NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 - Looking For The Knockout

Looking For The Knockout

NVIDIA is looking strong right now in the battle for graphics card dominance with its 28nm Kepler architecture seeming to have gotten the best of AMD’s 28nm GCN architecture. Leading the charge is NVIDIA’s GeForce GTX 680, which has put AMD’s flagship Radeon HD 7970 on the ropes. Now, NVIDIA is hoping to land a knockout blow with the dual-GPU GeForce GTX 690, a card NVIDIA is calling the "most powerful and striking video card ever built, with the performance of two GTX 680s running in SLI configuration."

Featuring two Kepler GPU cores running at a base clock speed of 915MHz, with 6008MHz DDR memory, 3072 CUDA cores, and backed up by a massive 4GB of GDDR5 VRAM, the GTX 690 certainly looks impressive on paper.

NVIDIA claims that the GTX 690 will be able to produce scores similar to two GTX 680s running in SLI configuration. We were somewhat skeptical to this claim, as our experience with NVIDIA’s previous generation dual-core GPU, the GTX 590, showed it to be more in line with two GTX 570 cards in SLI rather than dual GTX 580 cards. However, NVIDIA claims that power draw on a single board was the largest gating factor with their previous dual-GPU cards, which resulted in clock speeds on the GTX 590 being dramatically lowered to compensate - something they claim they have since fixed. Kepler’s superior power efficiency does seem to support this claim, although, in comparing the GTX 690 with the GTX 680, we did notice that the GTX 680 does have a slightly higher core clock speed of 1006MHz vs. 915MHz on the GTX 690. At least apart from a small difference in clock speeds, the GPUs used are the same as those on the GTX 680, thus delivering the full firepower of the architecture.

In further attempts to minimize power use on the GTX 690, NVIDIA is employing a 10-phase power supply with a 10-layer copper circuit board to ensure efficiency. The card is powered by two 8-pin Molex connectors. The GTX 690 has a rated TDP of 300W, which would necessitate a 650 or 700W PSU at the very least.

NVIDIA hasn’t just built the GTX 690 for performance, they’ve also worked on the overall build with extra concern for the heat and noise aspects of the card. The card takes up two slots and is just under 300mm in length (just about 11 inches). It's built with a rugged, industrial-looking, cast aluminum shroud, with trivalent chromium plating for extra protection.

Like the GTX 590, the GTX 690 features a centrally located fan sitting between two GPUs, each with their own array of nickel-plated cooling fins. Cool air is sucked in through the fans and onto the fins, while hot air is vented out at backplate, sides and even the rear of the card. Heat output and management could be a problem, but more on that during our temperature testing section.

The fan housing itself is manufactured from magnesium alloy using a thixomolding process in which liquid magnesium alloy is injected into a mold. NVIDIA uses the same aluminum used by Lockheed Martin on the F-22 Raptor fighter jet for its light weight, good heat dissipation and acoustic dampening properties.

NVIDIA has gone for a three dual-link DVI setup, similar to the GTX 590. Surprisingly, they've opted for a Mini-DisplayPort as the fourth port, omitting the mini-HDMI port this time round. The GTX 690 is of course capable of driving up to four monitors simultaneously, three in 3D Vision Surround, and a fourth without 3D. The limitation is purely a software constraint as put forth by NVIDIA as they find that gamers don't really need to go beyond triple screens for immersive gameplay, nor is it practical.

At an astronomical launch price of USD$999, the GTX 690 will be desired by only the most hardcore of enthusiasts. Given the price of a single GTX 680, the asking price of the GTX 690 with its capabilities and configuration doesn't really sound anything amiss. You either buy two separate cards or you get a single GTX 690. The choice is pretty clear. For those who really can splurge, you can even choose to purchase dual GTX 690 cards for the ultimate SLI setup. However take note that availability will be in very limited quantities, with a rumored 1000 units produced worldwide. Expect local supply to be even more limited, with the possibility of as few as 20 units reaching our shores.

So let's get on with how it really performs, starting with a specs comparison listing to quickly capture the vital stats of all the competitive graphics cards:-

Test Setup

• As usual, the following are the specs of our trusty graphics card test bed system:
• Intel Core i7-975 (3.33GHz)
• Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD4P motherboard
• 3 x 1GB DDR3-1333 G.Skill memory in triple channel mode
• Seagate 7200.10 200GB SATA hard drive
• Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit

Obviously, we’ll be pitting the GTX 690 against dual GTX 680s in 2-way SLI configuration to test NVIDIA’s claims of similar performance output. Take note that the slightly lower GPU base clock speed of the GTX 690 would mean that you're likely to see the GTX 690 tailing the GTX 680 SLI pair by a hair. We’ll also see how it compares to dual AMD Radeon HD 7970 cards in CrossFire configuration, a single GTX 680 and HD 7970 as well as previous generation dual-GPU cards.

The list of cards tested and driver versions used:

• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 4GB GDDR5 (ForceWare 301.33)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 2GB GDDR5 2-way SLI (ForceWare 301.10)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 2GB GDDR5 (ForceWare 301.10)
• AMD Radeon HD 7970 3GB GDDR5 2-way CrossFireX (AMD Catalyst 12.2 Preview Version)
• AMD Radeon HD 7970 3GB GDDR5 (AMD Catalyst 12.2 Preview Version)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 3GB GDDR5 (ForceWare 267.71)
• AMD Radeon HD 6990 4GB GDDR5 (AMD Catalyst 11.4 Preview)

The list of benchmarks used:

• Futuremark 3DMark 11
• Unigine Heaven V2.1
• Far Cry 2
• Battlefield: Bad Company 2
• Crysis Warhead
• Crysis 2
• Batman: Arkham City
• Dirt 3
• S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat

3DMark 11 Results

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 got off to a good start with a decent showing in Futuremark's 3DMark 11 benchmark, which uses various DX11 functions like tessellation and DirectCompute to put the cards through their paces.

While the GTX 690 wasn't quite as good as our GTX 680 2-way SLI setup, falling behind by about 4% on the Performance preset and 5.5% on the Extreme preset, it was far and away the second best choice holding a 10% lead on our AMD Radeon HD 7970 2-way CrossFire setup and absolutely destroying NVIDIA's previous generation dual-GPU GTX 590 with a massive 76% lead.

Unigine Heaven 2.1 Results

In the tessellation heavy Unigine 2.1 Heaven benchmark, at 1920 x 1200 pixels resolution, we saw a similar result to our 3DMark11 scores with the GTX 690 falling between the higher GTX 680 2-way SLI and lower HD 7970 2-way CrossFireX. At higher resolutions and with 8xAA, the GTX 690 scaled together with the 680 2-way SLI, always trailing it by about 4-5%.

It's worth mentioning that at a resolution of 2560 x 1600 with 8x AA, neither NVIDIA setups were able to keep up with the Radeon HD 7970 2-way CrossFireX. The GTX 690 fell behind by as much as 16.5% at the most taxing test setting.

This isn't entirely surprising as we have seen in our previous reviews that the Radeon HD 7970 really starts to shine on higher, more demanding settings and tests. 

Far Cry 2 Results

In the non DX11 enabled Far Cry 2, the GTX 690 performed very well, remaining competitive or even surpassing the GTX 680 2-way SLI on all settings. However, with cards this powerful, even at the highest settings and resolution, there wasn't much to separate them and the performance gains weren't as pronounced as they could have been. 

While the numbers still provide an idea of how the cards performed, in terms of actual gameplay, there would be almost no difference between any of them. 

Far Cry 2 might be a little too old to test the might of today's more powerful GPUs, but rest assured, we'll soon be reevaluating and updating our test setup and adding more worthy challengers!

Battlefield: Bad Company 2

In our first DX11 game, the GTX 690 continued to perform as we've come to expect, slightly trailing the GTX 680 2-way SLI. It fared slightly better, losing by only 2% this time. While the 'lower' 1920 x 1200 pixels resolution wasn't demanding enough to show much separation between the cards, at 2560 x 1600 we did see the GTX 690 beat the GTX 590 by a substantial 34% and maintained the lead over the red camp by at least 10%.

Crysis Warhead

We've finally reached the most challenging games in our test setup. First up Crysis Warhead. We once again saw the GTX 690 trailing the GTX 680 2-way SLI by about 2-3% across the board. Somewhat surprisingly, the clear winner here was AMD's Radeon HD 7970 2-way CrossFireX setup, which blazed its way to victory with a commanding 20% average lead against the GTX 690.

Looking at the other cards on our chart, you'll see that, compared to their closest NVIDIA competitor (e.g. HD 7970 vs. GTX 680), AMD is always in the lead, suggesting that Crysis Warhead just runs better on AMD cards. 

Crysis 2

In the toughest game on our list - and really, the first to even remotely challenge our multi-GPU configuration cards - we were pleased to see the GTX 690 rise to the challenge and remain highly competitive with both SLI and CrossFireX setups. We saw a slight dip at the higher 2560 x 1600 resolution, with the GTX 690 again falling behind the GTX 680 2-way SLI by about 4%, however it did perform an astonishing 85% better than the GTX 590.

Batman: Arkham City Results

With Batman: Arkham City optimized for use with NVIDIA's PhysX, we expected the GTX 690 to blow every AMD card out of the water. It delivered with a big 30% lead over the Radeon HD 7970 CrossFire setup. Compared to the GTX 680 2-way SLI, we again saw it trailing by 6% on 1920 x 1200 resolution and 2% at 2560 x 1600.

Dirt 3

Dirt 3 is one of the more forgiving DX11 enabled games around, and all of our top competitors took the opportunity to shine, posting impressive results within 1% of each other. At the extreme resolution of 2560 x 1600, the GTX 690 managed to snag a rare win, just slightly outperforming the GTX 680 2-way SLI by 0.5%.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat Results

On the less taxing Day Run, both the GTX 690 and GTX 680 2-way SLI were churning out scores well over 150fps, with the Radeon HD 7970 2-way CrossFire falling slightly behind. On the tougher Sun Shafts Run, the numbers settled into the same familiar pattern, with the GTX 690 falling behind the GTX 680 2-way SLI by about 2%. 

It's worth noting that as the runs got progressively more demanding, the Radeon HD 7970 2-way CrossFire chipped away at NVIDIA's lead, finally surpassing both NVIDIA leaders on the final Sun Shaft run at 2560 x 1600 resolution with 4x AA, pulling ahead by about 6%! In all other instances however, the green camp still managed to maintain a small lead.

Overclocking Results

How well does the GTX 690 overclock? We were able to push the it up to 1085MHz at the core, with memory running at 7208MHz DDR. For our efforts, we were rewarded with a 9% gain on 3DMark 11's Performance preset and a nice 15% improvement at Extreme settings. Best of all, we saw the GTX 690 take a small lead over the GTX 680 2-way SLI, surpassing it by about 2% on both tests - even though the latter configuration was clocked higher.

There may actually be even more room for improvement as we were able to get clock speeds even higher, but weren't able to find a completely stable performance level and in the interests of time, went for a safer setting.

Temperature

Despite NVIDIA's use of thixomolded magnesium alloy (chosen partly for its heat dissipation properties), the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 was easily the hottest out of all of our cards, reaching 79 degrees Celsius before we even started overclocking. 

It's also worth noting that, due to the side exhaust design of the GTX 690, the hot air that blasts out may well be emerging straight out onto your other components - on to other expansion cards and more so on your storage drives. You'll definitely need a case with excellent cooling capabilities when using this card. More so if you intend to get dual GTX 690 cards in SLI configuration.

Power Consumption

Contrary to the heat output, power consumption on the GTX 690 was fairly impressive for a dual-GPU card, at about 10% less than the GeForce GTX 680 2-way SLI configuration. NVIDIA's promise of increased power efficiency on the GTX 690 definitely holds true here. Kudos to the NVIDIA engineering team. Compared to the previous generation dual-GPU cards, the GTX 690 is really impressive as it's delivering way more performance at the same power draw.

Conclusion

Dual-GPU cards are a bit of a risk for manufacturers. At a very high price point, few people will be willing to fork out the money for them. Meanwhile, for your dual-GPU card to be competitive, it needs to be at least as good as what a multi-GPU setup would get you for around the same price. In the case of the GeForce GTX 690, NVIDIA set out to make it twice as good (and thus twice as expensive) as the GTX 680, and all credit to them, they've actually done a pretty good job of it. 

While it trailed behind in most categories, the difference between the GTX 690 and GTX 680 2-way SLI was fairly small, between 1-4%, which is by virtue of the small GPU base clock difference between them. We also saw that that gap can be closed fairly easily, and actually surpassed, by overclocking the card. Just take extra precaution for good case cooling as the GTX 690 will certainly need it.

At exactly twice the price of a GTX 680 (USD$999 vs. USD$499) the GTX 690 is certainly targeted at those interested in a dual GTX 680 setup. All in all, the benefits of a smaller footprint, more stable system and lower power consumption should make the GTX 690 a better choice - not to forget, the possibility of quad-SLI with two GTX 690s for the truly extreme - but unfortunately, with supplies limited, it may not be possible for everyone to get their hands on a unit.

Another tidbit of information we came to know recently was that NVIDIA had strict rules to the card vendors to not slap any of their own labels anywhere on the card. While the complexity of the cooling solution of the these ubber high-end cards are so high that most vendors just sell the reference model as-is, this extra ruling would now mean that it doesn't really matter if you choose brand A over brand B because they won't even be differentiated by fancy sticks or labels from each of the respective brands.

Is AMD Down For The Count?

So has NVIDIA landed the knockout punch on AMD? Not yet. While our NVIDIA cards had the upper hand on most of our tests, AMD remained competitive throughout, and scored particularly well on the toughest test settings in our gaming benchmarks. This reflects the previous pattern we've seen of NVIDIA's GTX 680 scaling well across all tests, while AMD's Radeon HD 7970 starts to shine in more demanding situations.

Don't forget, AMD has yet to release their dual-GPU HD 7990. And now that NVIDIA has brought theirs out to play, you can expect AMD to retaliate soon. Until then, NVIDIA's claim as the best performing single graphics card will hold true.

Our articles may contain affiliate links. If you buy through these links, we may earn a small commission.