A Closer Look

The ASUS heatsink looks massive. It uses five heatpipes to keep the card cool, with one heatpipe being extra wide for maximum heat transfer.


A little heatsink is placed on the VRM circuitry, and the whole card is stabilized by a metal tab running along the longest side of the board. You'll find a metal backplate on the back of the card. A welcome addition, it protects the card against damage during handling.


The card requires two 8-pin PCI-Express power connectors. This configuration is good for up to 375 W of power draw.


ASUS placed some cutouts for access to measuring points and the modification of power and voltage limits on the back of the card.


ASUS re-branded the voltage controller on their card, so we don't know its exact make and model.


The GDDR5 memory chips are made by SK Hynix and carry the model number H5GQ2H24AFR-R2C. They are specified to run at 1750 MHz (7000 MHz GDDR5 effective).


NVIDIA's GK110 graphics processor was first introduced as a Tesla-only product for powering demanding GPU compute applications. NVIDIA is now also selling it as a GeForce GPU. It uses 7.1 billion transistors on a die size we measured to be 561 mm². The GPU is produced on a 28 nanometer process at TSMC, Taiwan.

Please note that the GPU on the GTX 780 Ti is marked "B1", whereas previous cards used "A1". Whether this is really an updated GPU or simply a different label is not known. NVIDIA has not discussed A1 vs. B1 GPUs with the press.