MSI N9600GT Hybrid Freezer

Introduction

Introduction

With Computex just around the corner, it's almost time for both ATI and NVIDIA to launch their next generation products. Which just means that the present generation of graphics cards are only going to become more affordable and if the prices we have seen on online retailers are of any indication, this has been going on for some time now. Most of the fiercest competition is obviously centered in the mid-range segment, where NVIDIA's GeForce 9600 GT clashes with ATI's Radeon HD 3800 series.

Even among the GeForce 9600 GT cards, there are many brands and models vying for the consumer dollar. Hence, vendors have been trying all kinds of ways to differentiate their products. MSI's newest attempt is to attach an unique cooler that has both 'active' and 'passive' elements, which simply means that the usual cooling fan found on this card can be switched off automatically if the card deems that the temperatures are cool enough. As if that's not sufficient to attract consumers, MSI has also doubled the memory to 1GB and done the usual overclocking to boost its performance. We'll see how that works out shortly but before that, here's a glimpse of the card and the specifications: