normally I would rip off the stock heatsink and fan and replace it with a high performance one, no need to here as it cools the card very well.
I noticed straight away that it has dual DVI but it ...
Advantages: Good price Excellent mid-range card Overclocks well Disadvantages: Bad manual
Nvidia have really hit the sweet spot with this one! Seeing the gap in the market for a sub-£200 £150-plus card, they released the 6800GS based on the NV42 core at around £160, with 1.8nano second memory, and 256mb of it. This card was fast as it was, but Gainward took it a step surther, doubling the memory size and making the speed of it 1.2ns. This is hard to explain but in summary it mean that the memory can be overcloked further than the BLISS' already overclocked 1300MHz. The package is great, including PowerDVD and a VIVO cable with S-Video, RGB and Composite connectors. All this at a sub £170 price! The only gripe I had was the manual, which was lazy and generic, describing a different version of cards.
All in All though, for a mid-range card, it's the best on the market. ...
Advantages: Fast, Good Overclocker Disadvantages: Competitors like the 7900GT/7900GTO virtually the same price
The Gainward 7950GT "GoldenSample" is one of the fastest 7xxx series graphics cards on the market, and Gainwards card doesn't dissapoint!
It runs on a PCI-e connector, however as it draws more power than the slot can provide it needs an extra power connector on the side. This is NOT compatible with an AGP board, and does need a beefy power supply (i recommend 400+ watts).
The card has a dual slot cooler - that is to say that it takes up the width of one slot, and then the fan on the card takes up the space of another slot. The fan is quiet and looks sleek, however the card has a black piece of metal on top to make it look sleek and i've found that while this has no affect on temperatures, it's not helping the airflow and does nothing but take up unnecessary room in my case, however it was easy to remove with a screwdriver ...
Gainward's award winning High-Performance/Wide-Bandwidth hardware design powered by NVIDIA's GeForce 9600GT GPU integrating 512MB/256bits high-speed DDR3 memory which offers enhanced, leading-edge performance for the 3D enthusiasts.
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