# MSI GeForce GTX 480 Lightning 1536 MB



## W1zzard (Oct 20, 2010)

MSI's GeForce GTX 480 Lightning promises to be an overclocker's dream. It is build around a completely redesigned PCB and thermal solution with overclockers in mind. The card offers unique features like control for up to three voltages, dual BIOS with liquid nitrogen support and easy to reach voltage measurement points.

*Show full review*


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## newtekie1 (Oct 20, 2010)

Great review of a beast of a card.  Sad it didin't overclock all that spectacularly, but I'm guess sub-zero cooling will yeild amazing results on this card.

All of the graphs have MSI N480GTX Lightning *1024MB* though.


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## W1zzard (Oct 20, 2010)

ugh .. time to remake the graphs


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## LAN_deRf_HA (Oct 20, 2010)

Is that 90 degree temp limit that low on the reference card bios? Overall I don't see anything that would make be pay such a notable price premium. I will give them credit for that vrm/ram sink as most non-ref cards have little or no sinking for that.


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## W1zzard (Oct 20, 2010)

LAN_deRf_HA said:


> Is that 90 degree temp limit that low on the reference card bios



the limit is clearly at 90 or 91°. performance drops like 50% to keep that temp


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## newtekie1 (Oct 20, 2010)

W1zzard said:


> ugh .. time to remake the graphs



Sorry.


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## ebolamonkey3 (Oct 20, 2010)

So no point in getting this unless you're putting it under LN2?


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## Benetanegia (Oct 20, 2010)

First of all nice review and nice addition is the GPU clock vs temp vs Vcore chart.
Speking of which:



> Once we reached a voltage of 1.150 V, the card ran into the 90° temperature limit set by the BIOS which will cause the card to throttle down. *This means that maximum performance is available at 810 MHz*, even though the GPU could probably run higher clocks if temperature was lower. At this point the fan was already running at 100%.



The graph is showing clock increases all the way up to 850 Mhz @ 88-90ºC. It's a typo or all those clocks were not stable/were throtling down too?


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## dir_d (Oct 20, 2010)

This card dosent seem great at all, i thought they would be higher binned chips or something but it seems that regular 480's can achieve everything this one does graphically and speed wise.


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## W1zzard (Oct 20, 2010)

Benetanegia said:


> The graph is showing clock increases all the way up to 850 Mhz @ 88-90ºC.



and then at the next higher voltage, clock has to be dropped down due to heat

clarified in-article a bit


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## Benetanegia (Oct 20, 2010)

W1zzard said:


> and then at the next higher voltage, clock has to be dropped down due to heat
> 
> clarified in-article a bit



lol sorry I missread it. 

810 is the maximum attainable at 1,150 volts without throtling down

I understood 810 mhz is the maximum clock without throtling down (period, with any Vcore).


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## W1zzard (Oct 20, 2010)

newtekie1 said:


> All of the graphs have MSI N480GTX Lightning 1024MB though



graphs should be fixed now


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## jasper1605 (Oct 20, 2010)

good job on the review as always wiz.  I have digged it as well for ya


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## mastrdrver (Oct 20, 2010)

Just thought I'd add to those who like the voltage adjustment part you added and would like to see more.

At least the cooler is quite a bit quieter then the reference one.


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## HalfAHertz (Oct 20, 2010)

love the new voltage graphs. That's one beast of a card but unfortunately totally out of my budget


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## arnoo1 (Oct 20, 2010)

wow it consumed less than the reference design card that's damn impressive,just one watt more @ maximum and there also a 50mhz oc, can't wait until gf110/gf100b comes out, those will probally be great!

wizz plz put it under LN2 and oc the shit out of it1

nice review man


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## Delta6326 (Oct 20, 2010)

very good performance! closer to the 5970

BUT W1ZZ you tricked me i loaded techpowerup and i saw a pic of a gpu and the "new" on it and was like YES! a 6870 review! then i read the title


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## douglatins (Oct 20, 2010)

My card can get 850Mhz with the max voltage and stay around 84C while gaming with fan around 80-90%, that is with stock heatsink, why put all these components and be limited to air? This card tops at 825? Fail. This should have been LC'd.

This card should have a higher voltage limit and be able to reach 950-1000Mhz and be WCd


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## HalfAHertz (Oct 21, 2010)

Delta6326 said:


> very good performance! closer to the 5970
> 
> BUT W1ZZ you tricked me i loaded techpowerup and i saw a pic of a gpu and the "new" on it and was like YES! a 6870 review! then i read the title



same here 


douglatins said:


> My card can get 850Mhz with the max voltage and stay around 84C while gaming with fan around 80-90%, that is with stock heatsink, why put all these components and be limited to air? This card tops at 825? Fail. This should have been LC'd.
> 
> This card should have a higher voltage limit and be able to reach 950-1000Mhz and be WCd



Every chip is unique


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## erocker (Oct 21, 2010)

douglatins said:


> This should have been LC'd.



No graphics card should _have_ to be liquid cooled. Unless you're in the business of not making money of course.


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## wolf (Oct 21, 2010)

excellent review as always W1zzard, but alas it is a pity about the stock clocks.

for such an agressive card I was hoping to see 800 core, and 4200 effective memory, I've heard of a lot of people with stock GTX480's getting to those clocks and above, not to mention cards like the KFA2 GeForce GTX 480 Anarchy, which did something like 900 core after voltage tweaks and temps were still WELL in check.


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## Bahmanvidia (Oct 21, 2010)

whyyyy??? 

my stock cooled evga gtx 480 could easily reach 850 mhz core with 1.137 volt limit on the bios. fully stable!! and with unlocked bios and 1.183 volt it was reaching 880 mhz core again fully stable but with 100% fan. why on earth this card could 'nt pass 810 mhz?? do you test stablity with furmark? i think the reason of throttling is that furmark pushes card's temperature way beyound the necessary level( i mean way beyound any game can push). and the cooler can't manage it. have you tested stablity with higher clocks (but with crysis warhead or other games, not furmark) to see how it manages the temperature?


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## W1zzard (Oct 21, 2010)

Bahmanvidia said:


> have you tested stablity with higher clocks (but with crysis warhead or other games, not furmark)



i used the stability test in gputool which is less demanding than furmark but more demanding than most games.

relying on games to be low load so the card stays cool and then overheats in crysis 2 and framerate drops to gtx 460 levels is not the way to go

if you think you can live with an unstable card just add like 5% to all oc numbers you see


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## wahdangun (Oct 21, 2010)

WTF, 6+8+8 pin power connector !!! speechless


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## bacan (Oct 21, 2010)

This card can achieve GPU clock of 1400MHz (under LN2) and that's 100% overclock!
Here:
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?p=4551763#post4551763


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## Bahmanvidia (Oct 21, 2010)

W1zzard said:


> relying on games to be low load so the card stays cool and then overheats in crysis 2 and framerate drops to gtx 460 levels is not the way to go



i don't think any game can even remotely stress the card like msi kombuster or furmark. so there's no need to only rely on them for testing stablity. i always test the stablity of a gpu oc by running like 50-100 loops of crysis or crysis warhead benchmark. or just playing them for like more than an hour or so or running unigine heaven dx11 on max settings for same amount of time. (and ofcourse vertical sync off to ensure constant maximum load on gpu) because i think cry engine 2 is one of the most demanding game engines along with unigine engine. honestly if your oc can pass hours of playing crysis warhead without a problem i really doubt it becomes unstable in any other GAMING scenario. because as i learnt by now crysis is very sensitive to any kind of oc (cpu-ram-gpu...) and i doubt crysis 2 will be much different.


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## crow1001 (Oct 21, 2010)

Benching Dirt2 in DX9 is just so lazy, sorry but if you buy a DX11 card you will play the game in DX11 and it does look better than DX9. The fact that DX11 performance is much better under Nvidia than AMD in Dirt 2 makes the benchmarking in DX9 even more preposterous.


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## W1zzard (Oct 21, 2010)

crow1001 said:


> Benching Dirt2 in DX9 is just so lazy, sorry but if you buy a DX11 card you will play the game in DX11 and it does look better than DX9. The fact that DX11 performance is much better under Nvidia than AMD in Dirt 2 makes the benchmarking in DX9 even more preposterous.



go and find out what "looks better" in dirt 2 in dx11, you'll understand


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## wolf (Oct 21, 2010)

bacan said:


> This card can achieve GPU clock of 1400MHz (under LN2) and that's 100% overclock!
> Here:
> http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?p=4551763#post4551763



holy schmidt thats a fast running GTX480, single GPU heaven right there.



W1zzard said:


> go and find out what "looks better" in dirt 2 in dx11, you'll understand



so very true, Dirt2 DX11 is not worth the performance hit for what you get visually, not by a longshot. sure tack it on if you have GPU power to spare I guess.


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## claylomax (Oct 21, 2010)

Bahmanvidia said:


> whyyyy???
> 
> my stock cooled evga gtx 480 could easily reach 850 mhz core with 1.137 volt limit on the bios. fully stable!! and with unlocked bios and 1.183 volt it was reaching 880 mhz core again fully stable but with 100% fan. why on earth this card could 'nt pass 810 mhz?? do you test stablity with furmark? i think the reason of throttling is that furmark pushes card's temperature way beyound the necessary level( i mean way beyound any game can push). and the cooler can't manage it. have you tested stablity with higher clocks (but with crysis warhead or other games, not furmark) to see how it manages the temperature?



Most reference GTX480 can reach 810-840mhz on stock voltage, with 1.138 they go past 900mhz; what's more if you use stock clocks you can undervolt it and reduce the power draw and load temps a bit.


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## Bjorn_Of_Iceland (Oct 21, 2010)

Yeah.. was expecting highger overclocks as well for the premium price


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## the54thvoid (Oct 21, 2010)

Meh...

Call me captain sensible but I'm still under the impression that although the power draw is better-ish than a stock 480, it's still a big power consumer for a single card.  Of course it's bloody fast.  It uses 168% the power (average consumption) of a 5870.  It better be 168% faster (quick check - best scenario at 2560x1600 its 125% faster than a 5870).

So to the NV camp - yay, another comparatively high consuming behemoth that trashes AMD's single chip champ.  To the AMD camp, another NV behemoth that really should be better for all the power it sucks (but still doesnt beat the 5970).

Show me the GTX 580.  By End November.  Otherwise my cash is probably going to AMD again.


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## crow1001 (Oct 21, 2010)

W1zzard said:


> go and find out what "looks better" in dirt 2 in dx11, you'll understand



It looks better than DX9 that's a fact, performance hit with Nvida cards going from DX9 to DX11 is minimal, same can't be said of AMD cards that get owned big time in DX11 Dirt 2, so you benchmark in DX9 as it gives great performance figure for AMD cards or is it just easier to bench in DX9 because of the DX10 cards you're benching?

IMO a reviewer should be setting the games to maximum IQ and give the results, not to edit config files to run a game off its default DX path. The card you reviewed today, you think someone is going to buy it and then run Dirt 2 in DX9??? it's crazy.

And yeah going by the below comparison there is a good difference.

http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,...mpared-Top-article-of-December-2009/Practice/


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## Bahmanvidia (Oct 21, 2010)

claylomax said:


> Most reference GTX480 can reach 810-840mhz on stock voltage, with 1.138 they go past 900mhz; what's more if you use stock clocks you can undervolt it and reduce the power draw and load temps a bit.



900 MHz with 1.138v on air?? don'think so. on water pretty sure, but not on air. because high temp makes them artifact. so you shoud either lower the temp(water or something like kfa2 480!!) or raise the voltage(on stock cooler). anyway my point was something else. why gtx 480 lightning can't even oc like a normal stock cooled 480??? (according to this review) something must be wrong!! and another thing is why does it throttle at 90 degrees? gf100s temp limit is set at 105degrees by nvidia!! why should it throttle so soon?


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## W1zzard (Oct 21, 2010)

crow1001 said:


> It looks better than DX9 that's a fact, performance hit with Nvida cards going from DX9 to DX11 is minimal, same can't be said of AMD cards that get owned big time in DX11 Dirt 2, so you benchmark in DX9 as it gives great performance figure for AMD cards or is it just easier to bench in DX9 because of the DX10 cards you're benching?
> 
> IMO a reviewer should be setting the games to maximum IQ and give the results, not to edit config files to run a game off its default DX path. The card you reviewed today, you think someone is going to buy it and then run Dirt 2 in DX9??? it's crazy.
> 
> ...



thank you for your suggestion, the next time i rebench all cards with new drivers i will rebench dirt 2 in directx 11


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## Bahmanvidia (Oct 21, 2010)

W1zzard said:


> thank you for your suggestion, the next time i rebench all cards with new drivers i will rebench dirt 2 in directx 11



thanks a lot man


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## TheLostSwede (Oct 21, 2010)

bacan said:


> This card can achieve GPU clock of 1400MHz (under LN2) and that's 100% overclock!
> Here:
> http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?p=4551763#post4551763



Yeah, Elmor proved that at MSI MOA in Taipei a few weeks back, although he was one of the few that got the card running at those kind of speeds. The trick is that you need to make sure that the prodalizers don't get too cold or the card isn't going to be all that happy.


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## claylomax (Oct 21, 2010)

Bahmanvidia said:


> 900 MHz with 1.138v on air?? don'think so. on water pretty sure, but not on air. because high temp makes them artifact. so you shoud either lower the temp(water or something like kfa2 480!!) or raise the voltage(on stock cooler). anyway my point was something else. why gtx 480 lightning can't even oc like a normal stock cooled 480??? (according to this review) something must be wrong!! and another thing is why does it throttle at 90 degrees? gf100s temp limit is set at 105degrees by nvidia!! why should it throttle so soon?



Actually mine does 913mhz with 1.125; the fan is obviously at 100% and temps reach 84c. If I apply 1.138 my computer shuts down. Needless to say this setting is only for benchmarking, Vantage runs, Heaven, etc ... I'm still third here: http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=110050


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## Bahmanvidia (Oct 22, 2010)

claylomax said:


> Actually mine does 913mhz with 1.125; http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=110050[/URL]



then you must be terribly lucky


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## claylomax (Oct 22, 2010)

Bahmanvidia said:


> then you must be terribly lucky



That's what I thought considering that I got the card at the end of April, as they say that GPU chips get better as the production matures; it does stock clocks with 0.962v, this cuts power by some 30 watts and load temps reach 83c


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## Bjorn_Of_Iceland (Oct 28, 2010)

claylomax said:


> Most reference GTX480 can reach 810-840mhz on stock voltage, with 1.138 they go past 900mhz; what's more if you use stock clocks you can undervolt it and reduce the power draw and load temps a bit.


900 mhz on air is a lie! hehe. I can only get to 800 mhz max on stock volts. Not unless its a binned GTX480, Its pretty hard to believe 900mhz on stock air is possible..


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## newtekie1 (Oct 28, 2010)

crow1001 said:


> It looks better than DX9 that's a fact, performance hit with Nvida cards going from DX9 to DX11 is minimal, same can't be said of AMD cards that get owned big time in DX11 Dirt 2, so you benchmark in DX9 as it gives great performance figure for AMD cards or is it just easier to bench in DX9 because of the DX10 cards you're benching?
> 
> IMO a reviewer should be setting the games to maximum IQ and give the results, not to edit config files to run a game off its default DX path. The card you reviewed today, you think someone is going to buy it and then run Dirt 2 in DX9??? it's crazy.
> 
> ...



Looks better?  I'm with W1z here, it really doesn't.  In fact I had to pause the game and spend a good 10 minutes trying to figure out what actually looked different, and I couldn't find it, it was like a where's waldo search.  When you are racing around you will certainly never see the difference.

So, yes, I bought several DX11 cards, and I run Dirt2 in DX9 on all of them because there is no difference IQ that matters or is worth the performance hit.  And yes, there is a performance hit with nVidia as well.


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## YautjaLord (Nov 30, 2010)

By the end of this year. Hope that : a)HAF932 will be sufficient to cool it down (along with HX1000W to power it); b)January 10 - i'll have enough ca$h for this beast. Looks beastily !!!!!!!!! I'm ready for dual-fan Twin-Frozin' DX11-PhysX love from MSI. lol The only thing that i still feel is f***ed is 8-pin RAM connector - WTF ? Other than that - one heckuva purchase this will be. Stay tuned.


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