Did you know that some GTX 670 video cards are nearly as fast as GTX 680 video cards? That’s because some of them come factory overclocked meaning the GPU and/or memory frequencies have been increased to run at higher, faster default frequencies. And, they’re completely warrantied as they use higher quality components which can do more than just run stock. The GIGABYTE GTX 670 OC Version video card is one of the few coveted factory OC’d cards to offer speed, improved cooling and performance at the same price as stock cards. Impossible? Have a look for yourself.
Features and Specifications
In comparison to the current and previous gen GPUs, GIGABYTE’s GTX 670 OC gets all the enhancements where needed. The GPU is the main component that gets overclocked from 915 to 1085MHz which is the same as the reference GTX 680. This is where all performance gains matter the most. Overclocking the memory will help when you’re cranking up the extreme detail settings. However, at 6008MHz, the memory is already more than fast enough to feed the GPU needed data to render a sweet picture.
All that extra frequency needs good cooling since the GPU requires just a bit more power. An 8pin and 6pin PCIE power connector is required. GIGABYTE’s Triangle Cool VGA cooler takes care of any extra heat using heat pipes, high quality metals, and triple fans. Using more fans helps cut back RPM which means quieter operation.
The GIGABYTE GTX 670 OC also supports the very latest in NVIDIA 3D Vision Surround, PhyX for creating greater in game variables, CUDA Technology for more compiling professionals, and full 3-way SLI support. Remember, 4-way just doesn’t offer cost effective performance so this isn’t at all a limitation.
As mentioned earlier, retail price for GIGABYTE’s GTX 670 OC is well within striking distance of standard clocked options coming in at the $399 US MSRP price point.
What’s in the Box?
The box includes the bare essentials for connecting the video card and setting up the drivers without having to jump online or stop by your local PC store. The all important 6pin and 8pin PCIE power cable adapters are included. Four MOLEX connectors off your PSU are all that are required.
Also, the driver software disc contains the latest WHQL driver at the time of the card launch. The driver worked fine for our setup but it’s always a good idea to download the latest from NVIDIA. Other than the card and documentation, that’s all you’ll need to get rolling.
The Triangle Cool – VGA Cooling System
Sitting on top of GIGABYTE’s favorite blue PCB the Triangle Cool system uses a triple 92mm fan shroud clipped to the heat sink which is designed to maximize cooling without counter productive turbulence. This ensures that a substantial amount of air flow hits the entire card and heat sink. Estimated air flow is around 32 cubic feet of air a minute per fan.
The heat sink is quite simple and but is very common sense in design. It’s separated in to two sections with three copper heat pipes that stretch the entire length of the PCB. The largest section contains flattened heat pipes that sit directly on the GPU which carries the bulk of the heat away to the finned sections. This has worked well in CPU coolers so this should be an improvement over standard coolers typically seen on GPUs.
The secondary nickle plate has thermal pads which actually sit on the memory. They can help transfer some heat from the VGA memory. However, the GDDR5 memory modules most likely don’t get near hot enough to need it. This is probably more preventative than necessary but could trigger some memory overclocking possibilities that may not be possible otherwise.
Overall, the VGA cooler is still much lighter than the one used on the legendary “HOT” GTX 480 video card. Let’s get a system setup and find out just how effective this cooling system is.
Test System and Benchmark Setup
Long story short, here’s the break down of the test system using some of the latest components available. You can assemble your own or visit some of our friends like CyberPower PC, IBuyPower, and Puget Systems if you’d like something similar professionally built.
- Processor: Intel Core i7-3770K Ivy Bridge
- Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD3H
- Memory: Kingston HyperX Genesis 2800MHz DDR3
- Storage: Kingston HyperX 120GB SSD
- Graphics 1: GIGABYTE GTX 760 OC (As tested)
- Graphics 2: ZOTAC GTX 580 AMP!
- Graphics 3: NVIDIA Geforce GTX 680
- Power: Antec Earthwatts Platinum 650 Watt
- OS: Windows 7 Pro 64bit
- CPU Cooling: NZXT HAVIK 140
- Visual: ASUS VG278H 3D Vision Monitor
Since this is all about modern graphics performance, I’m only using DirectX11 video benchmarks: Batman Arkham City, Aliens vs Predator, Battlefield 3, Metro 2033, Unigine Heaven, 3DMark7, and MSI Kombustor (for cooling performance evaluation). Screen resolution is 1920 x 1080 throughout. Let’s get to work!
3DBenchmarks
I’m using an ASUS VG278H 1080p 3D Vision 2 monitor bundle which I’ve previously reviewed. In my opinion, it provides simply the best there is in 3D gaming monitors at the moment. Regular 2D benchmarks were performed first. Then , we move on to 3D Vision 2 performance testing, allowing for generational comparison since the new GPUs are suppose to be very 3D friendly in terms of frame rate. All game settings were maxed where possible.
Batman Arkham City (DX11)
These cards are all PhysX friendly. Running max settings and PhysX, the game looks fantastic and plays extremely smoothly on NVIDIA’s second in command single GPU solution. As you can see, the GTX 670 OC was merely one frame less. The GPU core frequency adds up to a lot of power and video data sent to the system. On to some more eye candy.
Aliens vs Predator Benchmark (DX11)
The AVP benchmark isn’t the most intensive, but it’s quite similar to many regular DirectX11 games and should point us in the right direction of what to expect. On the average, the GTX 670 OC just seemed to out pace the GTX 680 vanilla. Keep in mind they both have the same GPU core frequency thanks to the overclock, but do keep in mind, NVIDIA’s “GPU Boost” technology is a bit more aggressive than the GTx 680 clock for clock, on the GTX 670 and the effect of this is shown here.
Battlefield 3 (DX11)
Now, BF3 will slap your graphics card silly using crazy detailed settings. Despite the game’s special affliction of graphical oddities, the frame rates were consistently in favor of GPUs with larger memory capacity and higher frequencies. Still, three frames is well worth the sacrifice for a $100 US cheaper GTX 670 OC card over your standard vanilla bone stock GTX 680. Especially with the aforementioned GPU boost being slightly more in the GTX 670s favour.
Metro 2033
With Metro 2033 finally finishing spitting the cards out, the GTX 680 and GTX 670 OC were separated by about one frame. While not shown, if you relax the details to the default settings, the average frames jump up another 15 pretty easily making the game very capable of fluid play. It’s a tough race so far against the GTX 680 and the GTX 670 OC from GIGABYTE is clearly doing well.
Unigine Heaven
Yes, Unigine Heaven 2.5 demo will also make any video card work hard. It’s so accurate a benchmark, that it shows the effect of frequency variances between all the cards just a bit better than other benches. The GTX 670 OC scores within three frames of the top end single GPU GTX 680. Again, that’s pretty impressive for a $399 to bring it to a $499 card like that.
Let’s look at some final benchmarks including its cooling performance and take it home!
3DMark11
And, finally, 3DMark11 shows exactly what overclocked GPU and tuning can do for results, and gives us a good overall validation of what we’ve seen here today. The GTX 680 has just a few more CUDA cores and faster base clock which the benchmark puts to better use. If you’re looking for maximum CUDA processing power for Folding or other CUDA enabled apps, the GTX 680 is your prized fighter. However, if you want to save $100, and gaming is where your heart lies, then the GTX 670 OC won’t be far behind at all.
Triangle Cool Tested – Noise, Temps, and Power
The GIGABYTE GTX 670 OC GPU cooler works quite well keeping things quiet and cool. It’s about as silent as can be at idle producing about 11dB noise over ambient. It was difficult locating any fan noise as most of the lab hardware drowns out the card. But, perhaps even more impressive is that the card is especially quiet when gaming, creating about 15dB without any extra air flow applied. Artificial stress testing got the fans up to 17dB which is not at all offensive to the ears. In fact, the card is undetectable inside any of the lab computer enclosures.
Desktop idle temps were pretty much level at 29C. However, whether running benchmarks or MSI Kombustor stress testing, the GPU never topped 63C. The card’s PCB still gets a little warm during operation but it’s to be expected. As for the design of the cooler, it’s definitely doing a great job and expelling warm air internally really doesn’t matter as long as your computer enclosure has reasonable air flow. Of course, the more air the better for any high performance gaming system.
Final Thoughts
What can I say that you haven’t already figured out? In a very short sentence, the GIGABYTE GV-N670OC-2GD (GTX 670 OC) video card is quite fast.
In the 1080p tests, the card keeps up with the NVIDIA GTX 680 reference card and only falls just behind on the more serious DX11 titles. What you will also notice is that resolutions higher than 1080p will favor the faster GTX 680 though not by much at all. Gamers can expect about five to eight frames less on the average as you go higher. Still, two GIGABYTE GTX 670 OC cards will definitely give you 3D surround worth flaunting at your next gaming get together.
The VGA cooler and design of the GIGABYTE GTX 670 OC should get special mention. While using the card for days on end, it was always quieter than the GTX 580 and 680 reference cards. In fact, it was always been quieter than the CPU cooler and completely undetectable inside our NZXT Switch 810 test enclosure. Triangle Cooling design works and works well.
The cooler’s heat pipe design managed temps so well, the fans never had a reason to ramp. While I didn’t include the results, I did swap out the factory thermal paste for AC5 which helped cool things off a couple degrees more. Either way, the card’s cooling is exemplary and like many factory installed coolers, after market past applied properly, can improve things a little more if you take the extra time to apply it.
In terms of value, the GIGABTE GTX 670 OC (GV-N670OC-2GD) video card provides enthusiasts, but especially gamers, great value. It’s overclocked to 1085MHz and the card can be purchased at $399 which is the same price as most all reference design GTX 670 video cards. Unless you want an extra frame or two or bragging rights, there’s really no need to take it any further.
At the end of the day, my professional advice is to skip all other GTX 670s and go straight for this GIGABYTE. It won’t cost you any more than anything else, but performs much better, cools better, and if gaming is your thing, it’ll save you at least $100 over the higher end reference GTX 680. Definitely high performance and definitely recommended today. The only thing that holds us back from throwing down an Editors’ Choice is NVIDIA’s upcoming GTX 660 Ti. But if GIGABYTE can swing for the fences like it did with this GPU, then we might have some additional accolades to shower upon them later.
Pros
- High quality components
- Almost as fast as the GTX 680
- Great factory overclocked performance
- Windforce 3X and Triangle Cooling
- Quiet and cool gaming card
- Costs the same as reference vanilla cards
Cons
- Wish the OC cards came with black PCB (minor)
Overall Rating: 9.0 / 10.0
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