NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti 1 GB Review

Name: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti 1 GB
Brand: NVIDIA

W1zzard

on Jan 25th, 2011,

in Graphics Cards.

Manufacturer: NVIDIA

The Card »

GTX 560 Ti Review Introduction

Here you are, the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti launch pilot review. Making use of NVIDIA's proven second generation Fermi architecture, this GPU targets a key price point which has been NVIDIA and ATI's hunting ground since 2006. The sub-$300 segment is where customers have learned to expect high-end like performance and features at compelling prices. Price-performance ratio is the king here. The performance-price sweet spot is a virtual G-spot for GPU manufacturers. Whoever hits it right, gets loads of...sales. Veterans in this segment include the GeForce 7900 GT, Radeon X1950 Pro, GeForce 8800 GT, Radeon HD 4850, GeForce GTX 260-216, GeForce GTX 460, Radeon HD 6870, and in comes the latest contender, the GeForce GTX 560 Ti. The model name invokes some nostalgia as SKUs carrying the "Ti" marker were some of NVIDIA's first with programmable shaders. While the GeForce GTX 560 Ti isn't a "first" in anything as far as feature-set goes, I think "Ti" has more to do with shaping up the brand, telling buyers that the product has a little more to offer for its price, and that it's a step above the price point GTX 460 set for itself, while remaining to be a performance segment model.

Getting into the fine print of NVIDIA's offer, the GeForce GTX 560 Ti is based on NVIDIA's new GF114 chip. As far as its specifications and transistor-count go, the GeForce GTX 560 Ti is identical to the GF104 on which GTX 460 was based, except that it has all 384 of the CUDA cores physically present enabled, and that it uses the same secret-sauce (read: electrical enhancements) that made GF110, an evolved clone of the GF100, totally rock with power consumption figures. 384 CUDA cores apart, there's a 256-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, 32 ROPs, branched geometry processing, and the immediate fruition of the electrical enhancements, clock speeds: 822 MHz core, 1640 MHz CUDA cores, and 1000 MHz (4.00 GHz effective) memory. As far as features go, the GeForce GTX 560 Ti doesn't come with anything we haven't seen already with the GTX 460, it's all about performance per watt/dollar in this round.

	GeForce GTX 460	GeForce GTX 460	Radeon HD 6850	Radeon HD 5850	GeForce GTX 470	Radeon HD 6870	GeForce GTX 560 Ti	Radeon HD 5870	GeForce GTX 570	GeForce GTX 480	GeForce GTX 580	Radeon HD 5970
Shader units	336	336	960	1440	448	1120	384	1600	480	480	512	2x 1600
ROPs	24	32	32	32	40	32	32	32	40	48	48	2x 32
GPU	GF104	GF104	Barts	Cypress	GF100	Barts	GF114	Cypress	GF110	GF100	GF110	2x Cypress
Transistors	1950M	1950M	1700M	2154M	3200M	1700M	1950M	2154M	3000M	3200M	3000M	2x 2154M
Memory Size	768 MB	1024 MB	1024 MB	1024 MB	1280 MB	1024 MB	1024 MB	1024 MB	1280 MB	1536 MB	1536 MB	2x 1024 MB
Memory Bus Width	192 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	320 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	320 bit	384 bit	384 bit	2x 256 bit
Core Clock	675 MHz	675 MHz	775 MHz	725 MHz	607 MHz	900 MHz	823 MHz	850 MHz	732 MHz	700 MHz	772 MHz	725 MHz
Memory Clock	900 MHz	900 MHz	1000 MHz	1000 MHz	837 MHz	1050 MHz	1002 MHz	1200 MHz	950 MHz	924 MHz	1002 MHz	1000 MHz
Price	$160	$200	$180	$260	$260	$240	$250	$360	$330	$450	$500	$580