It's nice to be the first in Australia to review this card and you guys get the privilege to see it here first as well! The ASUS GTX670 DCUII TOP literally just arrived and I had less than 3 hours to review it before it got sent out on a sample run. I decided to go the distance and film, review, edit and upload the entire thing in a single day, the things I do for you guys!
Just found out today (I've seen a lot of people have been asking): For US readers - Fry's and Newegg will have stock this week. I will try to ask about other countries.
The TOP are supposed to have performance binned chips. I have no idea what the Q&A process is for this. Enlighten us Bindibadgi!
Yup physically the same. The TOP models are GPU binned: http://rog.asus.com/79472012/graphics-cards-2/the-makings-of-asus-top-graphics-cards/
I've always wondered why the TOP cards aren't designated as ROG. I can understand ASUS wanting to save it if the amount of models and numers available of all ROG products was limited, as it is with the GFX cards (mars, matrix and ares), but there are so many ROG motherboards which are in no short supply. To go through all that for the TOP cards and then not give them the ROG moniker is a big miss from the marketing department. people see ROG and they think 'Reliable Orgasmic Gaming'. take it to your bosses and see what they say!
Plus you could designate the ROG cards with extra-pimping versions of the default DIRECTCUII heatsink, which would look sexy as hell!
I really do agree with you - I'd like to see more DCIIs with custom PCBs get branded as ROG, but different departments treat the brand slightly differently depending on their resource As marketing its v.difficult LOL. Also, the problem with graphics cards are several fold: The GPUs are very limited at the high end. Generally manuf. get parts literally just before you do - that's why all the custom designed PCBs come 1-2 months later. To do a full OC PCB with proper QC and testing takes a good 6 months for most companies. To do a full custom card like the MARS - even longer! By that time another card might come out or there might be no more GPUs on the market or the price might have crashed under intense competition, so planning such an investment is very difficult.
I totally understand why cards like the Mars II are few and far between as they're a massive investiment in time and money. But with a process already in place for the TOP designated cards, which are on a 'custom' PCB (GTX 680 PCB???), all you'd need to do is alter the design of the cooler slightly and add in some top quality components like MSI's Military Class and bingo! You've got yourself a ROG card! EDIT: not that i'm insinuating the components used already aren't top quality.....
