9600GT Again? I normally wouldn’t take on another 9600GT review as I’ve done that quite a few times over, however this one’s was a Low Power and Low Profile version – so I thought it to be pretty interesting.
The Appearance
The card comes in Galaxy’s signature blue PCB and sticker over the heatsink, and it is both short in length and in height. This makes the card ideal for smaller casing.
Just how short is it? Here’s the card in comparison to a Tesco club card, which is based on the standard size for cards.
Solid caps and heatsink. Take note also of the copper based for the heatsink.
The heatsink is securely fastened at the back, however this might pose a problem on boards that are have PCI-E x16 slot placed in close proximity to the DIMM slots, in my case I found that the heatsink holding piece blocks the DIMM clip. Generally I blame this on the board design than the card itself, I’ve always disliked boards with PCI-E that are close to DIMM slots, and also those that place SATA ports near the PCI-E slot too.
The card relies on a small fan, and with it comes with DVI and HDMI output.
The Bundle
– The card
– Installation CD and guide
– Brackets (regular and short version)
– DVI to VGA dongle
Card Details
Here’s a summarized detail of the card.
More details at the official product page, it looks very similar to another one that’s not the low-power version. Note the PCI-E power connector at the end of the card.
Basically the card is a slower version of 9600GT (Reference) with 600Mhz GPU clock, 900Mhz Memory clock and 1500Mhz Shader clock while the regular versions come with 650 MHz GPU clock and 1625 MHz Shader clock.
Test Setup
The computer setup used for this review.
| Processor | Intel Coreâ„¢2 Duo E7200 @ 3.6ghz |
| RAM | Kingston HyperX 4GB Dual-channel Kit |
| Motherboard | Jetway X-Blue P45 |
| Cooler | Sunbeamtech Core-Contact Freezer Heatsink 92mm |
| Monitor | 20″ Dell Ultra-sharp Wide-screen LCD |
| Power Supply | Gigabyte Odin GT 550w |
| Operating System | Windows Vista Home Basic 32bit |
| Driver Version | Forceware 190.38 |
The Performance
For a fair comparison, I’ve placed the benchmarks from the HD4670 and HD4770.
Reason being that the 9600GT is priced between the HD4670 and the HD4770, hence comparing between them would give a good picture of the performance level.
World In Conflict
Graphic Detail : Maximum @ 1680×1050
| Card | Average |
| Galaxy Geforce 9600GT | 22 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4670 | 16 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4770 | 23 |
Company Of Heroes : Opposing Fronts
Graphic Detail : Maximum @ 1680×1050
| Card | Average |
| Galaxy Geforce 9600GT | 26.7 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4670 | 23 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4770 | 46.9 |
Lost Planet : Extreme Condition
Graphic Detail : Maximum at 1680 x 946
| Card | Snow (Average) | Cave (Average) |
| Galaxy Geforce 9600GT | 31.2 | 43.4 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4670 | 28.9 | 21.8 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4770 | 37.6 | 48.2 |
Crysis
Graphic Detail : Maximum @ 1680×1050
| Card | Average |
| Galaxy Geforce 9600GT | 6.85 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4670 | 7.95 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4670 | 12.87 |
H.A.W.X.
Graphic Detail : Maximum @ 1680×1050, not using DX10.1 for mode.
| Card | Average |
| Galaxy Geforce 9600GT | 29 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4670 | N/A |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4770 | 38 |
Furmark
Graphic Detail : Maximum @ 1680×1050
| Card | Average |
| Galaxy Geforce 9600GT | 14 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4670 | N/A |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4770 | 20 |
Operating Temperature
Furmark was used for graphic card stressing.
| Card | Idle (°C) | Load (°C) | Stress (°C) |
| Galaxy Geforce 9600GT | 45 | 60 | 73 |
Readings were taken when ambient temperature was around 23°C.
– Load, Furmark was run for 1 minute at 1680×1050 with 4xAA.
– Stress, Furmark was run under the Stress Test mode for 5 minutes.
I must say that I’m impressed by the temperature, seeing how compact is the cooler itself. The low-powered nature of the card helps.
Power Consumption
Please note that the numbers below indicate the wattage for the entire system, not the graphic card alone.
| System Power Consumption | Idle (w) | Load (w) |
| Galaxy Geforce 9600GT | 42 | 93 |
| Sapphire Radeon HD4770 | 56 | 121 |
Readings taken with Gigabyte’s P-Tuner software.
Unfortunately I do not have a regular 9600GT for comparison BUT I think the low-power consumption HD4770 is a decent comparison. Looks good here, low power consumption it is.
Conclusion
I am really tempted now to acquire another unit for SLI-ing on one of my rigs.
Basically, this card is a little faster than the HD4670 while both are good for low power consumption.
The card retails at around RM 320, it sacrifices a little on performance for the low power advantage, with the low profile being a plus.
(If you’re looking for something low profile, decent GPU power and of course, want something of low power consumption that doesn’t burden your already not-so-great power supply.)
Its hard to find low-profile card nowadays. Or maybe i wasn’t aware? 😛
Do you know where I can get one in the USA for under $120?
Just wondering
Where is the SLI bridge connector? 🙂
by soft-SLI instead of hardware SLI bridge..
find more at : http://www.galaxytechus.com/usa/where.aspx
like:
http://www.amazon.com/
http://www.bestbuy.com/
http://www.buy.com
http://www.compusa.com
http://www.newegg.com
http://www.tigerdirect.com
etc… … haha
Yea, yea, I know all of those places sell Galaxy products, but only BestBuy carries this one in particular and they have it priced at $140 + shipping. Are there any alternatlives to purchase this specific LowProfile, LowPower (600Mhz GPU clock) product?
Would u say this is the best low profile low power graphic card in the market???Ive been scouring thru ur articled finding the best lp lp graphic card..i m looking for 58 units…may i please trouble u for their [email protected]
Cheers mate,keep up the good work
u there?
Yes I’m here. 😀
Don’t you have any seller around you that sells such cards or similar? 🙂
i’m not sure if this is the best in the world but it certainly it’s the best I’ve come by.
Been to lowyat..noóne heard about the card…instead the keep pushing me a high powered card even though i need a LOW POWER LOW PROFILE card…Thanks for ur help buddy
i saw one seller list it on lyn, but he said permanently out of stock. i’m also looking for this card. but due to the hardship, i’ll go with radeon hd 5570.
ENGT 240 doesnt look bad either does it…
where can you get gt 240?
try Jason at IT hypermart PJ Digimall..nice helpfull fella unlike other places ive been to.
pj digimall? how to get there. lowyat no sell anymore? saw it at newegg, but they don’t ship to malaysia. llool.
will this be able to run with only 220 watts of power?
I bought three of these cards – I was shocked at how much HEAT they produce – its absolutely critical that the fans work all the time (there noisy). Anyway, the fans on two of my cards stopped working and the heat cooked the cards. Would not even bother replacing them with the same card.
My advice – look for another card!
@ apple, I don’t think 220 watts of power would work – 300 is the minimum recommended specification (and I imagine the requisite too).
I’m happy to hear I’m not the only one who has that problem with this board. How quickly this board augments to around 100C under load is unsettling, considering 105C is the maximum operating temperature. But I’ve never let it go upwards of 93C, even at 100% fan speed, and I know it won’t stop there, but even that is too hot for me and would certainly curtail the lifespan of the card to be ran at that temperature frequently, which it reaches in around 3 minutes under full stress load for me (:-/). I don’t think the fan/PCB used on this is very good at handling the heat of the 2+ year old G96 core, and it does sound whinier the higher speed the fan’s at. Baffling how the original 9600GT would run much cooler yet draws more power and qualifies for less of a low power/profile card, but I guess it’s because of the design. I bought this card over a year ago (Summer of 2009) and have been too afraid to ever let it run at full load for long because I’m scared it will overheat and die. But perhaps a better cooling system for this LP board would have rectified everything.
See, I also tried downclocking it 2 fold on all three clocks (shader, memory, and core), and even that didn’t reduce the heat and the time it takes to get hot by much at all. The only way I can play games with this or just run 3D apps is to use very low resolutions, turn of FSAA/AF, and cap the frame-rate somehow to at least 60FPS, if not lower. That way the card is not under full computational load, so the temperature remains around the 60C-70C range instead and the fan speed itself doesn’t even reach 100% (in my experience). Very cheap, but at least it works. But I don’t think anyone bought this card to do that, even if it’s just a bit slower than the reference 9600GT. Of course, I’m sure this is old news by now, so unless you have a well working 9600GT LP card (or even two of them for those who have SLI configs), I too would advise to look for another card, even if you want a LP upgrade.
turn off*
An update… I was able to get the card to have a 68C maximum by lowering the clock speeds by like 6x. :/ Well, it’s better than nothing, but it’s certainly not qualifying for a 9600 GT at that point. Though it does affirm the belief that the fan/PCB is too small to handle the G96 core (or that some cards/fans of this ilk are just faulty).
However, the card does not necessarily work properly at that point, as I believe the frame buffer doesn’t work correctly – it says it’s out of VRAM at higher resolutions in super low clock speeds. I suppose that’s the sacrifice, but I believe at around 400 MHz (for the core), 100 MHz (for the memory clock), and 1000 MHz (for the shader clock) that it would be able to reach 2560×1600 again and maintain a safe temperature maximum (below 80C, I think). Not acceptable at all, I think, but fascinating nevertheless.
Nevermind. The card’s fan died on me with the ball bearings going. :/ As many a review has stated, the card’s fan does not handle the PCB of the 9600 GT well.
My card died already too. 😛 I did face the slowdown of the fan as well, that was before the demise of the card.
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