Gigabyte debuts new GeForce GTX 970 Twin Turbo 4GB
Gigabyte has released a new version of the GeForce GTX 970, the GeForce GTX 970 Twin Turbo 4GB. The card utilizes a modified blower-style cooler that draws air in from both sides and is suited for use in SLI configurations because it vents heat out the back of the card.
Image Source: Gigabyte
The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 is a great card for the money. Despite being released almost a year ago, the card continues to deliver competitive performance in most modern games at 1080p resolutions. Perhaps that’s why Gigabyte has chosen to release a new version of the GeForce GTX 970 called the Twin Turbo 4GB, in order to milk to graphics card for all it’s worth.
The card features a redesigned blower-style cooler with Gigabyte’s Twin Turbo fan. You’re probably wondering where the “Twin” moniker comes from if there’s just a single fan, and that’s because this particular fan is capable of bi-directional airflow. That is, it draws air from both sides of the fan into the GPU and exhausts it out the back of the case.
Image Source: Gigabyte
This is possible because the Twin Turbo fan is exposed on both the top and bottom of the card, unlike NVIDIA’s reference card where the top is usually comprised entirely of a solid PCB. The blower-style cooler also means that the card is especially suited to SLI configurations. Most dual- and triple-fan coolers vent heat from the top of the card, which can have a negative impact on thermal performance when the cards are stacked on top of each other.
Image Source: Gigabyte
You can look at it as an upgraded version of NVIDIA’s reference blower-style cooler. Gigabyte is claiming a 24% increase in airflow and a 29% improvement in cooling performance over the reference design.
In addition, the card used Gigabyte’s Ultra Durable VGA design, which supposedly allows lower temperatures and higher overclocks. The copper inner layer of the PCB has been doubled for more effective heat dissipation, while the use of higher quality capacitors and chokes ensure more stable overclocking.
The GeForce GTX 970 Twin Turbo 4GB ships with two modes, OC mode and Gaming mode. The former is the higher clocked one, with a base clock of 1101MHz and boost clock of 1241MHz. Gaming mode clocks are slightly lower, with a 1076MHz base clock and 1216MHz boost clock. The effective memory clock remains at the 7010MHz reference clock.
Gigabyte recommends that you have at least a 400 watt power supply unit in your system to run the card. The card runs off a single 8-pin PCIe power connector, a change from the two 6-pin connectors on the reference design.
Source: Gigabyte via Tom’s Hardware
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