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*Official OMG I got my 460 thread*

Adz2991 said:
looks like the sparkle one is good, and it does hav the nvidia cooler, also seen an unboxing video on youtube.

Thing is i never heard of this company till today.
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Sparkle are a decent company, they have been around for quite a while but they're not very well known because they just release Nvidia cards with reference coolers, which is a good thing for the GTX460 :)

Might grab one of these myself, but it would be nice of OcUK got them in for the free shipping.
 
Some photos I took yesterday afternoon of the gainward gtx 460 1gb gs.

front/top of box
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front/top/side of box
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back of box
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cardboard inner box
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cardboard inner box opened
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revealing a red bubble wrapped gtx 460
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bundle contents overview, driver/utility disc, leaflet code for free cuda editing software, general manual, 1 2xmolex to 1 pci-e 6 pin power cable, no free game
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closer look at bundle
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top view of card, still with protective thin plastic cover on
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card model close up
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fan closer look
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fan close up, copper heatpipes seen below
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2x 6 pin pci-e power connectors on side of card
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backside connections, 2xdvi, 1xvga, 1xhdmi, 2 grills for cooling assist
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close up of front of card, no vrm heatsink present
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same again, further away
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close up of fan area, heatsink seen behind
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whole card shot
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whole card shot again
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whole card shot closer
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card standing on side
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above card standing on side
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multiple generation card comparison
gainward nvidia geforce gtx 460 gs 1gb pci-e, nvidia geforce 8800gtx 768mb pci-e, gainward nvidia geforce 7800gs+ 512mb agp, xfx nvidia geforce FX 5700LE 256mb agp, 3d power nvidia geforce mx 32 tv agp (geforce 2mx i think), 3dfx voodoo 3 agp (forgot the specs atm sorry).
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card comparison side shot
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side by side, my 2 recent cards, end heat plate (the black thing) on the faulty 8800gtx not usually attached and used due to length interfering with middle drive cage of p180, but it can be used if I take the drive cage out.
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gainward gtx 460 1gb, nvidia 8800gtx 768mb, gainward 7800gs+ agp 512mb
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side by side again, shorter pcb design by gainward is incredible.
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Click here if you want to see the pics in full size 5mp
 
If they put the cooler from the 8800gtx on it I'd be happy. Now who has a cooler like that? inno3d? zotac look quite similar. Hamster wheel fan lol
 
That Gainward 460 is exactly the same as the Palit Sonic Platinum. The only difference is the cooling shroud design. The box layout and contents are the same too.

Makes sense when you consider they're actually manufactured by Palit.
 
ha, yeah... same fan probably too, just different fin mould.

Just downloaded furmark, 1280x1024, put 4aa on, run in benchmark mode, time based for 60000, temp hit 69c with fixed fan speed of 45%, but this speed is still audible over my other 3 case and cpu fans.

MSI promo
http://event.msi.com/vga/cyclone/
 
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HeX said:
Can people with the Inno3d blower cards tell me what temps they are getting under furmark load with the fan fixed at what they would consider 'quiet' (so no louder than their system/cpu fans).

Also the % at which the fan is running. :)
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Ok, I ran furmark for about 5 minutes at 1280x1024, gpu temp seemed to plateau at 78/79C up from 38C idle. Now my case is far from silent so I turned the case fans right down to try and hear the card and I put my head right next to the case. The result? Over the test I couldn't hear any change in sound. The default fan profile is 40%, not sure what or if it changed at all. Overall it sounds as quiet as my old 8800gts 640 which had a very similar looking cooler. I would say that I'm very impressed by the cooler on the inno3d, but then I have come from a fairly noisey card and I'm not that bothered about noise.

Could anyone else run furmark 60s bench at 1280x1024 4xaa? I get min:41 max:77 av:50 fps with a 2.6ghz q6600. Sound about right?

I'm still not massively impressed by the performance of the card, good but not great. Perhaps my expectations were just too high? Crysis was much better, it's now very playble at 1920x1080 maxed out in dx9 averaging about 40fps but still a bit jerky in gunfights. Seems about twice as fast as my old 8800gt, whereas benchmarks indicated it would be more like 2.5-3 times as fast, perhaps there's a cpu/ram bottleneck. Though I didn't think so at this res and at those kind of fram rates.

Not sure if i was imagining things but I think I read somewhere that the Digital Audio sound only worked with the latest PowerDVD version and wasn't enabled for anything else at the moment?
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Aaargh! That would be terrible, I was hoping to use the card as a digital soundcard with my av amp, I know the ATI cards can do this, why can't the nvidias? If anyone could shed more light on this it'd be very much appreciated.:(
 
ugly ferret said:
Ok, I ran furmark for about 5 minutes at 1280x1024, gpu temp seemed to plateau at 78/79C up from 38C idle. Now my case is far from silent so I turned the case fans right down to try and hear the card and I put my head right next to the case. The result? Over the test I couldn't hear any change in sound. The default fan profile is 40%, not sure what or if it changed at all.

Could anyone else run furmark 60s bench at 1280x1024 4xaa? I get min:41 max:77 av:50 fps with a 2.6ghz q6600. Sound about right?
Click to expand...

I did the test, see above, will have to run again for fps tho.
What were you using to know about the fan profile being 40% ? if you are not fixing the speed manually then it will have gone higher in speed than that during stress. Your temp is 10c higher than mine, down to fan profile difference and case cooling i suppose. I didn't run it as long as that, but I haven't seen it go over 65c yet in anything. The inno fan does sound like a quiet performer though.
 
Bass, under load is it louder than your case fans? You can see the fan % in MSI Afterburner.
 
MissChief said:
Oooh that's pay day for me! now the question is when I can get a 768MB one for around £160, should I pay closer to £200 for the 1GB version? I do want a non reference cooler which will hopefully be quieter.
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If you are going for a 768MB version don't wait for the Gigabyte, the reference Nvidia coolers on many of them are very good, and quiet by all accounts.

Personally i would pay the extra for a 1GB version, unless you are gaming at 1680x1050 and don't plan to upgrade your monitor. You might be able to get a 1GB card a bit cheaper soon when more places stock the reference cooler versions of those as well, Sparkle are using them for one. The Gigabyte 1GB cards do look awesome though.
 
Do we know for sure that the Sparkle 1GB one is the reference cooler?

Tempted to get that Sparkle now. OR do I wait for the Gigabyte on 27th! :)
 
interesting on the gigabyte.. ill give the sparkle a shout when it arrives and if its a good clocker and quiet ill keep it, if not try and rma and swap to the gigabyte one..

rocky, i orderd the sparkle 1gb today ill post pics like i did with my kfa2. if its not reference cooler or if its not quiet ill return it citing an incorrect image on theirs and sparkles hq website.
 
Excellent. I'm now very tempted with the Sparkle one. BUT that place that's selling it, I once ordered an FM radio from them, took like 2 months.
 
@Nickg thanks. What delivery timescale did you get on the Sparkle? It's showing me 2-3 days (/me impatient :)
 
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