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Hardware MSI GTX 285 HydroGen OC Review

Discussion in 'Article Discussion' started by Lizard, 9 Jul 2009.

  1. Lizard

    Lizard @ Scan R&D

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  2. [USRF]Obiwan

    [USRF]Obiwan What's a Dremel?

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    What i see:

    All of the Game benches are won by the ATI HD4870 X2 2GB
    The only Application bench (folding at home) is won by Nvidia cards
    And in the power consumption part the ATI HD4870 X2 2GB is left out of it. (probably because it has higher power usage then anything else)

    IMHO you should have left out the ATI Dualcore card completely, now people will get the wrong idea. Without it Nvidia wins.
    Infact you should have left out all the ATI card and other Nvidia cards and only compare the Non watercooled GTX285 to the MSI watercooled GTX285.
     
  3. Baz

    Baz I work for Corsair

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    If we didn't include the HD 4870X2, it would make for an extremely misleading article. It's in there to demonstrate that for less cash, you can get a significant amount more performance. An HD 4870X2 can be had for less than £250 - thats less than the watercooler GTX 285. Of course, the watercooled card will be quieter and cooler, but if all you want is performance, a reader needs to know what else is out there - that;s why we have all these fancy graph engines and stuff, so show you what else is available!
     
  4. perplekks45

    perplekks45 LIKE AN ANIMAL!

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    Shouldn't that be 285 instead of 280?

    Other than that it's nice to see the comparison to other nVidia cards and the 4870X2. It just helps to keep in mind where to rank this one.

    Another nice article. Well done. :thumb:
     
  5. Matticus

    Matticus ...

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    What?
    Why would you possibly want to leave out a card that is cheaper and better? I thought reviews were about comparisons.

    One thing I would say about watercooling the ati would be the warranty. I know some vendors support changing the cooler as long as you don't cause any damage doing it, but I am sure this was usually nvidia vendors. So while it may be cheaper, if something goes wrong and they cotton on to your watercooling you may end up spending a LOT more.
     
  6. ry@n

    ry@n Minimodder

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    Great write up, I dont see that as a bad price at all. £100 extra is reasonable as the block alone would be about £60-70 so it means you don't have the hassle of fitting the block and you get to keep your warrenty.

    EDIT: I also had the same trouble with the G1/4 ports being too close together on my Heatkiller CPU block, Im also using 45degree TFC fittings to fix that.
     
  7. kenco_uk

    kenco_uk I unsuccessfully then tried again

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    A bit off-topic, but is there a review (to be done by bindi, natch) planned for the MSI X58M motherboard?
     
  8. Teq

    Teq What's a Dremel?

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    It would have been interesting to do a price/performance/installation comparison with other watercooled solutions, maybe grab a couple of cheap 285's, a full cover EK block and a nice little MCW60, for those of us with existing watercooled graphics hardware I think this might have been more meaningful then.
     
  9. perplekks45

    perplekks45 LIKE AN ANIMAL!

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    I think Bindi will kill you for asking for that. :D
    They tend not to have the time to do all they want, let alone all the stuff that would be considered "fun".
     
  10. [USRF]Obiwan

    [USRF]Obiwan What's a Dremel?

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    Hmmm sorry, did not look at the perspective of price, leave that out and you would probably have come to the same conclusion as I did :)
     
  11. Combatus

    Combatus Bit-tech Modding + hardware reviews Lover of bit-tech Super Moderator

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    Nope, did mean the GTX 280 - was speaking reference to the RAM that was on the top side of the 280's PCB (some was GPU side, the rest was on the top side and it would get very hot if you didn't use heatsinks when watercooling the card). On the GTX 285 it's all core side so if you have a full cover water-block, all the RAM is water-cooled.
     
  12. perplekks45

    perplekks45 LIKE AN ANIMAL!

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    Apologies for not reading/understanding properly.
    In the middle of learning for my final exam for BSc CS. God, how I HATE theoretical CS! :grr:

    Oh, and I blame it on Cheaps of course.
     
  13. xaser04

    xaser04 Ba Ba Ba BANANA!

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    Nice card but as I said about the other MSI card, far too expensive in the current market. Given you can now get two GTX275 for less than this single card it puts into perspective just how expensive it is...

    The water block does look nice though and seems to cool very well indeed.
     
  14. Combatus

    Combatus Bit-tech Modding + hardware reviews Lover of bit-tech Super Moderator

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    No worries, good luck and enjoy your long holiday after your final exam!:rock:
     
  15. perplekks45

    perplekks45 LIKE AN ANIMAL!

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    Long holiday? I wish!
    I studied in Germany so I'm 25 by now [yes, we take our time :p] and I really want to work after living in Bath for the last 10 months without proper job thanks to the recession. Well, I already applied for a couple of jobs at the UN here in Vienna, fingers crossed. :)

    Cheers anyway. :thumb:
     
  16. BrightCandle

    BrightCandle What's a Dremel?

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    The temperature seen here is a little on the high side in comparison to what most people actually see on a real watercooled system. The reason is the rather poor radiator space in comparison to what you really need for such a hot part. A quiet system would use 1200rpm fans, then the rule of thumb is that a single 120mm radiator can cool the water to 10C with about 100 Watts of load (90-115 depending on the radiator used).

    The GTX 285 is a 185W part, which means really it needs 240mm of radiator to cool it with a quiet fan, and that would halve the delta temperature seen in this review and be more inline with what you would normally get.

    Of course a water cooled 4870X2 is great (what I have) but we could do with some prebuilts or companies that have warranties that cover watercooled cards because at the moment if it breaks you are buying a new card (or committing fraud by sending it for RMA).
     
  17. Sparrowhawk

    Sparrowhawk Wetsander

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    ...
    What? You're confusing my stoooopid American mind.
     
  18. Combatus

    Combatus Bit-tech Modding + hardware reviews Lover of bit-tech Super Moderator

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    We do have a very powerful fan on the radiator - much more powerful than would normally be used so this will compensate as will the fact the lab has some fairly potent air conditioning. The rad itself was barely getting warm so we don't have any doubts that it was in any way over loaded. Agreed though, for a quiet system, a double 120mm rad would be needed.

    delta T is the difference between the ambient air temperature and the temperature reported by the hardware (in this case the difference between the ambient air temperature and the temperature reported in GPU-Z).

    If the temperature of the room is hotter when we test one graphics card, then cooler a week later when we test another, clearly the card tested on the cooler day will have an easier ride and the test is also unfair. A way to get around this is to use delta T - in theory if you test the same graphics card in two seperate rooms each with a different ambient temperature, you'll end up with the same delta T. At extreme temperature ranges this might not hold true, but our lab only varies between about 22 and 27 degrees which isn't an issue.
     
    Last edited: 9 Jul 2009
  19. Aracos

    Aracos What's a Dremel?

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    I think they mean that the temp reduced to 19C over ambient then in brackets is the stock cooler performance which would be 56C over ambient
     
  20. Elton

    Elton Officially a Whisky Nerd

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    The first thing I thought:

    Yuck, red PCB.
     
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