The new graphics card is packed into an upright box that shows basic product information on the face side and detailed info on the back.

 

There is one more box made from thick cardboard inside the external wrapping. The graphics card is fixed within a piece of foam rubber. The following accessories are included into the box:

 

Well, tastes differ, and gamers’ tastes differ, too. The card measures 267x111x32 millimeters.

As opposed to its predecessor GeForce GTX 280, the GeForce GTX 285 has no memory chips on the reverse side of the PCB and no cap above them.

The card has the same interfaces as its predecessor. It plugs into a PCI Express x16 2.0 slot and is equipped with two dual-link DVI-I connectors and one S-Video output. There is a vent in the card’s mounting bracket for the hot air to be exhausted out of the system case.

There are connectors for building SLI (or 3-way SLI) configurations in the top part of the card’s PCB.

 

A 6-pin power connector is now installed instead of an 8-pin one because the GeForce GTX 285 has lower power requirements due to the thinner GPU tech process. According to the specs, the reference GeForce GTX 285 has a peak power consumption of 183W (53W lower than that of the GeForce GTX 280). A 550W or higher power supply is recommended for a computer with this graphics card.

The card’s PCB differs greatly from the GeForce GTX 280. Nvidia’s engineers had had to make the PCB design simpler and cheaper in order to reduce the manufacturing cost and they succeeded.

Besides moving all the memory to the face side of the card, the engineers revised its power section:

The 55nm GT200-350 chip was manufactured in Taiwan on the 48th week of 2008.

 

 

Cooling System

The new card’s cooling system has not changed much over the mentioned GeForce GTX 280.

It consists of an aluminum base with a copper core and six 6mm copper heat pipes.

A heatsink consisting of thin aluminum ribs is soldered to the base.

 

XFX GeForce GTX 295 2x896MB (GX-295N-HHFF)

Package and Accessories

The second card from XFX comes in a box that is larger but designed in the same way as the box of the above-discussed GeForce GTX 285.

 

 

 

PCB Design and Functionality

The GeForce GTX 295 looks most impressive. It is a heavy, solid brick measuring 267x111x32 millimeters. The face side of the card is covered with a rubberized casing, and it is a pleasure just to hold it in your hands.

The reverse side has no casing, and we can make sure there are no memory chips on it.

The card is equipped with a PCI Express 2.0 interface, one HDMI port and two DVI-I connectors installed on one of the two PCBs.

There is a vent grid in the mounting bracket for exhausting the hot air out of the system case but some of the air goes into the gap between the PCBs and stays within the computer.

There is a MIO connector on one of the PCBs. It allows combining two GeForce GTX 295 cards in a Quad SLI subsystem. Two power connectors and an S/PDIF header are located at the opposite end of the PCBs.

 

So, the GeForce GTX 295 is powered by one 8-pin and one 6-pin connector and has a peak power draw of 289W. Nvidia recommends a 680W or higher PSU for a system with a GeForce GTX 295. For comparison, the peak power draw of the Radeon HD 4870 X2 is specified to be 260W.

When the plastic casing is removed, we can see that the PCBs face each other.

It was easy to take the card apart: I only had to undo the screws on both sides of it and unglue the GPUs from the cooling system.

 

There is a cutout at the back of the PCB for the cooler’s blower to get fresh air from.

In the front part of each PCB there is a NVIO chip. An nForce 200 chip, responsible for SLI mode, can be found there, too.

The PCBs are connected with two flexible bridges.

There are matching marks and numbers at the ends of each bridge and on the PCBs for you to connect everything properly. Otherwise, the card won’t start up or won’t work in SLI mode.

The GPUs are both revision B3. Their manufacture dates differ by one week only: 48th and 47th week of 2008. The third lines of the markings differ greatly but their meaning is only clear to Nvidia’s engineers.

 

 

 

Cooling System

The XFX GeForce GTX 295 has a dual cooling system with a blower that drives air in between the halves of the heatsinks.

 

 

Testbed and Methods

The graphics cards were benchmarked in a closed system case with the following configuration:

• Mainboards:
  
  
  
  • ASUS P6T Deluxe (Intel X58 Express), LGA 1366, BIOS 1102
    
  • DFI LANPARTY DK X48-T2RS (Intel X48), LGA 775, BIOS 10/03/2008
  
  
• CPUs:
  
  
  
  • Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9650, 3.0GHz, 1.15V, L2 2 x 6MB, 333MHz x 4 FSB, (Yorkfield, C0)
    
  • Intel Core i7-920, 2.67 GHz, 1.25 V, L2 4 x 256 KB, L3 8 MB (Bloomfield, C0)
  
  
• CPU cooler: Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme (2 Thermalright TR-FDB fans at 1030 RPM)
  
• Thermal interface: Arctic Silver 5
  
• System memory:
  
• DDR2 2 x 1GB Corsair Dominator TWIN2X2048-9136C5D (Spec: 1142 MHz / 5-5-5-18 / 2.1 V)
  
• DDR2 2 x 1GB CSX DIABLO CSXO-XAC-1200-2GB-KIT (Spec: 1200 MHz / 5-5-5-16 / 2.4 V);
  
• DDR3 3 x 1 GB Corsair DOMINATOR TWIN3X2048-1800C7DFIN (Spec: 1800 MHz / 7-7-7-20 / 2.0 V)
  
• Graphics cards:
  
  
  
  • XFX GeForce GTX 285 1024MB 648/1476/2484 MHz
    
  • XFX GeForce GTX 295 2x896MB 576/1242/1998 MHz
  
  
• Disk subsystem: Western Digital VelociRaptor (300GB, SATA-II, 10000 RPM, 16MB cache, NCQ)
  
• HDD silencer and cooler: Scythe Quiet Drive for 3.5-inch HDD
  
• Optical drive: Samsung SH-S183L DVD-burner (SATA-II)
  
• System case: Antec Twelve Hundred (five 120mm TriCool case fans at 1100RPM; one 200-mm fan at 400RPM)
  
• Control and monitoring panel: Zalman ZM-MFC2
  
• Power supply: Zalman ZM1000-HP 1000W (with a default 140 mm fan)
  
• Monitor: 24-inch BenQ FP241W

Performance

3DMark 2006

We’ve got very interesting results in 3DMark06. The GeForce GTX 295 is clearly more CPU-dependent than the GeForce GTX 285 just as we might have expected. The dual-processor card adds to the overall performance even in the hardest graphics mode when the CPU or the whole platform is changed or overclocked. The performance growth is nearly linear in the easy mode (1280x960 without FSAA and AF). Then, at the default frequencies the Core i7 is faster than the Core 2 Quad and increases the gap even more when they are both overclocked to the same frequency.

3DMark Vantage

3DMark Vantage refused to output the total score for the resolution of 1280x960, so I will only publish the results of the GPU tests and the full results in the Extreme mode.

3DMark Vantage being a heavier test, we can only see it depend on the platform’s speed with the GeForce GTX 295 – and only in the Performance mode. The GeForce GTX 285 is indifferent to the platform performance altogether.

 

World in Conflict

Both cards react eagerly to the acceleration of the platform in World of Conflict. Of course, this is more conspicuous with the GeForce GTX 295 than with the GeForce GTX 285. The Core i7 is astonishing again, being far faster than the 4GHz Core 2 Quad.

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is not a new game but its speed is limited by the graphics subsystem in the FSAA + AF mode. Moreover, the faster GeForce GTX 295 loses to the GeForce GTX 285 at 1920x1200. Considering that SLI technology works quite normally in this application, I can suppose that the dual-processor card just lacks graphics memory since the GeForce GTX 285 has an extra 128 megabytes.

Comparing the platforms in the easier graphics mode, the Core i7 is faster than its predecessor at the default as well as overclocked frequencies. The GeForce GTX 285 becomes indifferent to the change of the CPU at 1920x1200 without FSAA and AF whereas the GeForce GTX 295 really needs a fast CPU for this game.

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare MP

The graphics cards react well to the acceleration of the whole platform in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, too. It is the first time that the Core i7 920 is somewhat slower than the Core 2 Quad QX9650 at the default frequencies, but only with the GeForce GTX 285 graphics card. We don’t see the same thing with the more advanced GeForce GTX 295 – the platform with the newer CPU is ahead in every mode. Each graphics card delivers a comfortable frame rate in every test mode but the GeForce GTX 295 shows better scalability than the GeForce GTX 285.

Unreal Tournament 3

Unreal Tournament 3 produces interesting numbers. Despite the high frame rate in each mode, the GeForce GTX 295 shows excellent scalability on the Core i7 platform. Although such a high frame rate has no practical value, the Core i7 enjoys an impressive 22% advantage over the overclocked Core 2 Quad.

 

Devil May Cry 4

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky

Crysis

I have the same comment for all the three previous games: the graphics cards are not limited by the speed of the CPU or platform at large. The frame rate depends on the graphics card’s performance only.

Far Cry 2

The GeForce GTX 295 shows good scalability at 1280x960 without FSAA and AF on the Core i7 platform. We don’t see that in the other modes. The results of the GeForce GTX 285 are interesting because the Core i7 is somewhat slower than the Core 2 Quad (I rechecked this illogical fact but to the same effect).

 

X3: Terran Conflict

Save for one test mode, the graphics cards both show excellent scalability on the two platforms in this game. The Core i7 beats its predecessor at the default as well as overclocked frequencies.

Left 4 Dead

You have to manually specify the AFR2 rendering method in the driver in order to enable SLI mode in this game:

Unfortunately, we didn’t do that for our comparative review of CrossFire and SLI technologies. Hopefully, this problem will be corrected in the next version of the driver by means of a special settings profile. Here are the results:

The GeForce GTX 295 shows good performance scalability in Left 4 Dead until the resolution of 1920x1200 in the high-quality graphics mode. The GeForce GTX 285 is almost not limited by the platform at 1920x1200 in the low-quality graphics mode. The newer processor and faster memory wins in the competition between the Core 2 Quad QX9650 and Core i7.

Lost Planet: Colonies

The graphics cards are largely indifferent to the change of platform and CPU overclocking in this game. The only exception is that the GeForce GTX 295 delivers a higher average speed in the first scene of the test at 1280x960 without FSAA and AF.

Cryostasis: Sleep of Reason

The GeForce GTX 295 accelerates on the Core i7 platform at 1280x960. There is nothing interesting in the other test modes.

 

Summary Diagrams

First of all, I suggest that you take a look at the advantage of the dual-processor GeForce GTX 295 over the fastest single-processor graphics card GeForce GTX 285. The results are shown for the overclocked Core i7 platform.

Since these two diagrams compare fast graphics cards, I guess it would be correct to evaluate them by the least CPU-dependent modes, i.e. at high resolutions and with high graphics quality settings. For example, the GeForce GTX 295 has an average advantage of 47.5% over the GeForce GTX 285 at 1920x1200 and in the FSAA mode, but the gap is smaller (33.5%) at 1280x960. Anyway, you can see that the dual-processor card is far faster despite its lower frequencies and smaller amount of graphics memory.

The next two diagrams compare the platform with a Core i7 920 processor overclocked to 4GHz (and with 3GB of DDR3 memory clocked at 1.6GHz) and the platform with a Core 2 Quad QX9650 overclocked to 4GHz (with 4GB of DDR2 at 1GHz). The results are shown for the GeForce GTX 295 card.

It is logical: the easier the game is for modern graphics cards, the higher the performance growth from the change of the platform, and vice versa.

 

Power Consumption

I performed the power consumption test with a multifunctional Zalman ZM-MFC2 panel. This panel measures the overall power draw of the computer (without the monitor) rather than of a single component. There were two test modes: 2D (Word and Web surfing) and 3D (a double run of the DM-ShangriLa demo from Unreal Tournament 3 at 1920x1200 with 8x FSAA and 16x anisotropic filtering). I chose Unreal Tournament 3 because it can utilize all of the CPU’s four physical cores, which is not a typical capability of 3D games as yet. Here are the results:

It turns out that platforms with a GeForce GTX 295 consume about 80W more under load than the same platforms with a GeForce GTX 285. Comparing platforms with different CPUs (and mainboards and memory), the Core i7 920 consumes about 40W more than the Core 2 Quad QX9650 at the default frequency as well as at 4GHz. The difference is smaller in 2D mode but the newer platform still has higher power consumption.

 

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