GeForce 7600GS 256 or 512 MB

Today, we continue getting familiarized with the features of NVIDIA GeForce 7600GS under various capacities and operating speeds of the video memory. Tasting another inexpensive 512 MB since it's become a fashionable offering. In so doing, we'll be using ASUS Point of View video cards.

ASUS of View EN7600GS SILENT 256 MB

The video card is most likely to come across in this nice-looking and large enough package box. The setting is quite informative. At first glance you know what is inside the box and which features the product offers.

The package bundle is quite modest, which is traditional for mass video cards. The "hardware" part of the bundle includes, apart from the video card itself, 15-pin VGA D-Sub -> DVI, and TV-out -> component HDTV adapters. The more necessary adapters and cables for S-Video and Composite are missing.

On the other hand, the software and paper parts of the bundle have always been fine with ASUS: ASUS Bonus GAMEPACK (Savage, BillyBlade, Mashed), a CD with drivers and utilities, a CD with documentation, and a hard copy of the user's guide.

The video card is made on a blue textolyte board, with most part of it closed by a large aluminum radiator of the passive cooling system. Of note are the empty contact pads in the power supply scheme, but to all appearances this reduction is related to a lack of VIVO chip and does not affect the stability and overclocking at all. We also note the lack of a connector for plugging in a fan since the cooling system does not need power, which is logical but may cause issues on attempts to install one more cooler.

To plug in monitors and other devices, the video card is equipped with the following connectors: DVI, 15-pin D-Sub, and TV-out.

Under the cooling system, there are memory chips and the GPU itself. At the same time, the video memory has no contact with the radiator, which is no good for its cooling.

The aluminum radiator due to its shape is of a rather large heat dissipation area. Inside, there are three washers to keep everything intact during installation.

The G73 runs at the nominal 400 MHz. At the same time, the cooling system does its job well and does not let the temperature rise above 69°Ñ. We succeeded in overclocking the GPU of the video card to 470 MHz, and the temperature in these conditions did not go up over 74°Ñ. Through blowing about the 90 mm fan we were able reducing the temperature of the chip to the acceptable 60°Ñ.

The video card uses 256 MB of DDR2 video memory made by Infineon of 2.5 ns access time running at 800 MHz. We were able to overclock the memory to 900 MHz.

ASUS EN7600GS SILENT 512 MB

Externally and by the package bundle, ASUS EN7600GS SILENT with 512 MB of video memory is very similar to the above 256 MB version. Absolutely the same box has only one distinction - instead of the "256" label, it now shows "512".

The package bundle hasn't undergone changes.

While holding the video card in your hands, it is difficult to tell it apart from the 256 MB version - only by the sticker on the reverse side.

Although the video card uses the same GPU running at 400 MHz and the same cooling system, some overheating was noted. Even without overclocking, the temperature rose above 80 C which caused artifacts and resulted in a couple of hangs. We were not able to clean the GPU off the baked thermal interface. On renewal of the thermal paste and installation of additional cooling, we were able to overclock the GPU to 510 MHz, and the temperature did not exceed 61°Ñ.

The video card uses 512 MB DDR2 memory. For that, eight Hynix (ÐÍ5PS121621 FP-E3) chips running at 540 MHz were used. Again we see an annoying situation when slow chips are installed on video cards of greater memory capacity. We were able to overclock the Hynix chips to no more than 608 MHz.

Point of View GF7600GS 256 MB (VGA 150813)

Point of View video cards are put into boxes of smaller size as compared to ASUS produce, but they feel as comfortable in there. The color and style setting of the box itself is traditional for the manufacturer.

With smaller size of the box, the package bundle is more balanced: a user's guide, a CD with drivers, a 15-pin VGA D-Sub -> DVI adapter, a TV-Out -> S-Video/HDTV adapter, an S-Video -> Composite adapter, and a coaxial cable.

The video card is made on a green textolyte PCB of original design which does not provide an additional VIVO chip. Half of the front side is closed by the already familiar copper-aluminum cooling system with a heat pipe.

Communications are performed through a standard set of ports: VGA D-Sub, DVI, and TV-out.

There is nothing unexpected under the cooling system. A KPT-like thermo paste is used as the thermal interface for the GPU, with the video memory chips having no contact to the radiator.

Remember that some Point of View video cards use a cooling system just like that which comprises a large copper-styled aluminum radiator and a copper heat pipe which provides uniformity of the heat spreader. This structure is blown about by a rather quiet fan.

The graphic processor G73 runs at 430 MHz. It is cooled quite efficiently, so the operating temperature did not exceed 59°Ñ and after overclocking to 490 MHz it stayed at 65°Ñ.

The 256 MB video memory is made up by two Hynix DDR2 chips of 2.5 ns access time. The memory runs at 800 MHz. We were able to overclock these chips to no more than 856 MHz.

Point of View GF7600GS 512 MB (VGA 150821-1)

The box for the 512 MB GeForce 7600GS video card by Point of View looks absolutely the same as that of the 256 MB version but the "256" has been replaced with the "512". Nor has the package bundle undergone any changes.

But the exterior of the video cards has turned absolutely different. From the color of the textolyte and complete redesign of the PCB up to using a passive cooling system on a heat pipe. This video card resembles the MSI NX7600GS, but only having 512 MB memory - the same PCB, although of different color and absolutely the same cooling system.

On the other hand, the similarity to the MSI product is more due to the cooling system. If it is removed, the PCB can't be told apart from the above ASUS solutions.

To output image, 15-pin VGA D-Sub, DVI, and TV-out connectors can be used.

The video card uses a very efficient passive cooling system - an aluminum radiator with a copper heat pipe inside. This structure is firmly fixed with 4 spring-loaded screws.

The onboard GPU runs at 400 MHz but due to the cooling system is was overclocked to 515 MHz, and its temperature never rose above 58°Ñ.

The 512 MB of video memory is made up of eight DDR2 chips by V-Data of 3.7 ns access time runs at 533 MHz. The overclocking capability of the video memory amounted to 652 MHz.

Benchmarking

Benchmarking results

Already from the first tests, we can see a lag of video cards having greater capacity of slow video memory, and even overclocking doesn't help much. But that was synthetics, and what will games show?

As we expected, the situation with games is different. At low resolutions, all the video cards will provide a comfortable FPS which is restricted here by the CPU capabilities, but we are not sure there will be many of those willing to play games in such modes. Increase in resolutions in most new games will compel the gamer to spend some time choosing the optimum settings and even give up many effects and various antialiasing modes. Finally, in the most demanding modes it will be possible to play at high resolutions at only the minimum settings of quality and effects, and that is just what owners of 17", 19" and larger monitors will the default 1280õ1024 and higher resolution will have to do.

What if SLI?

Indeed, why not try merging two GeForce 7600GS video cards into a SLI configuration and see what will come of it? Some might say this is not topical. And we would have agreed to that but ... The price and performance of video cards based on GeForce 7600GS make them a really good bargain for the entry level, that is, for the first time when there is not enough funds for buying something more powerful. On the other hand, motherboards capable of providing the SLI operation are not a rarity at even lower-end systems. If the user has one GeForce 7600GS and a vacant PCI-Express 16x slot, then it makes sense thinking about the second video card like that.

Admit it, far not every user will find a way to dispose of the old video card at a higher price in order to get money for buying a new and faster video card, although that would be a sensible solution. Even if there is a desire to bargain, then the buyer at the sales area is most likely to receive a counter offer from the sales manager to give up the "buy and sell" mess but simply add another GPU into the system and get a 70-80% performance boost (and even will show the graphs to be more persuasive). It is much easier for the sales manager to sell an extra commodity item rather than solving the issues of replacement and extra charge.

We were curious to find out and thought "What if indeed?"

The system with two 256 MB video cards was assembled of a couple of Point of View GF7600GS 256 MB. During the synchronous overclocking which amounted to 490 MHz for the GPU and 856 MHz for the memory, to increase stability the video cards were blown by a 90 mm fan.

We had no two identical 512 MB video cards on hands, so we went on experimenting with two different ones: ASUS EN7600GS SILENT 512 MB and Point of View GF7600GS 512 MB. The SLI configuration ran slower but more stably, which allowed overclocking to 500 MHz for the GPUs and 608 MHz for the memory.

As a major rival to the pair of GeForce 7600GS we took a pair of View GeForce 7900GT which costs about the same.

Now on to the results.

Quite an unexpectedly good result for the SLI configuration made up of GeForce 7600GS 256 MB especially at increased operating frequencies. But that is merely synthetics for which the drivers are well "optimized". If the result hold for popular games as well, then the seemingly silly idea may prove a justified investment for many users.

At games, all has proved not so delightfully... But prior to making the final conclusions let's estimate the performance boost provided through adding another video card into the system.

Just note the interesting trait - in some cases, low resolution results in the negative performance boost, whereas in other it gives a substantially positive result. There is another evident trend which is well seen in most games when with the increase of resolution the faster combination provides a lower performance boost. There is a very simple explanation to that: where the boost is negative, all depends on the CPU capability, and where it is positive the bottleneck is the video card. Therefore, the more the CPU capabilities of a single video card are enabled, the less is the efficiency from using the same second video card because the CPU resources are not endless. There comes a conclusion which is not quite related to the video system, but very important. Prior to replacing the video card with a more powerful or setting up a configuration of two video cards, think twice if your processor is able loading the renewed video system.

Thinking about further progress of processors and video cards, we can say that manufacturers of video chips are thoroughly studying ways for relieving the CPU resources from computing the physics and gaming world. On the other hand, the Quad SLI is good enough, but the CPU is not capable of handling it. But let's not go deep into these details and return to the results of GeForce 7600GS SLI.

In any case, the performance boost is there and even rather impressive somewhere! Despite that, a couple of GeForce 7600GS is unable to complete on par with GeForce 7900GT, but they will beat 7600GT although the cost of such tampering will be overly high.

Final words

Summing up the today's material, we are not going to rate the winners and hand out any awards. Both video cards of onboard 256 MB memory showed approximately the same result and each may appeal to the buyer in its own ways. ASUS EN7600GS SILENT 256 MB operates noiselessly but may prove to be a bit more expensive and will require good ventilation in the housing, whereas the Point of View GF7600GS 256 MB can be heard in operation although it will cost cheaper. As regards the tested GeForce 7600GS 512 MB, we are not recommending each of them to anybody - the greater capacity of slow memory installed on a video card makes little sense. And of course we note the possibility of efficient operation of two GeForce 7600GS video cards in the SLI mode - it is not economical but feasible. The most important is not to forget that apart form the video card other system components should be on par with the tasks to be solved.

We appreciate LLC PF "Servis" (Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine) for the video cards presented for tests.