# ASUS GeForce GTX 680 Direct CU II 2 GB



## W1zzard (Apr 20, 2012)

The ASUS GeForce GTX 680 Direct CU II TOP uses the company's famous triple slot cooler to bring low temperatures and low noise to the GeForce GTX 680. ASUS has also increased the clocks of the card significantly, which gives it a healthy performance boost, for a reasonable $20 price premium.

*Show full review*


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## Fluffmeister (Apr 20, 2012)

What a great card, impressive stuff from both nVidia and ASUS.

Great review thanks.


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## zocksi (Apr 20, 2012)

Awesome Review! But I am missing a Temperature comparision. Still I love the Techpowerup reviews more then others.


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## LAN_deRf_HA (Apr 20, 2012)

length?


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## okidna (Apr 20, 2012)

W1zzard, HD7970 at $380? A typo maybe?



Great card, but 5 heatpipes with only 3 touching the core is kinda waste.


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## W1zzard (Apr 20, 2012)

LAN_deRf_HA said:


> length?



30 cm



okidna said:


> W1zzard, HD7970 at $380? A typo maybe?



yup. fixed



zocksi said:


> Awesome Review! But I am missing a Temperature comparision. Still I love the Techpowerup reviews more then others.



temperature data is on the overclocking page. nvidia reference gtx 680 is: 45 °C, 85 °C, 86 °C


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## LAN_deRf_HA (Apr 20, 2012)

Ouch. Quite a bit longer than reference.


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## zocksi (Apr 20, 2012)

Thanks W1zzard, I overlooked it because I wasnt interesetd in overclocking ^^ . imho you should but a comparision, at least with the reference card to see the difference. Thanks for the Information!


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## W1zzard (Apr 20, 2012)

zocksi said:


> Thanks W1zzard, I overlooked it because I wasnt interesetd in overclocking ^^ . imho you should but a comparision, at least with the reference card to see the difference. Thanks for the Information!



i have been thinking about adding a table of "same gpu" cards to the oc section to compare max OC. maybe i can add a similar table to temperatures


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## joeyck (Apr 20, 2012)

Dam not bad nice card! 

I'll stick with my 6950 though x)


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## zocksi (Apr 20, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> i have been thinking about adding a table of "same gpu" cards to the oc section to compare max OC. maybe i can add a similar table to temperatures



Correct me if I am wrong, but the "max OC" depends of the "quality of the chip" itself? , so maybe actually to compare to another cards isnt really significant, since the same card model can maybe be more or less oc using another batch?


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## W1zzard (Apr 20, 2012)

zocksi said:


> Correct me if I am wrong, but the "max OC" depends of the "quality of the chip" itself? , so maybe actually to compare to another cards isnt really significant, since the same card model can maybe be more or less oc using another batch?



you are correct, and yes my sample size is relatively small, but it is something that users do look at (they have to jump back and forth between reviews now)

if we add that table, i will mention random differences between chips


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## Benetanegia (Apr 20, 2012)

It seems that new drivers are helping the GTX680 stand out a little more than on launch. 5% higher clock than reference and  almost 10% higher performance.

And I'm always amazed at these non reference cards from Asus, MSI, Gigabyte, etc. Higher clocks, lower power and thermals, lower noise, not much higher price. For only $20 more than reference it's awesome. Probably will be higher on shelves tho.


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## xBruce88x (Apr 20, 2012)

the multi monitor power consumption was a nice surprise. I find it interesting that in some cases the card actually uses LESS power than the stock card. I'm guessing better quality VRMs and such.

lower noise is a plus. I'm sure they're working on a 4GB model, that will probably beat the 590 and 6990 in terms of relative performance at higher res.

nice to see an overclocked card that gets better performance per watt than the stock model, even if it is just a small amount, same with performance per dollar, and it costs more! haha

the extra $20 seems worth it for the better cooler and such... I paid about the same just for the cooler on my 8800gt


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## Benetanegia (Apr 20, 2012)

Benetanegia said:


> It seems that new drivers are helping the GTX680 stand out a little more than on launch. 5% higher clock than reference and  almost 10% higher performance.



Scrap the drivers comment, it's the virtues of GPU Boost showing up on a card with far better thermals and lower power consumption, right?

EDIT:  OK sorry, you mentioned it in your conclusion. Read before posting, dammit.


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## zaodrze244 (Apr 20, 2012)

pci-e 3.0 on sandybridge?


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## W1zzard (Apr 20, 2012)

zaodrze244 said:


> pci-e 3.0 on sandybridge?



must be a misreading then


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## avaya (Apr 20, 2012)

Great review! Your benchmarks and comments are noise are the best in class and what has got me addicted to reading all the reviews on techpowerup.

Hopefully the 580 Direct CU ii's will come down in price, they are still $500+ at all US vendors. Powercolor 7950 PCS+ also looks good, but I'd trade the added performance for the extra couple dBa of silence from 580 DCii, especially if a bit cheaper.


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## drade (Apr 20, 2012)

Wow an impressive card from Asus. To large, and a *too many slots* for my liking. Great card though!


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## BenchZowner (Apr 20, 2012)

No RIVE to test the card with higher Vgpu with VGA Hotwire ?


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## Recus (Apr 20, 2012)

> No technology similar to AMD's ZeroCore power



Why?



> Unlike its nemesis, the AMD Radeon HD 7970, Nvidia's new card doesn't require any application-specific software profiles for power management; it's all done using hardware monitors, which track power, temperature, and utilization and react almost instantaneously.



http://www.theverge.com/2012/3/22/2...-gtx-680-specs-release-date-price-28nm-kepler


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## BenchZowner (Apr 20, 2012)

Recus said:


> Why?
> 
> 
> 
> http://www.theverge.com/2012/3/22/2...-gtx-680-specs-release-date-price-28nm-kepler



nVIDIA has no "ZeroCore Power Saving" feature-alike.

In ZeroCore Power when your monitor goes into standby ( the computer's obviously idling at the desktop ) the card goes into a hardcore power saving mode, in which case consumes very little, pretty close to none ( what's ~5W ? ).

nVIDIA doesn't do the same thing.
They have power saving features, but not this kind.


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## W1zzard (Apr 20, 2012)

ZeroCore goes to around 1 W, yet the PC is not in standby so you can still download porn



Recus said:


> Unlike its nemesis, the AMD Radeon HD 7970, Nvidia's new card doesn't require any application-specific software profiles for power management; it's all done using hardware monitors, which track power, temperature, and utilization and react almost instantaneously.


looks like the good people at the verge didn't understand how nvidia's dynamic oc works. first, it is a software solution, not hardware. second, it is only active during gaming, for which it provides _increased_ clocks when possible.


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## Casecutter (Apr 20, 2012)

Wizzard said, "ASUS has informed us that this will be fixed in the retail version of the card."  
Interesting and telling that these are still/may be not even in the retail boxes or yet moving to market?

When the rubber meets the road there's like 7 title's that the 680GTX provides clear advantages in Fps and real game play; Crysis II, Shogun2, Dragon Age, Alan Wake and most of all BF3 @ 1920x. If BF3 is what you intend to play, it's justification to step up another $40 (9%) to get 21%.  The GTX 680 has Hardrest and Skyrim as wins, but not a big difference by 2650x.  While A/P and Metro are 7970 titles. I'd like to see the summary only worked up with those titles as that give a clearer synopsis of the "real meat" in such a competive evaluation. 

I will say Nvidia has the most to gain when upcoming drivers releases, as they have traditional gaming optimizations' within Kepler, and then fine tuning the dynamic clock profiles so they have room to improve on two fronts.

The unknown is will the OC profile provided in such OC custom’s, give up all that much more.  I find it odd that W1zzard only showed what his extra 6% OC provided on COD4 (?) not a title stressing anyone’s true game play.  I’d like to see the original Crysis, BF3, and Sryrim to evaluate the gains from overclocking.  Any of these GTX680... are more get one... and plug and play; because OC'n limits are still curtailed based on dynamically adjusted clock/voltage against the rendering load, temperature, and other factors.

While if/when the card is in the E-tail channel and sticking to a $520 price there will be a clear advantage, although with a Sapphire (11197-01-40G) 7970 OC (Dual BIOS provides 1GHz core/1450MHz memory) for $470 –AR $10 w/FS at Egg.  That can be added to the cart and be on the door step on Monday, the $50 extra and wins extinguish rapidly.


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## BenchZowner (Apr 20, 2012)

I see 3 reviews of the DCUII online today and none of them tested the card with the VGA Hotwire feature of the Rampage IV Extreme.
What's up with that ?
I'm pretty sure that Asus would like to see it included in the reviews.


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## eidairaman1 (Apr 20, 2012)

LAN_deRf_HA said:


> Ouch. Quite a bit longer than reference.



Ya and a bit too tall for those who want to run SLI.

Others are keeping this series cool with a dual slot configuration, why not Asus


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## RevengE (Apr 20, 2012)

Awesome card. I really liked the Direct Cu II technology on my Crossfired 6950s I had before my GTX 480.


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## Krahl (Apr 20, 2012)

Hello folks and pardon this - in your eyes most likely - newbish question ( as follows):

Can I use 2 DVI cables on this card like I do on my gtx570 or am I forced into a displayport/mDP solution or heck even a mix of it all?

Not my first visit here - but first post. Been reading your reviews for quite a while now - just lurking


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## BenchZowner (Apr 20, 2012)

Krahl said:


> Hello folks and pardon this - in your eyes most likely - newbish question ( as follows):
> 
> Can I use 2 DVI cables on this card like I do on my gtx570 or am I forced into a displayport/mDP solution or heck even a mix of it all?
> 
> Not my first visit here - but first post. Been reading your reviews for quite a while now - just lurking



Of course you can use 2 DVI cables.


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## cadaveca (Apr 20, 2012)

BenchZowner said:


> I see 3 reviews of the DCUII online today and none of them tested the card with the VGA Hotwire feature of the Rampage IV Extreme.
> What's up with that ?
> I'm pretty sure that Asus would like to see it included in the reviews.



If they really wanted that, they'd send out review kits with RIVE and CPU included. Do you really think W1zz would turn such down?

Soldering wires isn't for the faint of heart, the feature was shown, in a way, can't get more than that without the other supporting parts. IF ASUS had sent me RIVE for review, I'd have gladly sent it to W1zz for such testing, but TPU does not currently have one. Perhaps in the future.


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## W1zzard (Apr 20, 2012)

i dont have a R4E, and my soldering skills might only be good enough for breaking the card -> no review

i see no reason why this wouldnt work as expected, hotwire is actually very simple technology (a great idea though)


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## cadaveca (Apr 20, 2012)

I've been watching the extreme guys use it, seems nice, but for benching only... I have also seen that a few times, it's also tied into VCORE settings, and in some instances, this wil lead to excessive vcore to CPU for daily cooling options.

Shamino has a guide here:

http://91.121.148.119/downloads/PDF/R4E_shamino_guide.pdf



> **ONLY For the Extreme Overclocker who is adept at doing soldering!!**


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## Krahl (Apr 20, 2012)

BenchZowner said:


> Of course you can use 2 DVI cables.




Yeah I did made sure in my own post that I'd make a complete and utter twat out of myself 
Packing bags for a trap with the kids and wife tomorrow, so didn't add the bit which would make my post make just a wee bit more sense:
I'm using a Dell U2711 with 2560x1440 resolution - will this card support that with it's 2 DVI slots or is it the mDP/DP path like the 7970 lightning?


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## W1zzard (Apr 20, 2012)

Krahl said:


> will this card support that with it's 2 DVI slots or is it the mDP/DP path like the 7970 lightning?



if it were you'd see me complaining all over the review  still fighting my lightning to get it working at 2560x1600 .. 4th adapter now and still not working right

the 2 dvi slots are both dual link and can be used at the same time without any adapters or other gotchas.


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## Krahl (Apr 20, 2012)

Thank you very much W1zzard! Putting my preorder in tonight... for som obscene amount of money here in Denmark 
Close eyes - enter creditcard info!

Long discussion on a danish hardware site about the lightning - we were very dissapointed


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## illli (Apr 20, 2012)

i'm glad you took a picture of the bottom of the heatsink. i notice many reviews from other sites dont even bother to remove the heatsink at all, but i like to see what is under there


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## cowie (Apr 20, 2012)

cadaveca said:


> I've been watching the extreme guys use it, seems nice, but for benching only... I have also seen that a few times, it's also tied into VCORE settings, and in some instances, this wil lead to excessive vcore to CPU for daily cooling options.
> 
> Shamino has a guide here:
> 
> ...


I'v only just started using asus x79 me board that has this feature and with my asus 680 it was not tied to vcore,i think on some other mb's/bios its true
only did 2 680's and a ref 275 using this hotwire mod so simple for a volt mod noob like me.it saves on vrs  too
You need to treat it as any mod thuo read volts live cooling and all,its great feature it looks like one could do a solderless hotwire mod like so easy on the dcII 
good review On the 680dcII Wizz and dont blame you about not doing any hardmods on a review card.


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## BenchZowner (Apr 20, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> i dont have a R4E, and my soldering skills might only be good enough for breaking the card -> no review
> 
> i see no reason why this wouldnt work as expected, hotwire is actually very simple technology (a great idea though)



Thought you had one.
What's up with Asus nowadays.
In the past you could get several motherboards to review easily, but VGA's harder.
Can't believe they haven't supplied you with a R4E.

I don't blame the crisis though 

With the DCUII apart from any shorts that you need to do ( can be done with conductive ink pen ) you can get away without soldering the cables to the "holes" ( you can use some relatively thin cheap multimeter beads [probes] to connect them  )

Modding review hardware before completing your tests would be stupid in deed, but I see no harm done ( no offense of course as always ) if applied afterwards ( assuming that you have somebody to mod the card safely for you ).



cadaveca said:


> I've been watching the extreme guys use it, seems nice, but for benching only... I have also seen that a few times, it's also tied into VCORE settings, and in some instances, this wil lead to excessive vcore to CPU for daily cooling options.
> 
> Shamino has a guide here:
> 
> http://91.121.148.119/downloads/PDF/R4E_shamino_guide.pdf



It's a pretty good idea, although I prefer the hard way ( VRs or DIP switches and VID mods )


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## Krahl (Apr 21, 2012)

Order in place...now lean back and wait for it to hit shelves.

Great review - totally convinced me going for nvidia again instead of the price cut 7970s


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## MicroUnC (Apr 21, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> if it were you'd see me complaining all over the review  still fighting my lightning to get it working at 2560x1600 .. 4th adapter now and still not working right
> 
> the 2 dvi slots are both dual link and can be used at the same time without any adapters or other gotchas.




Hey W1zz! is there any benifit form PCi-E 3.0???


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## NHKS (Apr 21, 2012)

BenchZowner said:


> I see 3 reviews of the DCUII online today and none of them tested the card with the VGA Hotwire feature of the Rampage IV Extreme.
> What's up with that ?



how abt *this*?


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## Assimilator (Apr 21, 2012)

Best thing about this card = non-retarded PCI-E power connector arrangement.


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## cadaveca (Apr 21, 2012)

BenchZowner said:


> It's a pretty good idea, although I prefer the hard way ( VRs or DIP switches and VID mods )



I do as well. You can use the same points with VRs no problem, board just have that control built in. With UEFI, there is much more possible with BIOS than ever before, so I am glad to see stuff liek this, just wish it was on more boards.



cowie said:


> I'v only just started using asus x79 me board that has this feature and with my asus 680 it was not tied to vcore,i think on some other mb's/bios its true
> only did 2 680's and a ref 275 using this hotwire mod so simple for a volt mod noob like me.it saves on vrs  too
> You need to treat it as any mod thuo read volts live cooling and all,its great feature it looks like one could do a solderless hotwire mod like so easy on the dcII
> good review On the 680dcII Wizz and dont blame you about not doing any hardmods on a review card.



The VGA HOtwire is only available on one motherboard, that i know of, the RIVE. THe issues come from using cards other than the ASUS DirectCU II cards, yet to me, this is 100% acceptable....it's just not really for 24/7 use unless you are watercooling your cards, or just use the rig to bench.


Personally, I'd love a RIVE and a couple of DirectCU II cards, and I would NOT hesitate to do the VGA HOTWire either.


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## GC_PaNzerFIN (Apr 21, 2012)

The performance is insane for single GPU. On par with GTX 590 at full hd res! And only downside I see is the price they are asking for it over here.


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## Delta6326 (Apr 21, 2012)

Nice card! I was expecting higher price.

So W1zz are you going to upgrade your ASUS GeForce GTX 580 Direct CU II to this one


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## W1zzard (Apr 21, 2012)

Delta6326 said:


> So W1zz are you going to upgrade your ASUS GeForce GTX 580 Direct CU II to this one



i'm tempted, not 100% sure yet. maybe asus can make me a low noise bios =)


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## avaya (Apr 21, 2012)

GTX 580 DC II has been $500 to $550, although Newegg now has one listed at $430 as of today


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## BenchZowner (Apr 21, 2012)

NHKS said:


> how abt *this*?



They in deed show how VGA Hotwire is done, etc, but they don't seem to mention their overclocking experience ( clocks ) with raised voltages.
The 1328MHz GPU Core clock measurements in the charts were done with the stock voltage of the card ( 1.175V which in reality is more around 2.08V ).

Perhaps they kept those results for another article, or just wanted to show it and use it later for extreme overclocking on liquid nitrogen, anyway, it would've been nice to see what kind of clocks they'd manage with reasonable additional voltage for 24/7.


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## Nelly (Apr 22, 2012)

Good review, I am not keen on the way these have to be modded slightly to enable voltage adjustment.

This card would be great to review in my opinion click >> *KFA2 GeForce GTX 680 LTD OC Hall Of Fame Edition 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card **WHITE PCB** *

I think in America it's this >> *http://www.galaxytech.com/__en_gb__/Product266.aspx*



			
				Gibbo said:
			
		

> Sorry mate, this card hands the Phantom its arse in comparison. *These things are capable of 1400MHz region with air cooling, 1500MHz+ under water and with LN2/Phase these should pass beyond 2000MHz.*


Source


2x 8pin Connectors, so upto 300W TDP
3x 90mm Fan Cooling design, powerful yet quiet
*Custom GX31 controller chip for software voltage control*
WHITE PCB DESIGN
8+2+2 Power Phase Design


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## MeanBruce (Apr 22, 2012)

Dynamic OC cannot be turned off! Ok, I don't know NVidia tuning software, but AMD CCC lets you drop the mem and gpu speeds down to reference levels even if your card comes OC'd a little out of the box.

Is that not possible with the GTX 680? It might be a dumb question but I am an NVidia noobie!


My current card Asus 6870DirectCu fans spin at 15% (inaudible) in auto mode. Wondering if there is an auto fan speed control in the NVid software and if so what % the two fans spin at idle?

Major learning curve moving to another gpu brand!


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## Captain Howdy (Apr 23, 2012)

I'm not impressed by this card at all (this sample anyway). The max stable gpu overclock (oc+boost) W1zzard was able to achieve was 1272. I know that other reviewers were able to go higher but I've seen many examples of the reference 680 with 2-slot cooler and 6-pins get to an oc+boost of 1272 and better.

EDIT:
W1zzard: I assume this is the case, but can I just confirm... you set the power target to max for overclocking test?


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## SonDa5 (Apr 24, 2012)

I don't care for the cooler but the PCB is bitching.


Disappointed to not see the Voltage Tweak software sticker on the box.  


What a waste of PCB if this card doesn't support voltage tweak.  The Dynamic OC software that doesn't turn off ruins this card.


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## inzaji (Apr 25, 2012)

Superb Card. Can wait to get 1


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## Animalpak (May 6, 2012)

This for me seems the most aggressive in performance custom overclocked GTX 680... Reach the highest FPS in most of the games.

Im looking for a new card anyone confirm my impression ? Or there will be another much faster ? 

Thanks guys


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## 680sli (Jun 25, 2012)

*Running Asus GTX 680 CU Top in SLI*

Hi All,

I'm running these cards in SLI on a new build. It was a little tight in my old case and I ended up getting a new case (Rosewill Thor). Everything powered up first time and no driver issues.

Here are some basic stats:

Idle temps: Card 1 (top): 32c and Card 2 (bottom) 27c. Amazing temps considering the cards are on right next to each other. I used a small plastic spacer to make sure the card have at least 0.5 inch between the cards. The cards do tend to bow slightly, so pay attention to this if you're doing a SLI solution.

Load temps (based on Battlefield Bad Company 2 all detail set to high etc @ 1920x1080). 3 hrs solid gaming. Fraps should frame rates 200-140. I can't hear any fan noise above my already quiet case fans. My XBOX sounds louder - lol.

Temps after gaming:
Card 1: 71c
Card 2: 56c

Card 1: boosts to 1280 (stock)
Card 2: boots to 1228 (stock)

4% boost difference between the cards not bad on stock and especially because the cards are stacked almost top of each other (because of additional heat transfer). Will try overclocking to see where I can take the cards. So far everything is awesome on stock speeds.

Cards show running both PCI 8x in the Asus M/B bios, not sure if I'd see much more in 16x and game play has been flawless, no stuttering whatsoever.  

3D 2011: Came out to 15k+ on stock (can't remember exact #).

I believe this is the best single GPU card you can buy and Asus hasn't put it much over MSRP (given the custom PCB & copper heat pipe solution). The cards cool down very quickly too, further evidence that the triple slot cooling solution is working (in addition to Nvidia's magic on the Kepler core).

If you're going for an SLI solution, there are only a few M/B's that can handle the triple slot design. Also make sure you case can handle the larger card size (almost 12" in length). Lastly make sure a SLI or single card solution, that you have good airflow through the case and at all times, as this card will not vent out of the case.

Hope this helps anyone looking at this card. It's hard to find at the moment, but it's definitely worth it when you get it !!


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## 680sli (Jun 25, 2012)

Animalpak said:


> This for me seems the most aggressive in performance custom overclocked GTX 680... Reach the highest FPS in most of the games.
> 
> Im looking for a new card anyone confirm my impression ? Or there will be another much faster ?
> 
> Thanks guys



The MSI 680 lightning looks good, but it's more money and I don't see any performance improvement over the Asus card. I have heard the lightnings fans can get a little noisy under load. Both good cards and really depends what you're willing to spend.


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## thebluebumblebee (Feb 12, 2014)

W1zzard said:


> maybe asus can make me a low noise bios =)


Did Asus ever do anything along this line?  There's one on CL....


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