MSI GeForce FX 5700 Ultra/NonUltra
MSI FX5700U-TD128 Video Card Features
 Package bundle:
- the card itself;
- DVI-to-D-Sub adapter;
- a video cable;
- a cable to provide additional power to the board;
- 1 big and good manual (on the video card installation and on the software);
- 5 CD with drivers and varied software suites (MSI Multimedia Beyond 3D, MSI Media Center Deluxe 2, Intervideo WinDVD, Virtual Drive Professional, Adobe Photoshop Album SE);
- 5 gaming CDs in a smart package (The Elder Scrolls: Morrowind, Ghost Recon, Duke Nukem: Manhattan Project, Games Collection CD: The Sum of All Fears, IL-2 Sturmovik, Serious Sam: The Second Encounter, Rally Trophy, Beam Breakers, Zax: The Alien Hunter, Oni);
- A small "MSI" logo sticker.
The retail bundle is traditionally rich, which is normal for MSI. In some ways, MSI is even better at that than ASUS. The only thing what we'd like to see from MSI in the nearest time is the updated bundle in the part of supplied games selection. Clearly, the company is reluctant to pay much of royalties, but to date the games shipped in the package bundle of MSI FX5700U-TD128 can no longer be regarded as novelties and, unless the company takes enough care about the bundled software updates for the product line in the nearest future, it may run the risk of losing to its competitors.
Design and layout
The MSI FX5700U-TD128 is fully based on NVIDIA's reference design. All the components and power cells are positioned strictly in accord with the reference.
But the board's cooling system, albeit different from the reference, offers no radical changes to it.
The board is made on a bright red textolyte PCB, offers 128 MB DDR memory onboard, AGP 2x/4x/8x interface, and a standard set of outputs: one analogous, one digital, and one TV-OUT. The TV-OUT functionality is implemented with the NV36 chip itself. No VIVO functionalities are provided onboard, but instead of that the pad for a VIVO chip is wired (normally, a Philips SAA7108AE chip should be there) , but no chip is installed over there.
The video card is equipped with 128 MB DDR memory packaged in 8 chips (4 chips on each of the sides - front and rear) within the advanced BGA packaging, with the 128-bit memory bus. The memory is produced by Samsung (K4N26323AE-GC 2.2), offers 2.2 ns access time, which is equivalent to approximately 450 MHz (900 MHz) of memory operation at which the memory is running. The graphic chip also runs at 475 MHz as per the specifications.
Let's feast our eyes with the graphic chip NVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 Ultra itself. As can be seen on the marking, the chip was manufactured on the 44th week of the year 2003 and is of revision A1.
The socket for additional onboard power is wired in precisely the same way as on the NVIDIA reference board.
The cooling system does not offer any extra "luxuries". The memory chips are covered from the front and rear sides of the PCB with small golden radiators. The nice thing is that MSI decided not to follow the way of many manufacturers with its board built on the NVIDIA GeForce FX 5700 Ultra chip who recently are very keen to fitting memory radiators on the front side only, for "cosmetic" purposes, so to say :). The cooling of NV36 graphic chip is implemented through fitting a sizeable radiator blown around by a no less massive fan. The NV36 chip does not offer so much power consumption like NV38 does, so this solution of MSI engineers seems to be quite sufficient. If we recall the cooling system used on the NVIDIA reference board, this conclusion is even more supported.
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