Hi all. In this review, as a happy owner of the Asus Geforce Gtx780 Ti, I will try to reveal its main advantages and disadvantages, but I will start with a preface.

Why are 2x Asus Matrix HD7970 bad?

It was not the mania to spend money that pushed me to this act, but the deplorable situation of AMD in the field of drivers. The fact is that if one Asus Matrix worked perfectly, then with the second the situation changed radically. For example:

When using Catalyst 13.11 Beta, the second video card was loaded up to 99% in idle time, and warmed up well. And the first one was fine. And if this was solved by rolling back the drivers to 13.4, then I lost about 20% in performance. And the problem was in the drivers. Yes, and stability suffered, FPS subsidence did not suit me either. But this is not the only reason. I was not quite happy with a home "oven" in the literal sense, although I placed 10 turntables in the Corsair Carbide Series 400R case. Yes, and they consumed a lot.

With the GTX780 Ti, the situation is different: the performance is higher (with more stable operation), the heat is less (especially the air was thrown out), and the "green" ones are much better with firewood. And also in the Geforce Experience with ShadowPlay, game optimization, driver control, as well as the ability to change the visualization of the "GEFORCE GTX" backlight on video cards with a reference CO. But more on all this later.

Since I sold my Asus Matrix on the 27th, I had to think quickly. On the one hand, I could take the version from Gigabyte with their WindForce, but the warranty and availability decided everything. On Sunday I went and bought, perhaps, one of the few Gtx780 Ti brought to Sochi.

Design and Cooling System

Perhaps I'll start with this. Now all the latest Nvidia reference COs look almost the same, below is a photo comparing Gtx780 Ti, Gtx Titan and Gtx780

Well, the internal

as well as characteristics

Perhaps I will not write much about the effectiveness of Nvidia's reference CO. If you, like me, are not very worried about noise (maybe you are sitting in headphones), or you just don’t pay attention, then your own profile in Msi Afterburner will help you, and thanks to this, even with overclocking, the video card does not heat up more than 80 * C even in the heaviest applications. But I think that dropsy would not hurt such an apparatus. Fortunately, on the way Asus Geforce GTX780 Ti ROG Poseidon. Yes, and Asus Gtx780 Ti with DirectCU II is also just around the corner

Or you can put Arctic Cooling Accelero Hybrid.

By the way, the air does not stagnate in the body - the turbine at maximum speed (more than 4200Rpm) blows air no worse than any fan at 120 at a speed of 2000Rpm. The only downside is the noise.

Performance and overclocking

Application performance

As befits a high-end product, the graphics card delivers excellent performance in all applications. And, as mentioned above, it does it stably, without FPS subsidence. Crysis 3 is also quite playable at maximum settings. However, nothing else can be expected. It should also be noted that in idle (or at light load), the frequency drops to 324Mhz, at light load - about 700Mhz.

idle

Below are videos from Battlefield 4, Crysis 3, Saints Row IV and Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon. The settings are maximum.

The tests were carried out on the configuration:

Kingston HyperX 8Gb 1600Mhz

OCZ Vector 128Gb

Seagate Contellation 3Tb 7000Rpm, 128Mb

Battlefield 4

Crysis 3

Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon

Saints Row IV

As well as temperature readings

Battlefield 4

Crysis 3

Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon

Saints Row IV

Overclocking

The Gtx780 Ti does an excellent job with overclocking, the frequencies of 1080 for the core and 1838 for the memory were excellent, there are no artifacts or FPS drops, the voltage is also stable. And thanks to Boost, the frequency increases to 1132. But this is the case, according to Gpu-Z. In applications, I observed 1209Mhz. Compared to the factory overclock (about 928 in Boost and 1000Mhz in reality) this is not a bad option. The only disappointing thing is that the power reserve is 106%. But not everything is so simple. If you believe the official data, then the TDP of the GTX780 Ti is 250W, and with an increase in power reserve, these 106% are counted not from 250, but from 300W! In the end, everything turns out very well. And yes, the video card with a custom CO profile does not heat up more than 80 * C, the frequency is not reset, and we have smooth gameplay in any games.

Screenshot of Gpu-Z in standard frequencies

Screenshot of Gpu-Z in overclocking

If you want to overclock your video card even more, then you need to resort to unlocking the voltage for Msi Afterburner, everything is described below.

You should start by checking the PWM controller for compatibility, for this, enter on the command line: msiafterburner / ri4,20,99 or msiafterburner / ri3,20,99. If the program returns a value of 41, then you can go further. In the MSI Afterburner folder, go to the profiles directory. Find the file with the card ID and at the end add:

VDDC_Generic_Detection=0

VDDC_NCP4206_Detection=4:20h

VDDC_Generic_Detection=0

VDDC_NCP4206_Detection=3:20h

Geforce Experience

It is worth mentioning separately the new application from Nvidia, Geforce Experience.

1.) Here you have the game optimization that works in most licensed games (list on the Nvidia website), you don’t have to configure anything. Although sometimes jambs happen - for example, I found 3x Crysis 3, 2x Fallout 3, 2x Skyrim, and 2x Borderlands 2.

2.) Checking and automatic (or at the request of the user) installation of drivers, including Beta versions.

3.) Shadow Play. This is a separate utility from Nvidia that uses a separate H.264 codec to capture video from games without significant performance loss. Of course, there are losses, but within 10 Fps. It doesn't affect gameplay. You can choose the type of recording (background and manual; background; manual; broadcast on Twich;). When in the background, you can select the duration of the recording, a maximum of 20 minutes. with a size of 7.5 GB. It should also be noted that the recording is only in 1080p.

4.) Highlight visualizer. Works on reference Gtx690, 770, 780, Titan and 780 Ti. There are many modes, I will not describe them.

My opinion

Buying this device for 30,000, I was hoping to get maximum performance and I got it. Yes, it was possible to take the Gtx780 with Direct CU II, but I did not want to. Yes, and the guarantee here is 3 years, in any case, this device will be relevant all this and next year.

If you are an avid gamer, an enthusiast, then you should definitely pay attention to this card. Excellent build quality, optimized drivers from Nvidia, maximum performance + excellent overclocking potential. Premium product, nothing to add.

Pros and Cons

To the pluses It is worth mentioning the huge performance - the most powerful single-chip video card! More good drivers and a new Geforce Experience app with useful features

To disadvantages it is worth including only the reference cooling system and the initial price in DNS

advertising

Let's take a look at NVIDIA's line of video cards. GeForce GTX 770, GTX 780, GTX Titan and GTX 690 - a slightly wrong, but understandable classification of the company's accelerator lineup. But the GTX 780 Ti? What for? Where? With what to compare? The answer is not as simple as it might seem at first glance. If you think about it...

The sixth series of GeForce was extremely clear: each next-ranked model was distinguished by a large number in the name. And then there are video cards with an index that includes 7x0. At the same time, the GTX 690 has not disappeared anywhere, it still remains the fastest dual-core solution. Maybe the GTX Titan wormed its way into the wrong group? Well, why not, because he came to the gaming market from the world of calculations and remains the ultimate offer for both gaming and computing.

The question arises - should NVIDIA remove it from production after the release of the GTX 780 Ti? The answer is also simple. What for? It is popular with those people who need computing, and enthusiasts, nevertheless, for games. the best choice should be the GTX 780 Ti. This is because users are finally provided with a fully functional GPU with 2880 stream processors. Yes, only now after certain changes, which will be discussed below, the GK110 GPU is ready to join the gaming applications and show what it can do.

Probably, everyone is wondering why the GK110 got a new name, or rather the B1 stepping, and not say A2? It is believed that the numbers indicate fixes in the metal connections inside the GPU. The letters refer to changes in the transistors themselves. In any case, there are no radical changes inside the crystal - it's still the same GK110. All NVIDIA had to do was to adapt the full version of the GK110 to the required heat dissipation at the calculated frequencies, and this was not easy to do.

The secrecy of the company's developments is covered with such a veil of secrecy that it is almost impossible to get intelligible answers, you will simply be bombarded with advertising or general phrases from which it is impossible to find out the technical data. Well, secrets must be kept undisclosed, even under sharp questions from the press. For our part, one can only guess what tricks had to be taken to fit the new GPU revision into the allotted power consumption range.

advertising

Technical features

As you already understood, there are no physical changes in the main logic circuits. Perhaps there are optimizations inside that reduce the time it takes to complete tasks inside the GPU, which leads to a smaller amount of simultaneously working transistors. This scheme of work has existed for a long time and is called "dark silicon". All 7.1 billion transistors operating at the same time cannot be cooled by any system, which means that it is constantly necessary to monitor the balance, on the one hand of which is performance, and on the other, frequency, power consumption and the temperature resulting from them. The better and more economical the shutters work, and the lower temperature is kept, the faster the calculations occur.

Even before the advent of Hawaii from a competitor, NVIDIA introduced several provisions for the operation of the GPU. So, the base frequency is the lowest level of GPU operation, GPU Boost is the average GPU frequency in games. Most often, even after a long stay of the video card under gaming load, GPU Boost kept the GPU frequency slightly higher than stated. AMD has gone the other way - the only mode in which the video card fully realizes its power is "Normal" or, as it is also called, Uber mode.

But unlike the competitor, NVIDIA believes that the user does not need to deal with either the BIOS switches or the settings in the drivers - the video card will do everything for them, and by itself. And what can really be reproached by the GeForce developer is that the fixed power consumption limit is too close to the factory setting. It remains to be seen whether the engineers really solved the general problem of a sharp increase in energy consumption?

Specifications

Name	R9 290	R9 290X	GTX 690	GTX 780	GTX 780 Ti	GTX Titan
codename	Hawaii	Hawaii	GK104	GK110	GK110	GK110
Process technology, nm	28	28	28	28	28	28
Core size/cores, mm 2	438	438	294x2	521	521	521
Number of transistors, million	6200	6200	3540x2	7100	7100	7100
Core frequency, MHz	Up to 950	Up to 1000	915 (1020)	860 (900)	880 (930)	840 (880)
Number of shaders (PS), pcs.	2560	2816	3072	2304	2880	2688
Number of rasterization blocks (ROP), pcs.	64	64	64	48	48	48
Number of texture units (TMU), pcs.	160	176	256	192	240	224
Maximum fill speed, Gpix/s	60.6	64	58.6	41.4	42	40.2
Maximum texture fetch rate, Gtex/s	151.5	176	234.2	165.7	210.2	187.5
Pixel/vertex shader version	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0
Memory type	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5
Effective memory frequency, MHz	5000	5000	6000	6000	7000	6000
Memory size, MB	4096	4096	2048x2	3072	3072	6144
Memory bus, bit	512	512	256x2	384	384	384
Memory bandwidth, GB/s	320	320	192x2	288.4	336	288.4
Power consumption (2D / 3D), W	nd / nd	nd / nd	nd / 300	nd / 250	nd / nd	nd / 250
CrossFire/Sli	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Recommended price at the time of announcement, $	399	549	999	499	699	999

Appearance and dimensions

Due to the release of the AMD Volcanic Islands family of video cards, a hard boom began in the graphics adapter market. Nvidia even lowered the prices of their top graphics cards, but that didn't help either. I had to do something and somehow change the situation in my favor. We needed a special model that would take the flagship - AMD Radeon R9 290X and removed it from the list of competitors.

In principle, nVidia has such a video card - this is the GeForce GTX TITAN. This is the fastest video card on a single chip at the time of release. But its price is too high and for most it is simply inaccessible. Even not every gamer decides to buy one. After all, for this money you can easily buy a good computer with excellent performance.

And now, nVidia has finally released a video card that is better than its competitor from AMD and more affordable - the GeForce GTX 780 Ti. She also became the head of the GTX 7xx family of video cards.

It can be assumed that this is a kind of trump card that the greens kept up their sleeves. A certain pause was simply waited for and the right moment was chosen for the release.

Specifications

Three out of fifteen large blocks from the Kepler architecture - streaming multiprocessors - were returned to this video card. It is much more powerful, especially in terms of shader instructions and texturing.

It also supports 7 GHz video memory, thereby increasing the bandwidth by as much as 14%.

Reference version dimensions

• Height: 26.67 cm / 10.5 inches
• Length: 11.16 cm / 4.376 inches
• Width: Two slots

GPU Specifications

• CUDA cores: 2880
• Base clock: 875
• Boost Clock: 928
• Texture Fill Rate: 210 (GigaTexels/s)

Memory specifications

• Memory speed (Gbps): 7.0
• Memory capacity: 3072 MB
• Memory interface: 384-bit GDDR5
• Maximum Memory Bandwidth: 336

Capabilities

• FXAA and TXAA: +
• Support for NVIDIA SLI technology: +
• pure video: +
• 3D Vision: +
• PhysX: +

Software environment: CUDA

• DirectX: 11
• OpenGL: 4.3
• Bus: PCI-E 3.0
• 3D Games: +
• Blu Ray 3D: +

Specifications

• Maximum digital resolution: 4096×2160
• Maximum VGA resolution: 2048×1536
• Media connection: HDMI, DisplayPort, Dual Link DVI-I, Dual Link DVI-D
• Multi-Display Support: +
• HDCP: +
• HDMI: +
• HDMI Audio Input: Internal

Power and temperature

• Maximum temperature: 95
• Power consumption: 250W
• Minimum system requirements by power: 600 W
• Power connectors: 6-pin & 8-pin

Comparison of GTX 780 TI and GTX 780

	GeForce GTX 780	GeForce GTX 780 Ti
GPU	GK110	GK110
Number of transistors	7.1 billion	7.1 billion
Process technology, nm	28	28
GPU clock frequency, MHz: Base Clock / Boost Clock	863/900	875/928
Stream Processors	2304	2880
texture blocks	192	240
Rasterization Units (ROPs)	48	48
Video memory: type, size, MB	GDDR5, 3072	GDDR5, 3072
Memory clock frequency: real (effective), MHz	1753 (7010)	1502 (6008)
Memory bus width, bit	384	384
Interface	PCI-Express 3.0 x16
Image Output
Interfaces	1 x DL DVI-I 1 x DL DVI-D 1 x HDMI 1.4a 1 x Display Port 1.2
Maximum Resolution	VGA: 2048×1536 DVI: 2560×1600 HDMI: 4096x2160, DisplayPort: 4096×2160
Maximum power consumption, W	250	250

Manufacturers

MSI GTX 780 Lightning 3 GB

It has a core frequency: 980 MHz and a memory frequency of 1502 MHz

MSIGTX 780TwinFrozrGaming 3GB

ASUS GTX 780 DirectCU II OC 3 GB

It has a core frequency: 889 MHz and a memory frequency of 1502 MHz

EVGA GTX 780 Superclocked w/ ACX Cooler 3 GB

It has a core frequency: 967 MHz and a memory frequency of 1502 MHz

Video card Gigabyte GTX 780 WindForce OC 3 GB

It has a core clock of 954 MHz and a memory clock of 1502 MHz

PalitGTX 780SuperJetStream 3GB

It has a core frequency of 980 MHz and a memory frequency of 1550 MHz

MSI GTX 780 Gaming 6 GB

It has a core clock of 902 MHz and a memory clock of 1502 MHz

Comparison with competitors

Specifications/Model	AMD Radeon R9 290X	nVidia GeForce GTX 780	nVidia GeForce GTX 780 Ti	nVidia GeForce GTX Titan
GPU	Hawaii XT	GK110 (GK110-300-A1)	GK110 (GK110-425-B1)	GK110 (GK110-400-A1)
Process technology	28 nm	28 nm	28 nm	28 nm
Number of transistors	6.2 billion	7.1 billion	7.1 billion	7.1 billion
GPU clock speed (base frequency)	—	864 MHz	876 MHz	837 MHz
GPU clock speed (Boost frequency)	1.000 MHz	902 MHz	928 MHz	876 MHz
Memory frequency	1.250 MHz	1.502 MHz	1.750 MHz	1.502 MHz
Memory type	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5
Memory size	4.096 MB	3.072 MB	3.072 MB	6.144 MB
Memory bus width	512 bit	384 bit	384 bit	384 bit
Memory Bandwidth	320.0 GB/s	288.4 GB/s	336 GB/s	288.4 GB/s
DirectX Version	11.2	11.1	11.1	11.1
Stream Processors	2.816	2.304	2.880	2.688
texture blocks	176	192	240	224
Raster Operations Pipelines (ROPs)	64	48	48	48
TDP	> 250W	250 W	250 W	250 W

Comparing the 780 Ti with its competitors, you can understand its pros and cons. For example, the number of streaming processes is not much different from others, but the throughput is still slightly higher. But here AMD has a much higher amount of video memory, Boost frequency and pixel fill rate. Now it is PowerTune and GPU Boost that greatly affect performance. And it is not so easy to evaluate it. So comparing all these basic characteristics is not so important.

Overclocking and tests

Overclocking the GTX 780 Ti is something. The video card has significant hidden reserves.

The company's engineers did their best. Due to a more advanced chip and an improved power system, you can overclock it by 200 MHz without raising the voltage.

Tests in benchmarks

Tests in games

Crysis 3

In Crysis 3, the video card showed excellent results, up to 36 fps at maximum settings.

Total War ROME II

This game is just crammed with various modern graphic bells and whistles.

In FullHd resolution, fps ranged from 65-99 at maximum settings.

Call of Duty Ghosts

In FullHd resolution, fps ranged from 132 to 148 at maximum settings.

conclusions

We can say that the GTX 780 Ti is an example of a high quality graphics card that is designed for serious games. Nvidia has taken a step forward in the development of the Kepler family of GPUs. It can be argued that this architecture has reached its ceiling.

advertising

Let's take a look at NVIDIA's line of video cards. GeForce GTX 770, GTX 780, GTX Titan and GTX 690 - a slightly wrong, but understandable classification of the company's accelerator lineup. But the GTX 780 Ti? What for? Where? With what to compare? The answer is not as simple as it might seem at first glance. If you think about it...

The sixth series of GeForce was extremely clear: each next-ranked model was distinguished by a large number in the name. And then there are video cards with an index that includes 7x0. At the same time, the GTX 690 has not disappeared anywhere, it still remains the fastest dual-core solution. Maybe the GTX Titan wormed its way into the wrong group? Well, why not, because he came to the gaming market from the world of calculations and remains the ultimate offer for both gaming and computing.

The question arises - should NVIDIA remove it from production after the release of the GTX 780 Ti? The answer is also simple. What for? It is popular with those who need computing and enthusiasts, however, for games, the GTX 780 Ti should be the best choice. This is because users are finally provided with a fully functional GPU with 2880 stream processors. Yes, only now after certain changes, which will be discussed below, the GK110 GPU is ready to join the gaming applications and show what it can do.

Probably, everyone is wondering why the GK110 got a new name, or rather the B1 stepping, and not say A2? It is believed that the numbers indicate fixes in the metal connections inside the GPU. The letters refer to changes in the transistors themselves. In any case, there are no radical changes inside the crystal - it's still the same GK110. All NVIDIA had to do was to adapt the full version of the GK110 to the required heat dissipation at the calculated frequencies, and this was not easy to do.

The secrecy of the company's developments is covered with such a veil of secrecy that it is almost impossible to get intelligible answers, you will simply be bombarded with advertising or general phrases from which it is impossible to find out the technical data. Well, secrets must be kept undisclosed, even under sharp questions from the press. For our part, one can only guess what tricks had to be taken to fit the new GPU revision into the allotted power consumption range.

advertising

Technical features

As you already understood, there are no physical changes in the main logic circuits. Perhaps there are optimizations inside that reduce the time it takes to complete tasks inside the GPU, which leads to a smaller amount of simultaneously working transistors. This scheme of work has existed for a long time and is called "dark silicon". All 7.1 billion transistors operating at the same time cannot be cooled by any system, which means that it is constantly necessary to monitor the balance, on the one hand of which is performance, and on the other, frequency, power consumption and the temperature resulting from them. The better and more economical the shutters work, and the lower temperature is kept, the faster the calculations occur.

Even before the advent of Hawaii from a competitor, NVIDIA introduced several provisions for the operation of the GPU. So, the base frequency is the lowest level of GPU operation, GPU Boost is the average GPU frequency in games. Most often, even after a long stay of the video card under gaming load, GPU Boost kept the GPU frequency slightly higher than stated. AMD has gone the other way - the only mode in which the video card fully realizes its power is "Normal" or, as it is also called, Uber mode.

But unlike the competitor, NVIDIA believes that the user does not need to deal with either the BIOS switches or the settings in the drivers - the video card will do everything for them, and by itself. And what can really be reproached by the GeForce developer is that the fixed power consumption limit is too close to the factory setting. It remains to be seen whether the engineers really solved the general problem of a sharp increase in energy consumption?

Specifications

Name	R9 290	R9 290X	GTX 690	GTX 780	GTX 780 Ti	GTX Titan
codename	Hawaii	Hawaii	GK104	GK110	GK110	GK110
Process technology, nm	28	28	28	28	28	28
Core size/cores, mm 2	438	438	294x2	521	521	521
Number of transistors, million	6200	6200	3540x2	7100	7100	7100
Core frequency, MHz	Up to 950	Up to 1000	915 (1020)	860 (900)	880 (930)	840 (880)
Number of shaders (PS), pcs.	2560	2816	3072	2304	2880	2688
Number of rasterization blocks (ROP), pcs.	64	64	64	48	48	48
Number of texture units (TMU), pcs.	160	176	256	192	240	224
Maximum fill speed, Gpix/s	60.6	64	58.6	41.4	42	40.2
Maximum texture fetch rate, Gtex/s	151.5	176	234.2	165.7	210.2	187.5
Pixel/vertex shader version	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0	5.0 / 5.0
Memory type	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5
Effective memory frequency, MHz	5000	5000	6000	6000	7000	6000
Memory size, MB	4096	4096	2048x2	3072	3072	6144
Memory bus, bit	512	512	256x2	384	384	384
Memory bandwidth, GB/s	320	320	192x2	288.4	336	288.4
Power consumption (2D / 3D), W	nd / nd	nd / nd	nd / 300	nd / 250	nd / nd	nd / 250
CrossFire/Sli	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Recommended price at the time of announcement, $	399	549	999	499	699	999

Appearance and dimensions

The seventh series of video cards from NVIDIA ruled the market for a very short time. Only in the spring we were shown the GTX 780, which remains a very fast video card today. But AMD recently released a new line of graphics cards, and NVIDIA couldn't stand aside. No, we are not being offered a new line yet. We are offered a new video card - NVIDIA GTX 780Ti, let's talk about it. To begin with, we will look at the slides from the official presentation, and then we will move on to the torture of the video card itself and the comparison with its direct competitor - AMD R9 290X.

What is the GTX 780Ti graphics card? NVIDIA identifies four main factors. Now we have 25% more CUDA cores, namely 2880 pieces. This is nice, because now we have a full-fledged GK110 GPU without blocked modules.

The second highlight is the initial clock frequency of the video memory of 7000 MHz. It's really a lot. Apparently, in this way NVIDIA is struggling with the 512-bit memory bus of its competitor AMD R290X. The fact is that monitors with support for 4K resolution (3840 x 2160) have recently appeared. In this resolution, the memory bus is very heavily loaded, requiring a large bandwidth. Of course, it is obvious to everyone that monitors with such a resolution will not be in demand for a very long time, since the price for them today is about 150 thousand rubles. Even if in a year it drops to 50 thousand, monitors still will not be a bargain. For a very long time, monitors with a resolution of 2560 x 1440 have been on the market for 20 thousand rubles, but even they are too expensive for most buyers. And if the user can somehow save up money for a new expensive video card, understanding what exactly such a new thing will give him, then the monitor for most players is not a paramount thing. But the arms race in ultra-high definition combat has already begun and is unlikely to be stopped.

In addition, NVIDIA offers us GPU BOOST 2.0 technology, which very accurately selects the most stable clock speed. The fourth bonus is the power subsystem, which works very accurately, thanks to which we can count on good overclocking potential.

On this slide we are shown the superiority of NVIDIA GTX 780 Ti over AMD R9 290X. You immediately pay attention to the “GFLOPS” parameter, which literally rises above the competitor’s result by a millimeter. Especially when you consider that the graph is not built from zero.

NVIDIA GTX 780 Ti Performance

Judging by this slide, the GTX 780 Ti video card unconditionally wins in power consumption. We are told a TDP of 250 watts. This is not much for a performance card. In addition, the GTX 780 Ti is noticeably colder, and, according to NVIDIA, only warms up to 83 degrees. Good, we'll definitely check it out.

And here are the measurements of gaming performance. Everything here is good for NVIDIA, and not so good for AMD. In most modern games, the novelty wins from 10 to 50%. This is a serious statement, let's see what happens in reality.

Features look very impressive. The number of stream processors is 2880, which operate at 875 MHz, and GPU BOOST increases the frequency to 928 MHz. Memory bus 384 bits, memory type GDDR5. The clock frequency of the video memory is 7000 MHz. TDP 250 Watts, the card is powered by one six-pin and one eight-pin connectors.

To sum up, the NVIDIA GTX 780 Ti is faster, cooler and quieter than the AMD R9 290X. We will definitely measure each of these parameters, and now let's move on to the video card itself.

NVIDIA decided not to come up with a new design for the GTX 780 Ti, but to use the same one that NVIDIA TITAN had. On the one hand, when you buy New Product, I want the appearance to be new. Of course, the main thing lies under the heat-distributing cover, but people still buy with their eyes. On the other hand, NVIDIA has clearly found a very successful design that does not age and, if I may say so, is timeless. He's just smart and stylish.

The entire body is made of aluminum, which gives the video card a solid weight. In the center there is transparent window made of plastic, through which you can see a massive radiator. True, it is beautiful exactly until the moment when the radiator is not clogged with dust. And self-opening the card for cleaning threatens to void the warranty.

The video card is equipped with four video outputs: one HDMI, one DisplayPort and two DVI. All four connectors can be used at the same time.

On the top edge of the video card there are two additional power connectors, one six-pin and one eight-pin. The name of the graphics card is LED backlit and glows beautifully in the dark. Another small design plus.

There is absolutely nothing interesting on the back of the video card. Is that a few tantalum capacitors.

The design of the printed circuit board has not changed either, almost all elements have remained in the same places as in NVIDIA TITAN.

In the center of the board, we see the GPU itself, labeled GK110-425-B1. Around it are twelve video memory chips with a total volume of three gigabytes. Why only three? Good question. For this video card, it would be just right to have six gigabytes of video memory, since it is aimed at fighting at high resolutions.

The power subsystem has not changed and operates according to the 6 + 2 scheme, where 6 phases are assigned to the video processor, and two more phases are given to the video memory.

The cooling system rests on many small screws, which are popularly called asterisks. In the center of CO, we see a small polished area, which is in contact with the GPU itself. Video memory chips and elements of the power subsystem transfer their heat to the radiator through thermal pads.

This concludes the study of the video card and proceed to the table of technical characteristics.

Specifications table

		NVIDIA GTX 780	AMD R290X
Nucleus	GK110	GK110	Hawaii
Process technology, nm	28	28	28
Number of stream processors	2880	2304	2816
Number of blocks (ROPs)	48	48	64
Core frequency, MHz	875	863	1000
Memory bus, bit	384	384	512
Memory type	GDDR5	GDDR5	GDDR5
Memory size, MB	3072	3072	4096
Memory frequency, MHz	7000	6008	5000
Supported version of DirectX	11.1	11.1	11.2

The differences between the regular GTX 780 and the GTX 780 Ti are quite noticeable. Here and an increased number of cores, an increased number of texture units and an increased clock frequency of video memory. And if AMD's new R9 290X overtook the usual GTX 780 in almost all applications, then the alignment of forces is likely to change here.

Overclocking and temperatures

Rumors circulated long and hard on the Internet that a full-fledged GK110 would overclock well. The fact is that previous NVIDIA cards usually showed mediocre overclocking, without outstanding results until a serious change in cooling. We'll test overclocking the GTX 780 Ti with stock cooling and see if it surprises us.

So, the stock clock frequency of the video processor is 875 MHz. In self-overclocking mode, we are promised up to 928 MHz. But NVIDIA paid special attention to GPU BOOST 2.0 technology. Let's check how the clock frequency of the video processor actually is under load. The load was created by the 3DMark 13 benchmark.

The clock frequency was always at around 1020 MHz. It is worth noting that this is a very high-quality and serious benchmark that loads the map completely and does not let it relax. Especially since we ran it in Extreme mode. Therefore, here we got exactly what the card really can do, without the influence of the crooked code of some toy.

Such a result cannot but rejoice, especially considering that this is a stock cooling system. And the clock frequency of new video processors in auto-overclocking also depends on temperature. Speaking of temperature. We got the maximum value of 78 degrees, which is very good.

We will overclock the video processor at the standard voltage without making any changes to the operation of the entire device as a whole.

The video processor was able to function stably at a frequency of 1126 MHz. This is a very good indicator. Relative to the stock 875 MHz, we received an increase of 251 MHz. This is indeed a very good result, especially considering stock cooling and native voltage. Let's see what the real frequency is under load. Video memory overclocked to 8000 MHz. This is also a very high figure.

The actual clock speed was firmly at 1270 MHz. What can I say, this is a great result. Frankly, we expected to get no more than 1100-1150 MHz. NVIDIA has really released a great GPU. If you change the cooling system to a more efficient one and increase the voltage on the video processor, the result may exceed all expectations. The temperature at the same time increased only to 81 degrees.

As for the temperature in the popular FurMark utility, we got the following results. Under load at nominal value, the card warmed up to 84 degrees, which is only 1 degree more than NVIDIA promised.

Under load in acceleration, we got all the same 84 degrees. The fan speed increased from 59% to only 61%. Of course, the noise level has not changed, which is very nice. It should be noted that the card does not make any noise under load.

Available on GeForce.com a new version GeForce Experience - 1.8 . In addition to new profiles, updated settings, and some other new features, GeForce Experience 1.8 includes the much-anticipated GeForce ShadowPlay gaming image capture tool.

Fast, free and simple, ShadowPlay is a new approach to gameplay recording powered by the NVENC H.264 hardware encoder built into the GeForce GTX 600 and 700 series GPUs.

Shadow mode continuously records gameplay, saving 10 to 20 minutes of play to a temporary buffer hard drive. If you've done something amazing, just press Alt + F10 to save that memorable moment to the right folder. To prevent clutter of video files on the hard drive, ShadowPlay saves the file only when hotkeys are pressed.

The saved footage can then be edited in popular editors such as Sony Vegas, Adobe Premier, the free Windows Movie Maker or any other .mp4-compatible video editor, and immediately uploaded to YouTube. You can also upload the raw file to YouTube first and then edit it with the built-in tools. In future versions of GeForce Experience, ShadowPlay will be integrated with the Twitch.tv online service, which will allow ShadowPlay users to send recorded files directly to Twitch.

ShadowPlay uses the H.264 hardware encoder built into the GeForce GTX 600 and 700 series graphics cards to record at 1920x1080 at 60 fps. All games using DirectX 9 or later versions of this interface are supported. Compared to software solutions that use CPU resources to record gameplay, GPU hardware encoding reduces performance by only 5-10% when recording videos of maximum quality at a bit rate of 50 Mbps. With automatic H.264 encoding, compression and MP4 recording, ShadowPlay prevents huge multi-gigabyte files from cluttering up your hard drive.

If you want to record your entire game session, select manual mode using the Alt + F9 key combination - in this mode, the tool works similarly to traditional applications for recording gameplay. In the case of Windows 7, due to the nature of the OS, the file size is limited to 4GB, but in Windows 8 and Windows 8.1, the file size is limited only by the availability of hard disk space, so you can easily create hours of video.

Immediately after the release of the beta version, NVIDIA released an update that includes the following changes/additions:

• Win7 removed the 3.8 GB file size limit.
• Record game video up to 20 minutes in Shadow mode.
• Unlimited manual recording.
• When a file reaches 3.8 GB, ShadowPlay creates new files.
• Record video without rescaling up to 1080p. At higher resolutions, the aspect ratio is preserved.
• Added microphone recording.

  

  

  The NVIDA GTX 780 Ti video card won an unconditional victory over the AMD R9 290X. There is not a single game that the 290X wins. Note the huge performance boost in overclocking.

  Conclusion

  The NVIDIA GTX 780 Ti video card proved to be a very high-quality product. She is fast, cold and good looking. Performance in all tested games was higher than that of the AMD R9 290X. Particularly pleased with the excellent overclocking potential. The video processor functioned stably at a frequency of 1270 MHz. This is a very high rate, which is rare. It is worth noting that the card was overclocked on a stock cooling system and nominal voltage. In light of this, I really want to see something like the ASUS GTX 780 Ti DirectCU II TOP. It is likely that such a video card will be able to submit to a frequency of 1350-1400 MHz.

  I was somewhat surprised by the amount of video memory - only three gigabytes. Although it is worth recognizing that even in UltraHD (4K) resolution, this volume should be enough for all modern games.

  The video card turned out to be very cold and completely silent, which is doubly pleasant. Even FurMark couldn't get the card above 84 degrees when overclocked.

  All this suggests that we will soon be shown another modification of the GTX 780 Ti video card, the clock frequency of which will be under gigahertz, the memory will be 6-12 gigabytes and the memory will function at 7500-8000 MHz. If such a video card sees the light, then we are even afraid to imagine how much they will ask us for it. After all, the usual GTX 780 Ti costs today in Moscow stores from 24,000 rubles.

  The video card wins an Editors' Choice award.