The Card
MSI is using their Twin Frozr III cooler on the card, which we have seen on other models before. The cooler covers the whole card, which means its two fans will provide plenty of airflow to all components on the board. Please note that the heatsink extends a bit beyond the PCB area, which could lead to difficulties installing the card in smaller cases.
The card requires two slots in your system.
Display connectivity options include one DVI port, one full size HDMI port and two mini-DisplayPorts. You may use all the outputs at the same time, thanks to AMD's superior display output architecture.
An HDMI sound device is included in the GPU, too. It is HDMI 1.4a compatible which includes HD audio and support for Blu-ray 3D movies. The DisplayPort outputs are version 1.2 which enables the use of hubs and Multi-Stream transport.
You may combine up to two HD 7870 cards from any vendor in a multi-GPU CrossFire configuration for higher framerates or better image quality settings.
Pictured above are photos of the front and back, showing the disassembled board. High-res versions are also available (
front,
back). If you choose to use these images for voltmods etc, please include a link back to this site or let us post your article.