MSI's new GTX 660 HAWK is an evolutionary improvement over the company's GTX 660 Twin Frozr OC. We see higher clocks and a better PCB design that has more power phases and an additional six pin PCI-Express power connector. Cooling capability has also been upped slightly even if it does not make that much of a difference given the low heat output of the GTX 660.
In terms of performance, we see an 8% performance improvement compared to the reference GTX 660. This puts the card right between the GTX 660 and GTX 660 Ti, although some benchmarks show performance reaching GTX 660 Ti levels. I kind of miss a memory overclock, which should have been easy considering that our manual overclocking reached well over 1700 MHz.
Non-gaming power consumption is quite a bit higher than on the reference design if you look at the percentage difference, but the difference is relatively small when converted into watts - it is still better than most AMD-based cards. Typical gaming power consumption is pretty much the same as the reference GTX 660, which is quite good considering the 660 Hawk runs higher clocks and delivers 8% more performance. As a result, the GTX 660 HAWK is about 3% more power efficient during gaming. MSI has also added a second power connector that enabled them to increase the board's power limit, which resulted in higher Furmark power consumption. That is a good thing. The higher limit means that NVIDIA's boost-clock mechanism can boost the card higher since it has a higher power headroom, which results in additional performance.
Noise and temperature levels of the card are great, although we have seen slightly better results from other cards. The differences are so small that only specific tests will show the differences. The subjective experience will be the same.
MSI has added several features geared towards enthusiast overclockers to their card, but they are of limited use because NVIDIA policy limits software-voltage adjustments. Pro overclockers will have to do a manual voltmod through soldering on the card. I am also not sure if a card in the GTX 660 performance class is at all interesting to that crowd. Nevertheless, the extra OC features and added power capabilities certainly make this card the weapon of choice for GTX 660 record hunting. The separate LN2 BIOS, available via BIOS switch, will also be useful in such scenarios.
We haven't found a final street price for the GTX 660 HAWK yet, but pricing should be around $250. The cheapest GTX 660 is available for $230, making a $20 increase for its OC features sound reasonable. On the other hand, normal gamers will not see much of a difference between the HAWK and the TwinFrozr OC, for example. Most custom design GTX 660 cards are already quite good, and small differences in OC potential will barely make a difference. Today, AMD also announced a new driver update that provides an additional 4-10% performance boost depending on the card. A new game bundle with top notch titles is also available. I'm sure that this will put additional price pressure on NVIDIA based cards, and we might see further price reductions in the near future.