This next graphics card is enough to make the gamers among you drool. The Zotac GTX980 AMP! Edition is, at the time of writing at least, regarded as the most powerful graphics card in the world. As we all know, though, technology marches onward at a pace, so by the time you read this, that claim may belong to another model.
For now, though, this immensely impressive looking monster of a card has been given the Zotac treatment, a company that prides itself in aggressively overclocking already super-fast cards and has come out with a GPU core clock speed of 1165MHz, with a potential boost speed of up to 1266MHz – a good 4% faster than the stock GTX980.
The 4GB of 256-bit GDDR5 memory runs along at a startling 1753MHz, and the entire card is cooled by a triple-fan IceStorm LED-laden arrangement in a gunmetalgrey casing over the large heatsink. The effect is quite stunning and, despite the amount of cooling going on, also remarkably quiet even when under the pressure of benchmarks. Video outputs come in the form of HDMI, three DisplayPorts – all capable of up to 4K resolutions at 60Hz – and lastly a DVI port.
As you would expect, the 3DMark 11 benchmark was certainly a big number; to be exact, the GTX980 scored 18,890, which is by far the biggest number we’ve had so far. While we’re on the subject of performance, the Battlefield 4 benchmark scored an average frame-rate of 165; Skyrim, as before with Ultra settings and so on, scored 165fps. And finally, Watch Dogs with everything set to high scored 105fps. There’s not much this card can’t do. It’ll happily play everything you throw at it, and it’ll do it to the maximum resolutions and with every graphical setting turned as high as possible.
Interestingly, while this version of the card is splendid, Zotac has since launched another two versions of the GTX980. There’s an Omega Edition that has upped the core clock speed to 1202MHz, with a boost of 1304MHZ, and there’s an Extreme Edition, which boasts a core clock speed of 1291MHz and turbo boost of 1393MHz. Unfortunately, we didn’t get hold of the Extreme Edition to test, and in all honesty there’s little chance that Zotac would have got it back after having a room full of reviewers salivating all over it.
While amazing, outstanding and looking pretty terrific, the Zotac GTX980 AMP! Edition does come at a heavy price. Unless you’re willing to part with the princely sum of around £450, you’re better of dipping into one of the lesser-powered cards on test until the price has come down to something a little more reasonable.
Needless to say, the Zotac GTX980 is an incredibly powerful and very impressive graphics card. It’ll blow anything else currently available out of the water, but it’s also hugely expensive and therefore a little out of the budget range for us mere mortals. Still, one can dream.