The ornithologically themed STRIX line gets the midrange Maxwell treatment
As there are no reference versions of the new GTX 960, it’s all up to the manufacturers just how far they go with their cards. Nvidia has put out its own guidelines for base and boost clocks, but that’s all they are. Because of that, the GTX 960 has spawned a glut of factoryoverclocked cards being first out of the gate. But is that really where the sweetspot lies for Nvidia’s mid-range Maxwell?
As is its wont, Asus has released an owly version of the GTX 960 under its STRIX branding, replete with the alwaysimpressive DirectCU II cooler. The stock 1,126MHz base and 1,178MHz boost clock laid out for the GTX 960 has been torn open once more, with the STRIX sitting at 1,291MHz and 1,317MHz respectively. Again though we didn’t see the card at those frequency points once during testing. Our sample was instead intent on rock-solid gaming at 1,354MHz.
That shows just how much overclocking headroom there is in the GTX 960. Though the fact that the EVGA version is clocked even higher, yet still posts incredibly close gaming frame rates, does mean there’s not really any great advantage to running at these speeds. But there’s almost no reason not to. Temperature isn’t really an issue, especially with the formidable cooling that Asus has layered on top of its GPU. The DirectCU II cooler on the STRIX kept our review sample running at its top overclock at only 58ºC, considerably cooler than the ACX 2.0+ cooler on the EVGA SuperSC version.
Likewise noise isn’t a problem either. The STRIX’s fans only spin up once the GPU reaches 55ºC, which means that on your Windows desktop the card is running entirely on passive cooling. And again those fans are incredibly quiet when they do get going.
So, why wouldn’t Nvidia set its recommended clocks higher? Mostly for reasons of marketing and allowing its partners to charge that little bit more for overclocked iterations of its cards. After all, having huge overclocking figures on the packaging is a good sell for both Nvidia and the card makers.
And this brings us to the real problem with Asus’s take on the GTX 960. The STRIX OC Edition is simply too expensive for such a middling GPU. At £190 it’s a good deal more than other overclocked versions on the market, including the EVGA SuperSC. And it’s a bit slower than that card too in the gaming benchmarks. Only a little slower because of the clockspeed differences, but still slower.
Because of the low-power, low-temp nature of the new GM 206 GPU, a £160 card – such as the Palit or Gigabyte cards – will offer similar levels of overclocking and gaming performance without the hefty price premium. And despite the impressive cooling, the STRIX isn’t able to match the EVGA card’s beastly overclocking prowess either. Our card tapped out at 1,478MHz, even though it was still only whispering away at some 58ºC.
But this is the real triumph of the GTX 960. No matter how underwhelmed we’ve been with its overall performance, Nvidia has made a card where 1080p performance has been utterly nailed in a relatively small form factor and where noise, power and temperatures have all been rendered complete non-issues. Unfortunately for Asus though, the GM 206 doesn’t need the might of the DirectCU II to achieve such feats, which means this kind of premiumpriced, factory-overclocked version is mostly unnecessary. – Dave James
SPECIFICATIONS
GPU Nvidia GM 206
CUDA cores 1,024
ROPs 32
Base clock 1,291MHz
Boost clock 1,317MHz
Memory capacity 2GB GDDR5
Memory bus 128-bit
PCIe power 6-pin