MSI N560GTX-Ti Twin Frozr II OC Extreme Performance Review

[Vivi]

MSI N560GTX-Ti Twin Frozr II OC
Extreme Performance Review

robot made by me
Thanks to MSI for letting me test this card.

I'm not here to tell you how good this card is in games or what you get in the box, this review is for extreme performance namely overclocking and benchmarking

Some pictures:














The card has a very impressive cooler The Twin Frozr II. So i did a few temperature related tests before overclocking.















I whipped out my infrared temperature measurement gun to measure memory and VRM temps.










Then i started with some 3D Benchmarks.

System Used for all tests:

Graphics card: MSI GTX 560Ti Twin Frozr II OC (@ default speed and overclocked) (100% fan speed)
CPU: Intel Sandybridge 2600k (@ 4.5ghz 8 threads)
Memory: Corsair dominator GT 2000Mhz cl7. (@ 2133mhz 7-7-7-20)
PSU: Antec HCP 1200W
Motherboard: Giga P67

I compared it to an Ati HD 6950, the 560ti's biggest rival.

Using MSI's Afterburner i could set GPU Core voltage to 1.15 for overclocking. Some very impressive air results followed.


Overclocked speed: Gtx 560Ti 1080mhz core / 1260mhz mem





Overclocked speed: Gtx 560Ti 1050mhz core / 1200mhz mem





Overclocked speed: Gtx 560Ti 1015mhz core / 1250mhz mem





Overclocked speed: Gtx 560Ti 1000mhz core / 1250mhz mem





Overclocked speed: Gtx 560Ti 1025mhz core / 1250mhz mem





Overclocked speed: Gtx 560Ti 990mhz core / 1200mhz mem



Overall a close battle between 6950 and 560, but the OC'ing capabilities is what makes it shine.


The PCB design for the Twin Frozr II OC is close to the 560Ti Hawk's PCB, so that means the twin Frozr II OC has a very strong PWM design, but not as strong as the HAWKs 8+1 phase. I took a closer look to see what core voltage this PWM produces.

Below are some tests with an oscilloscope. Variables were set to .05v volts per vertical division (to see voltage noise clearly) and .1ms time per horizontal division. I kept the same setting on all tests to make viewing easier.

Look at the screens grid, each square on the vertical axis represents .05v (50mv). This way you can see the Vcore ripple/noise that the GPU core is receiving.

For reference i compared it with a very older card, 8800gts (G92). So you can see a clear difference between the two power feeds and understand it better.



Very clean no problems during IDLE. (duh)


Here we can see + - .15v peak-peak ripple, which is fine. We can see the GTS is less clean but also fine.


Once again, a little bit more Peak-peak ripple but still fine. The result from GTS looks unclean.


Alright so the card is strong on air. Let's put it to the real OC test .

Subzero cooling using Liquid Nitrogen and Dry ice.

Preparation Pics:


















CPU: Intel 2600K @ 5.7ghz for most tests. On Dry ice.

GPU: Running at 1.4v core and -120C I reached a stable corespeed of 1300mhz!

There are stronger MSI 560's out there but this was sufficient to achieve the goal i set out to get.


Bringing home some Gold Cups for MSI .



The MSI 560Ti Twin Frozr II OC broke 5 World Records in the 560GTX Ti Class.

5x World record for 560 Gtx
2x 2nd place spots
1x 3rd place.

#1 Aquamark 3 - 427925
#1 3DMark2001SE - 119312
#1 3DMark2003 - 113718
#1 3DMark2005 - 51467
#1 3DMark2006 - 39151
#2 3DMark11 - 6494
#2 Unigine Heaven - 1483
#3 3DMark Vantage - 28919








Hope you enjoyed reading.

[Dumo]

Awesome card...in your hand it roars Vivi

[[200]]

Thanks & a great review, well done on the results too!

[OCX600RR]

Wow my sample blows. Awesome overclocking, very impressive numbers! BTW in your photos it looks like the PCB is as black as the Gigabyte P67..? My Twin Frozr II has the more brown PCB...maybe earlier samples?

[massman]

Looking good man! Now I have to go the extra mile to really please the boys and girls at MSI

Oh, the Hawk's PWM is a little more beefed up: http://i154.photobucket.com/albums/s...g?t=1305615474

[Leeghoofd]

My Twin Frozr II has the more brown PCB...maybe earlier samples?

Maybe special sample :p I have the brown one too... ( I think )

Nice review Vivi, real XS style !! not PR craptastic

[Vivi]

Looking good man! Now I have to go the extra mile to really please the boys and girls at MSI

Oh, the Hawk's PWM is a little more beefed up: http://i154.photobucket.com/albums/s...g?t=1305615474

haha sorry :P.
Thx for the pic, you are right thats allot more BEEF! I'll update. (no wonder *cough* 1475 core)

Wow my sample blows. Awesome overclocking, very impressive numbers! BTW in your photos it looks like the PCB is as black as the Gigabyte P67..? My Twin Frozr II has the more brown PCB...maybe earlier samples?

Nah i also have the normal brownish pcb .

Thanks leeghoofd appreciate it. Card should be reviewed for the purpose we use it, it has a "extreme cold" switch /Area for goodness sake :P

[Ket]

My OCd GTX460 gets scores almost identical to the OC results of that 560 and it barely has to break 900MHz on the core to do it. Nice review.. but I really can't see the value in the GTX560s with so many GTX460s kicking around.

[tom1]

fantastic Vivi

[Vivi]

My OCd GTX460 gets scores almost identical to the OC results of that 560 and it barely has to break 900MHz on the core to do it. Nice review.. but I really can't see the value in the GTX560s with so many GTX460s kicking around.

True the 460's are also strong compared to 560's. But it all go's down to user preference as to what they want to buy. The 560's are stronger for extreme overclocking though, and they can be pushed further on air.

[runmc]

Great review
Great volt mods
Great Gold Cups

[sin0822]

looks like MSi is at it again! Excellent work Vivi!

[Ket]

True the 460's are also strong compared to 560's. But it all go's down to user preference as to what they want to buy. The 560's are stronger for extreme overclocking though, and they can be pushed further on air.

Thats true, but theres hardly anything extra under the hood of a 560 so although you can push them further, the gains are practically zero as there isn't enough under the hood to make use of the extra OC headroom. Maybe the 560 bodes well for the next gen though where we might be lucky enough to see say a GTX660 that has equivillent hardware of a GTX570 and 2GB vRAM, that would be pretty sweet

[Vivi]

Thats true, but theres hardly anything extra under the hood of a 560 so although you can push them further, the gains are practically zero as there isn't enough under the hood to make use of the extra OC headroom. Maybe the 560 bodes well for the next gen though where we might be lucky enough to see say a GTX660 that has equivillent hardware of a GTX570 and 2GB vRAM, that would be pretty sweet

agree'd nvidia should go straight to some new badass design rather than these little increase in performance

[Ket]

Out of curiosity what version of Heaven did you test with? The newest version of Heaven is more demanding than the older 2.1 version so if you didn't use Heaven 2.5 you might want to re-run that test

[Vivi]

I used the HWBOT official version, to submit the scores with.

it was only for comparison testing and to see % overclock gain.

Even if i use the newer version and if scores drop it will still be the same ratio.

[Ket]

Ratio might be the same, but FPS won't I'm a perfectionist so I nit-pick

[Vivi]

i can see that ^_^.

I just ran with the official version. Quite interesting that scores drop with a newer version.

[Ket]

AFAIK Heaven 2.5 adds and changes a few graphical elements and thats why FPS goes down. One of the methods added looks to be some kinda of Global Illumination, but documentation of exactly what was changed and added doesn't reveal much.

[basco]

first thanks for the test.

sorry if it´s a dumb question.
you think it´s possible to get tripple volt out of afterburner?
same pcb+controller uPI uP6213 as 460 hawk.
only voltmeasurment and 2x dipswitches are missing.

thank´s in advance

and vivi:
i can see you use the dipswitches with a vr ? is this on or off or something in between?

[Vivi]

first thanks for the test.

sorry if it´s a dumb question.
you think it´s possible to get tripple volt out of afterburner?
same pcb+controller uPI uP6213 as 460 hawk.
only voltmeasurment and 2x dipswitches are missing.

thank´s in advance

and vivi:
i can see you use the dipswitches with a vr ? is this on or off or something in between?

i didn't use it with a VR, just measured it .

i haven't thought about that yet. I don't think it's possible though, the twin frozr has kind of the same pcb but not entirely.

[basco]

thanks for quick answer.
the 460 hawk has same pcb and tripple volt.
i thought the controller is the important thing here?

and flashing hawk bios is no good idea

[Vivi]

I don't know, i don't think flashing the hawk bios to a twin frozr to activate triple voltage is such a good idea but that might unlock it? It probly won't work though.

[basco]

ok thanks so i do it the hardmod way.

would you be so kind and post a fine pic of nr.4 preparations-maybe?

sorry for being annoying

[basco]

doublepost