Product Listing

MSI NX7600GT Diamond Plus (GeForce 7600 GT, HDMI)

By Vincent Chang - 13 Nov 2006

Conclusion

Conclusion

Falling prices dampen the market for 'special' editions and at the moment, it's a buyer's market, with the new GeForce 8 series adding to the already competitive scene. Consumers are more likely to review their options and perhaps even upgrade to a more powerful graphics card since their dollar can buy more now. Such a scenario is more likely to affect those special overclocked versions, as their main selling point is strictly performance. Fortunately for MSI, its NX7600GT Diamond Plus appeals to a different if smaller niche of consumers.

MSI's decision to outfit the Diamond Plus with high definition capabilities is probably the correct one, as opposed to overclocking a mid-range GPU facing stern competition.

We had nothing but praise when Gigabyte introduced its HDMI equipped GeForce 7600 GS. MSI's approach is similar - repackage an affordable mid-range GPU with the aim of making it HTPC friendly. While Gigabyte went with a slightly slower GeForce 7600 GS GPU and a passive heatsink to ensure that noise is a non-factor, MSI went with a more powerful GeForce 7600 GT GPU and a larger cooler. Crucially however, the noise from the Diamond Plus fan has been kept to a minimum while the temperatures were also significantly lower than the reference model. For a good measure to appeal a wider audience, MSI also integrates a Philips VIVO chip for video capturing and output.

As for MSI's Dual CoreCell technology, there is little evidence to its effectiveness from the benchmarks. Our results showed the MSI NX7600GT Diamond Plus in a less than flattering light as it scored marginally lower than the reference card. We can't dismiss it based on these scores alone but then we also doubt that consumers would choose MSI's products solely on the criteria that it has Dual CoreCell. After all, this 'technology' is only vaguely described with little concrete information on the details, so one is unlikely to judge the Diamond Plus based on the presence of this technology. We did find this card having better overclocking tolerance than a number of its competitors so that could be attributed to the optimizations MSI did but like what we said earlier, that's just speculation on our part.

In the end, the features on the MSI NX7600GT Diamond Plus should prove enough to tempt early adopters, especially those planning a HTPC system for high definition content. With NVIDIA's recently released PureVideo HD drivers, high definition videos should playback with minimal fuss on NVIDIA's GeForce 7 cards, including this MSI card, which should retail at a higher price than the typical GeForce 7600 GT. We haven't got a definite price quote from MSI yet but some of the online sources have put it at around US$250. However, for its features, it is quite reasonable, especially for those willing to splurge on high definition systems. MSI has done its part to ensure that it has a competent graphics card for this niche segment but the eventual shift to the HD era will depends more on products that have the real drawing power, something like the iPod or the PlayStation 3. The MSI NX7600GT Diamond Plus has to be content to hang onto the coat tails of others.

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