GeForce GTX 460 Roundup Part 2 - Mainstream Bonanza

Mainstream Bonanza

The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460’s unbeatable combination of performance and price means that it is the kingpin in the US$200 to US$250 price bracket. Nothing from ATI is even close to challenging it and is, quite easily, one of the best things to have come out from the green camp in a long, long time. So much so that anyone who is looking to spend US$200 on a decent graphics card cannot afford to overlook it.

We’ve already covered the GeForce GTX 460 extensively, in our full review and then in a later roundup article. And now, we are continuing our coverage of the GeForce GTX 460 with another five choice selections, this time from ECS, Gainward, Manli, MSI and Palit.

Here’s the full list of cards that we’ll be evaluating today:

• ECS GTX 460 Black
• Gainward GTX 460 Golden Sample GLH
• MSI N460GTX Hawk
• Palit GTX 460 Sonic Platinum
• Manli GeForce GTX 460

And without further ado, let's jump straight in and introduce our the first card in our roundup.

The ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black

Much like AMG’s Black line of super souped up Mercedes-Benzes, ECS’ GeForce GTX 460 Black is the company’s pimped out and flagship GeForce GTX 460. As such, it runs at a higher core clock speed of 765MHz, a respectable 90MHz bump compared to a reference card, and also higher memory clock speeds of 3700MHz DDR, a 100MHz DDR increase from a reference card’s 3600MHz DDR. To keep the card running cool, ECS has plonked a massive twin-fan, 2.5-slot Accelero Twin Turbo Pro cooler from cooling specialists Arctic Cooling (now known simply as Arctic).

The Gainward GeForce GTX 460 Golden Sample GLH

The Gainward GeForce GTX 460 Golden Sample GLH “Goes Like Hell” might be really compact, but it boasts one of the highest clock speeds we have seen on a GeForce GTX 460 right out of the box - a heady 800MHz at the core, 1600MHz at the shaders, and an equally impressive 4000MHz DDR at the memory. This should make it a close competitor against the reigning GTX 460 speed king - the Galaxy GeForce GTX 460 Super OC. However, despite its considerable clock speeds, Gainward has decided to go with a pretty basic cooler, hence it’ll be interesting to see what kind of temperatures this card will reach.

What’s also interesting is that unlike the usual twin DVI and mini-HDMI video output options we get on Fermi cards, Gainward has decided to be more practical and is offering two DVI ports, a single HDMI and VGA ports instead.

The Manli GeForce GTX 460

Of all the cards here, the Manli GeForce GTX 460 is unquestionably the plainest, sporting not only a reference cooler, but also reference clock speeds. Hopefully the cooler will be tuned to provide better cooling and overclocking.

The MSI N460GTX Hawk

After the MSI GTX 460 Cyclone, we now have the MSI N460GTX Hawk. The N460GTX Hawk is an improvement over the earlier seen Cyclone by having higher clock speeds and the more effective Twin Frozr II cooler. In terms of clock speeds, the N460GTX Hawk comes in at 780MHz at the core and 1560MHz at the shaders, a significant improvement over the Cyclone’s equivalent 728MHz and 1455MHz. Both cards’ memory clock speeds remains at 3600MHz DDR.

What’s also unique about the MSI N460GTX Hawk is that it is the first card to support what MSI calls “Triple Over-Voltage”, which lets users adjust core, memory and PLL voltage values. And MSI claims this card is able to reach an unbelievable 1GHz at the core by air-cooling alone. This is something we will have to see for ourselves. Stay tuned to our findings later in the article.

The Palit GTX 460 Sonic Platinum

Palit is the parent company of Gainward, and the Palit GTX 460 Sonic Platinum, is a carbon copy of aforementioned Gainward GTX 460 Golden Sample GLH. Like the Gainward card, the Palit GTX 460 Sonic Platinum has the same core, shader and memory clock speeds of 800MHz, 1600MHz and 4000MHz DDR respectively. The cooler is also identical save for the less different cover.

The Palit card also has the same twin DVI, single HDMI and VGA video output ports as the Gainward cards. The inclusion of the VGA port is new as previous Palit Fermi cards had a DisplayPort instead of a VGA port. Perhaps as a high-end mainstream card, Palit thought that users would find a VGA port more useful as opposed to a DisplayPort.

Test Setup

The cards will be tested using our high-end X58 system with the following specifications:

• Intel Core i7-975 (3.33GHz)
• Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD4P motherboard
• 3 x 1GB DDR3-1333 OCZ memory in triple-channel mode
• Seagate 7200.10 200GB SATA hard drive
• Windows 7 Ultimate

Clock speeds are often a good gauge of a card’s performance and we are expecting both the Gainward and Palit cards to come out tops as far as raw performance is concerned. We have also thrown in the super fast Galaxy GeForce GTX 460 Super OC to act as a speed benchmark.

Elsewhere, it’ll be interesting to see how the MSI N460GTX Hawk and ECS GTX 460 Black copes, especially were operating temperature and overclocking is concerned.

And finally, while we expect the Manli GeForce GTX 460 to struggle in terms of performance, we are hoping to see if Manli has made any optimizations to make their card run more efficiently than a reference one.

Here's a quick summary of the cards' clock speeds.

Here is the full list of cards tested and the driver versions used:

• ECS GTX 460 Black (ForceWare 258.96)
• Gainward GTX 460 Golden Sample GLH (ForceWare 258.96)
• MSI N460GTX Hawk (ForceWare 258.96)
• Palit GTX 460 Sonic Platinum (ForceWare 258.96)
• Manli GeForce GTX 460 (ForceWare 258.96)
• Galaxy GTX 460 Super OC (ForceWare 258.96)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 1GB GDDR5 (ForceWare 258.80)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 470 1280MB GDDR5 (ForceWare 257.21)
• ATI Radeon HD 5850 (Catalyst 10.6)

The list of benchmarks used are as follows:

• Futuremark 3DMark Vantage
• Crysis Warhead
• Far Cry 2
• Warhammer: Dawn of War 2
• Battlefield Bad Company 2
• "Heaven" from Unigine v1.0

3DMark Vantage Results

Much like we predicted, the Gainward and Palit cards came out tops amongst the five cards, and scored almost as high as the more costly GeForce GTX 470. However, they weren't able to outscore Galaxy's blazing fast GeForce GTX 460 Super OC. Coming slightly behind was the MSI N460GTX Hawk, followed by ECS' GeForce GTX 460 Black, and rounding up the pack was the Manli GeForce GTX 460.

Crysis Warhead & Far Cry 2 Results

Once more, the Gainward and Palit recorded nearly identical scores and were on a par with the Radeon HD 5850. Scoring just slightly lesser was MSI's N460GTX Hawk, which was about a frame off the pace compared to the Gainward and Palit cards. The ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black finished ahead of the Manli GeForce GTX 460, which was only as quick as a reference card.

It was more of the same on Far Cry 2 as the Gainward and Palit cards were once again neck to neck. And again, the two cards failed to challenge the Galaxy GeForce GTX 460 Super OC, which easily retains its position as the fastest GTX 460 we've ever tested. Slightly off the pace was the MSI N460GTX Hawk, followed by the ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black and finally the Manli GeForce GTX 460.

Dawn of War 2 & Battlefield Bad Company 2 Results

The Gainward and Palit cards share the same clock speeds and so managed to do identically well on Dawn of War 2, although we noted that they were somewhat off the pace compared to the Galaxy card this time round. Nevertheless, the two cards were still a good 5% faster than a reference GeForce GTX 460. The MSI card came slightly behind the two cards, whereas the ECS card once again found itself sandwiched between the MSI and Manli card.

There's no separating the Gainward and Palit cards on Bad Company 2 as they managed nearly identical frame rates and were a good 15% quicker than a reference card. The MSI N460GTX Hawk and ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black didn't do too badly also and were about 10% quicker than a stock card. With its reference clock speeds, the Manli card was only just about as quick as NVIDIA's own reference card.

Unigine "Heaven" Results

The Gainward and Palit card once again managed very similar frame rates, thanks to their identical clock speeds. The MSI N460GTX Hawk remains competitive, but is still no much for the Gainward and Palit cards. The ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black occupies a place on its own in the middle of the pack, whereas the Manli GeForce GTX 460 was the slowest of the five cards. That said, NVIDIA's Fermi cards are well suited for tessellation heavy applications, and we can see that even the Manli GeForce GTX 460 can give a Radeon HD 5850 a run for its money.

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

On S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat, we noticed the usual four distinct tiers of performance. The Gainward and Palit cards, by virtue of their aggressive clock speeds, came out tops amongst the five cards; while the MSI N460GTX Hawk was slightly behind; and further back in the ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black, which has rather tame clock speeds; and rounding up is the Manli GeForce GTX 460, which, disappointingly, only sports reference clocks.

Temperature

With its massive triple-slot cooler from Arctic, the ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black was our coolest card, recording a mere 49 degrees Celsius at load. The MSI N460GTX Hawk did impressively too with its tried-and-tested Twin Frozr II cooler, recording an equally outstanding 51 degress Celsius. And despite sporting a reference cooler, Manli has somehow managed to improve on its efficiency managed a respectable 61 degrees Celsius compared to a reference card's 67 degrees Celsius. And finally, great power comes at a price as the two quickest cards - Gainward and Palit - both recorded over 70 degrees Celsius, making it hotter than a reference card.

Power Consumption

The notable mentions here are the Gainward card, which recorded a slightly higher than expected power draw figure; and the Manli card, which did the opposite and had a power draw figure that was noticeably lower than NVIDIA's reference card. The rest of cards performed as we had expected.

Overclocking

The GeForce GTX 460 is an able overclocker and the five cards did reasonably well in this segment. The MSI N460GTX Hawk, with its "Military-Class' components, effective cooler, and Triple Over Voltage function was the best overclocker. Although we didn't manage to hit 1GHz at the core, we managed an equally impressive 950MHz. This gave us 8984 3DMarks, a considerable 16% more than even the GeForce GTX 470!

The ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black and its massive triple-slot cooler did well too as we successfully got it to run stably at 920MHz at the core and 4000MHz DDR, giving us 8732 3DMarks, a substantial improvement over its own stock readings.

The Palit wasn't that far behind, managing 910MHz at the core and 4200MHz DDR at the memory, giving 8731 3DMarks, a mere point behind the ECS card.

The Manli GeForce GTX 460 has reason to be proud of itself, managing to run quite comfortably at 880MHz at the core and 4000MHz DDR.

Surprisingly, the Gainward GeForce GTX 460 Golden Sample GLH ran out of puff the earliest, calling it a day at only 860MHz at the core and 4100MHz DDR.

Conclusion

All in all, our selection of five GeForce GTX 460 cards performed commendably. But before we offer our analysis of the cards, here’s a quick summary of their clock speeds and prices, followed by the breakdown of scores.  

When raw performance is concerned, the Gainward and Palit duo are unrivaled thanks to their aggressive clock speeds. Both cards are super quick out of the box and are fast enough to outperform the Radeon HD 5850 and even challenge the more powerful and costly GeForce GTX 470.

However, its outstanding graphics performance has come at the price of increased heat and power consumption, because despite their custom coolers, both cards ran even hotter than NVIDIA’s own reference version. Also, we noted that their maximum power draw figure is noticeably higher than its competitors.

Considering that both cards are identically specced, the Palit GeForce GTX 460 Sonic Platinum is the one we would go for because of its attractive price. At US$230, it is only a tad more costly than reference versions and is markedly more affordable than the Gainward card which costs around £180, which translates to around US$270, thus making it very costly. As such, bearing in mind the Palit’s performance and price, the card also gets our Most Value for Money award.

Performance-wise, the MSI N460GTX Hawk was equally capable, but was unable to keep up with the Gainward and Palit cards because of its lower clock speeds. However, it makes up with its outstanding overclocking performance, achieving an incredible 950MHz at the core and 4000MHz DDR at the memory, and so it gets our Most Overclockable Award. This is testament to the technologies that MSI have implemented on this card to make it so efficient. We were also very impressed with its Twin Frozr II cooler, which managed to keep the card running at only 51 degrees Celsius at load, a tremendous improvement over a reference card’s 67 degrees Celsius.

But if a super cool card is your priority then look no further than ECS’ GeForce GTX 460 Black. The dual-fan, triple-slot custom cooler from Arctic was able to maintain the card at a breezy 49 degrees Celsius at load, which is certainly jaw-dropping. And although the card was no match for the Gainward, Palit and MSI cards, it is no slouch in the performance department either, as it could comfortably outpace a reference GeForce GTX 460. However, the massive cooler on the ECS card comes at a price, as it is one of the more costly cards at US$260.

The Manli GeForce GTX 460 is as plain as vanilla and with its reference clock speeds, it doesn’t offer anything extra on the performance front. However, it is cooler to run and it offers decent overclocking potential.

In the end, it was a close fight between the value for money Palit GeForce GTX 460 Sonic Platinum and the technologically-advanced MSI N460GTX Hawk, and it was difficult to determine which is a better card.

If you don’t mind spending more, you cannot go wrong with the MSI N460GTX Hawk. Out of the box, it might not be as quick as the Palit card, but it will certainly overclock beyond the Palit’s capabilities. What’s more, it is also markedly cooler to run, and therefore, is the better all-rounder.

On the other hand, buyers on a tight budget will definitely appreciate what the Palit GeForce GTX 460 Sonic Platinum offers - no fuss, blistering performance right out of the box.

<img height="203" width="280" class="caption" title="The MSI N460GTX Hawk " src="https://cassette.sphdigital.com.sg/image/hardwarezone/5b63dd31b903ba34c741cd2d97af9a7ff9d4c472276d26247f49345e326ab9d7" alt="">
<img height="206" width="280" class="caption" title="The ECS GeForce GTX 460 Black " src="https://cassette.sphdigital.com.sg/image/hardwarezone/5f7c7419184260fe4f48cf6d86d2df691c868786bb23a4ff0996e13cb9c4512b" alt="">
<img height="220" width="280" src="https://cassette.sphdigital.com.sg/image/hardwarezone/6e323382651bd6e49d6e49004d6145ffc3257fcbf741c6a11a739e32161837fb" title="The Manli GeForce GTX 460 " alt="">

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