NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670 Review Feat. EVGA: Bringing GK104 Down To $400
by Ryan Smith on May 10, 2012 9:00 AM ESTMeet The GeForce GTX 670
Because of the relatively low power consumption of GK104 relative to past high-end NVIDIA GPUs, NVIDIA has developed a penchant for small cards. While the GTX 680 was a rather standard 10” long, NVIDIA also managed to cram the GTX 690 into the same amount of space. Meanwhile the GTX 670 takes this to a whole new level.
We’ll start at the back as this is really where NVIDIA’s fascination with small size makes itself apparent. The complete card is 9.5” long, however the actual PCB is far shorter at only 6.75” long, 3.25” shorter than the GTX 680’s PCB. In fact it would be fair to say that rather than strapping a cooler onto a card, NVIDIA strapped a card onto a cooler. NVIDIA has certainly done short PCBs before – such as with one of the latest GTX 560 Ti designs – but never on a GTX x70 part before. But given the similarities between GK104 and GF114, this isn’t wholly surprising, if not to be expected.
In any case this odd pairing of a small PCB with a large cooler is no accident. With a TDP of only 170W NVIDIA doesn’t necessarily need a huge PCB, but because they wanted a blower for a cooler they needed a large cooler. The positioning of the GPU and various electronic components meant that the only place to put a blower fan was off of the PCB entirely, as the GK104 GPU is already fairly close to the rear of the card. Meanwhile the choice of a blower seems largely driven by the fact that this is an x70 card – NVIDIA did an excellent job with the GTX 560 Ti’s open air cooler, which was designed for the same 170W TDP, so the choice is effectively arbitrary from a technical standpoint (there’s no reason to believe $400 customers are any less likely to have a well-ventilated case than $250 buyers). Accordingly, it will be NVIDIA’s partners that will be stepping in with open air coolers of their own designs.
Starting as always at the top, as we previously mentioned the reference GTX 670 is outfitted with a 9.5” long fully shrouded blower. NVIDIA tells us that the GTX 670 uses the same fan as the GTX 680, and while they’re nearly identical in design, based on our noise tests they’re likely not identical. On that note unlike the GTX 680 the fan is no longer placed high to line up with the exhaust vent, so the GTX 670 is a bit more symmetrical in design than the GTX 680 was.
Note: We dissaembled the virtually identical EVGA card here instead
Lifting the cooler we can see that NVIDIA has gone with a fairly simple design here. The fan vents into a block-style aluminum heatsink with a copper baseplate, providing cooling for the GPU. Elsewhere we’ll see a moderately sized aluminum heatsink clamped down on top of the VRMs towards the front of the card. There is no cooling provided for the GDDR5 RAM.
Note: We dissaembled the virtually identical EVGA card here instead
As for the PCB, as we mentioned previously due to the lower TDP of the GTX 670 NVIDIA has been able to save some space. The VRM circuitry has been moved to the front of the card, leaving the GPU and the RAM towards the rear and allowing NVIDIA to simply omit a fair bit of PCB space. Of course with such small VRM circuitry the reference GTX 670 isn’t built for heavy overclocking – like the other GTX 600 cards NVIDIA isn’t even allowing overvolting on reference GTX 670 PCBs – so it will be up to partners with custom PCBs to enable that kind of functionality. Curiously only 4 of the 8 Hynix R0C GDDR5 RAM chips are on the front side of the PCB; the other 4 are on the rear. We typically only see rear-mounted RAM in cards with 16/24 chips, as 8/12 will easily fit on the same side.
Elsewhere at the top of the card we’ll find the PCIe power sockets and SLI connectors. Since NVIDIA isn’t scrambling to save space like they were with the GTX 680, the GTX 670’s PCIe power sockets are laid out in a traditional side-by-side manner. As for the SLI connectors, since this is a high-end GeForce card NVIDIA provides 2 connectors, allowing for the card to be used in 3-way SLI.
Finally at the front of the card NVIDIA is using the same I/O port configuration and bracket that we first saw with the GTX 680. This means 1 DL-DVI-D port, 1 DL-DVI-I port, 1 full size HDMI 1.4 port, and 1 full size DisplayPort 1.2. This also means the GTX 670 follows the same rules as the GTX 680 when it comes to being able to idle with multiple monitors.
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Vertigo2000 - Monday, May 14, 2012 - link
That's some bad, bad math comprehension. 300 and 365 are already the calculated areas.300 mm sq. = 17.3205 mm x 17.3205 mm
365 mm sq. = 19.1050 mm x 19.1050 mm
365 mm sq. is 21.667% larger than 300.
chimaxi83 - Thursday, May 10, 2012 - link
Pay no attention to this known banned from the forums troll. Poor, sad little man you are lol, sucks to be you doesn't it?CeriseCogburn - Thursday, May 10, 2012 - link
I agree, the targeted "forum trusted end user alpha males" amd's pr campaign handlers coddle and coach and follow and email and bribe with free amd hardware and event tickets are gonig to be sorely pressed making up enough fanboy lies to earn their freebies.They are sad, and muted, bringing down the entire amd fanboy morale - the lies need to be too big this time - and evil amd already scapled the crap outa their fanbase, lost in their power perf area, lost in frame rate, lost their 3G future fantasy ram argument - all they have left is blowing chunks about overclocking the unstable poor drivers 7000 series - not to mention the GTX570 slamming their 78xx series, and a single GTX680 outselling their entire 78xx series at the egg...
I've seen more than one reviewer mention the 680 back orders were so great and the 79xx and 78xx sales so stalled, that they hoped for some kind of change... now the egg is full of 670's...
amd fanboys need a whole wheel barrel full verdetrol just to not off themselves
Spunjji - Friday, May 11, 2012 - link
What kind of weird conspiracy crack are you on? :SCeriseCogburn - Friday, May 11, 2012 - link
I guess you're so ignorant you didn't read the fired AMD employees testimonies concerning and explaining their "use" of amd fanboys, preferably the "trusted alpha male" type from long established forums all over the web, including anand's here.If you're entirely clueless, as you are, you have a lot of homework to do to be able to understand.
Now, with your rude attack due to your personal ignorance above, I think all of us can fairly completely ignore your sad, pathetic, amd pro backing smack talk comment above that, where put down the entire comments section as an argumentative and sad place.
Kind of ironic that after trying to defend another amd fanboy who smarted back about not being sad, you wound up saying this place is sad, and yes we've all seen your amd favoritism for some time now.
You are sad, amd has lost, and has been forced down into shame by their superior, nVidia.
Galidou - Saturday, May 12, 2012 - link
LoL Cerise is still here launching inflammatory stuff at everyone who says something about AMD. Look at the mad Nvidia fanboy crying setting fire to the rain...Whoever loses, you don't have to get so MUCH mad when speaking of computer parts, they are freaking computer parts, not women intimate parts... get laid before speaking of ignorance...
Why is it always the nvidia fanboys who gets so mad, are they freaking lacking real life sex so they become obsessed by video cards. I don't even want to think at what kind of picture they look at when they try to evacuate the pressure.... NO I DON'T...
CeriseCogburn - Thursday, May 31, 2012 - link
Amd lost, and lost badly, and all you do is attack me, so you lose too.Gastec - Tuesday, November 13, 2012 - link
Omg he's just a troll and you have fallen into his trap. Went me talking to the walls painted 6 months ago....Ah but maybe the troll reads this and replies. And if he's a mad troll he will copy my comments store it in a .txt. or .doc and use it "against" me in future ..."fights" Pfff! Sayonara suckers!Galidou - Sunday, May 13, 2012 - link
''Now, with your rude attack due to your personal ignorance''LOL, I wonder who's rude?
''your sad, pathetic, amd pro backing smack talk comment above that, where put down the entire comments section as an argumentative and sad place''
I think that just answered my last question. Just sad to see someone who gather this information to use it like you do, good job.
''You are sad, amd has lost, and has been forced down into shame by their superior, nVidia. ''
I think the only one who lost, it's you. You lost your sanity just for speaking about video card companies, according so much importance to it while it's so much irrelevant. 90% of the people will continue going to best buy and get a geforce 8600gt or a Radeon 2600xt for 120$ thinking they got the deal of the year because it has a 30$ rebate on it and allow them to run their game at 720p. GG
CeriseCogburn - Sunday, May 13, 2012 - link
Ah yes, another whose only "information" in 2 consecutive posts is 100% personal attack.Thank me when you grow up enough to realize rebutting lies and fibs by others is an adult and responsible thing to do. Something you obviously are absolutely incapable of, since expertise is not in your arsenal.
BTW - the gentleman who had to be corrected on his lackluster amd excuse concerning gpu core size vs amd's ability to for the 3td time in a few months, reduce prices, it has been pointed out, lied about the nVidia core size exaggerating it's dimensions (by mistake of course!).
ROFL hahahha - you pathetic amd fanboys have to lie all the time....
Not 300mm, 294mm sonny boy. ROFL
When it's so bad no lie is too big or too small, this is what happens - this is what we're (well not you of course, you're just an attacking troll) dealing with.