Gainward GTX 460 2GB Golden Sample

[onethreehill]

Palit-owned add-in board maker Gainward is out to impress and thus has announced a new GeForce GTX 460 which not only has a custom PCB and cooler, but is also factory-overclocked and packs 2GB of GDDR5 memory, double the amount found on 'regular' models.

Seen below, the Gainward GTX 460 2GB Golden Sample, is powered by the GF104 40nm GPU, includes a dual-slot cooler with an 80mm fan and two 6mm copper heatpipes, 336 CUDA Cores, a GPU clock of 700 MHz (675 MHz stock), a shader frequency of 1400 MHz, a 256-bit memory interface, and a VRAM clock of 3600 MHz........

http://www.tcmagazine.com/tcm/news/h...460-2gb-memory

[Gamekiller]

Looks kinda cool. Has a ton of connectors.

[initialised]

You really think doubling the RAM will help in anything but SLi?

[slaveondope]

You really think doubling the RAM will help in anything but SLi?

I was thinking the same thing and even when in sli though wouldnt the memory control bus limit things here? Just like the 5870 2gb's

Either way curious to see some benchmarks on them

[SKYMTL]

What a waste. The GPU can't even take advantage of 2GB. Sure you may see some improvements at absolutely insane AA settings but a those levels, the GF104 won't be spewing out playable framerates anyways.

[Mechromancer]

Lets see some reviews before we say 2GB is useless on this card. High resolutions and AA are memory hogs. A lot of folks have 1920x1080 native displays these days. As long as the price is kept in check this may be a fine card.

[Manicdan]

Lets see some reviews before we say 2GB is useless on this card. High resolutions and AA are memory hogs. A lot of folks have 1920x1080 native displays these days. As long as the price is kept in check this may be a fine card.

lets see some reviews with modded games to use ultra rez textures, since thats where its really at.

too bad 90% of the reviews out there are trying to do the same thing as the rest, but with different colored charts. im always a fan of the super indepth review of one feature, rather than, o this card is 9.35874% better than whatever.

[Hell Hound]

Nvidia Surround

[screwtech02]

Nvidia Surround

I agree, 3 of these in tri-sli would make for a killer suround gaming setup, and depending on price, pretty cheap too...

[takamishanoku]

Let's hope the cooler that was reviewed is the same that can be bought in stores.

[SKYMTL]

Surround, high res textures, etc. You will still smash into architectural limitations far before bandwidth limitations.

[PatRaceTin]

hmmmmmmmmmm 2GB???

[initialised]

Nvidia Surround

True, could be where it shines. Hope they have an extra finger for 3-Way SLi

[screwtech02]

Surround, high res textures, etc. You will still smash into architectural limitations far before bandwidth limitations.

So basically this card is crap, and wont run in tri-sli, and have the benifit of 2gb for AA/AF?? Is that what your saying??? Is there any proof of this in a "real world" gaming test????

[LinusTech]

So basically this card is crap, and wont run in tri-sli,

It's not tri-SLI compatible, so it definitely won't run that.

and have the benifit of 2gb for AA/AF?? Is that what your saying??? Is there any proof of this in a "real world" gaming test????

If you've been around the hardware scene long enough, it becomes pretty intuitive...

Not once have we seen a card released that has double the memory of the reference model that actually brings anything significant to the table performance-wise.

Not to mention we have current generation high end cards that see next to no benefit from doubling the memory to 2GB (see HD 5870)

The one exception to all of this is high resolution texture packs which MAY see a benefit from 2GB in the future, but I can pretty much guarantee none of the ones out there now will actually need more than 1GB considering that this is the upper end of video card memory right now. What's the point of creating a texture pack no one can use?

[Loque]

I <3 2gb

[Manicdan]

more memory helps future proof things. it also gives incentive to build games around that.

if you expect in the next year only .5% of the PCs will have 2GB u might not care. but if that becomes 25%+ the game designers really might take advantage of it.

or we can just use 512MB and never see progress, thats a pretty extreme way of thinking right?

[Florinmocanu]

What a waste. The GPU can't even take advantage of 2GB. Sure you may see some improvements at absolutely insane AA settings but a those levels, the GF104 won't be spewing out playable framerates anyways.

NO Skymtl, not a waste. I use Octane Renderer, a GPU rendering software and i desperately need more memory on my GPU. This is awesome, i'll buy it as soon as it comes in stores. It's like Palit/Gainward heard some of my prayers

[revenant]

Nvidia Surround

i havent seen my two 470s use more than 945mb each while gaming in surround... but maybe afterburner is fibbing

[STEvil]

Not once have we seen a card released that has double the memory of the reference model that actually brings anything significant to the table performance-wise.

G92's with 256mb, 512mb, and 1gb.

[Johnny87au]

Hell yeah 2gb , gainward have hit the spot with this card! 2 of these suckers in SLI would be so good running a big resolution for Nvidia vision, cant wait!

[LinusTech]

G92's with 256mb, 512mb, and 1gb.

IIRC the only reference cards were 512MB and 1GB between which there was next to no difference.

256 was a down-cost bastard child that was developed by the board partners.

[STEvil]

IIRC the only reference cards were 512MB and 1GB between which there was next to no difference.

256 was a down-cost bastard child that was developed by the board partners.

Then you'd best refresh your memory

[LinusTech]

Ah I stand corrected here. I did forget about the 8800GT 256MB.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2396/5

Either way I'll eat my hat if this 2GB card shows that kind of performance difference

[STEvil]

Ah I stand corrected here. I did forget about the 8800GT 256MB.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2396/5

Either way I'll eat my hat if this 2GB card shows that kind of performance difference

I doubt it will amount to much at high res, but the big buffer helps in situations (and engines) that can take advantage of it.

Sadly nobody does very good performance reviews of cards with large buffers.

edit - better review of the old G92's with 256 vs 512 vs 1024
http://en.expreview.com/2007/12/30/r...BC%9F/159.html

benches (click for picture, its big): http://www.expreview.com/img/review/...rd_roundup.png