MSI GeForce GTX 770 Gaming and ASUS GeForce GTX 770 DirectCU II Review
NVIDIA today released the GeForce GTX 770 GPU for $399. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 770 uses a Kepler GK104 GPU with 1,536 CUDA cores and either 4GB or 2GB of high-speed 7 Gbps GDDR5 -- the world's fastest memory ever on a graphics card. It also supports NVIDIA GPU Boost 2.0 technology and a new GPU cooler. Read on to see how retail GeForce GTX cards from ASUS and MSI perform!
The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 brings a welcomed performance increase to the now year-old GeForce GTX 680 graphics card. Our testing found the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780 2GB OC Edition cards by ASUS and MSI were between 5-15% faster than the original GeForce GTX 680 2GB reference card. This is a nice performance increase thanks to the higher clock speeds and the additional memory bandwidth provided by the 7.0 Gbps memory.
I like that it's cheaper but seems completely unnecessary since it's using the same core as the GTX 680. If it were a more "gimped" version of the GK110 then I might be singing a different tune.
At first I though it would be a rebrand like the 8800 GTX -> 9800 GT, but I don't think this is really a rebrand.
Changes - new vBIOS (clock speeds, voltages and so on), new 7.0 Gbps GDDR5 IC's, New PWM components for memory (Also the card is now 8-pin & 6-pin for power connectors), new GPU cooler due to the higher TDP and so on.
If they didn't change the memory IC's and tweak the boards power system it would be a rather simple rebrand. I used the word 'refresh' in the article as they actually did hardware changes. Like you said the price drop is also nice, but there is a rather large performance gap left between the GTX 780 at $650 and the GTX 770 at $400. Obviously high-end GTX770 cards and 4GB derivatives will get up to the $450-$475 range, but that still leaves a $200 gap between cards.
I'm also curious if the entire GTX 700 series will be just a refresh of Kepler. Sure looks like that is what is going to happen across the board.
IMHO they ought to just discontinue and allow any retailers that are still holding them to drop prices enough to liquidate their stock and get their money back. A rebate wouldn't work, no one would want to pay more for the lesser product and then wait two months jumping through hoops just for an equalizing rebate.
I have come to the conclusion that "FaceBook" should be renamed "FacePalm"
Prepare for 680 price drops! Maybe ...
Very good, but i still think 7970 (1GHz+) is better value for 1440p/1600p.
3GB for 399$ and definitely OCs better due to unlocked voltage
I'll still say it though. Finally Nvidia did it
