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NVIDIA Kepler GeForce GTX 680 Video Card Review @ [H]ardOCP

Well, looks like AMD won't be doing much good before they've got a Turbo boost on their own, since auto-overclocking widely turns the results Nvidia's way. Will be interesting to see how long it takes them to come up with a similar concept.

It's a rather impressive card though. Surprised at how it did so much better than the 7970 at lower resolution. Nvidia's always felt better to me at sub 1600p, but this large a gap was unexpected. That said, I think we might have seen a bit too few games reviewed to properly discover whether it'll be limited by the memory capacity at higher resolutions.

Still, finally something to drive prices down. I expect the overclocked 7970 to hold up fairly well against the 680 and beat it at higher resolutions, but even so the 7970 should probably come down 100$ in price.
 
Digital Viper-X- said:
One question, which is most likely related to your next review, is it possible to do surround on 2 cards still? (Using DVI only?) or is it limited to 1 card now?
Click to expand...

I'm just speculating here, but I don't see why not. Just SLI the second card but keep all your monitors hooked up to card 1.

I see it as a huge advantage over AMD that NV allows 3-monitor hookups using 2xDVI and HDMI. DP adapters are a huge pain.
 
Impressive review. I particularly like the adaptive VSync feature. I think the dynamic clocking is going to have interesting effects when it comes to SLI. And perhaps I'm missing something, but it appears that you can't overclock; instead you have to change the maximum temperature or improve the cooling system.

Looking at the tests, it seems that the 7970 will better the 680 when standard overclocks are applied.

I'm looking forward to seeing a [H] article testing comparative overclocking and multiple GPU performance.
 
Seems like a nice card.

The performance is very similar to the 7970, so there is no slam dunk here one way or another, but I am really impressed with some of the advanced features.

Like their dynamic overclocking whatchamacallit.

Set the target FPS to 60, and it will dynamically underclock itself to meet that framerate at the best power use and temps, and when needed clock itself up dynamically. This is effing brilliant, and should cut down on noise levels. I wish someone had thought of this earlier!

Adaptive vsync is an awesome feature as well.

Now all I desire out of a video card maker is to make use of custom mix and match screen resolutions and orientations possible in a surround/eyefinity group.

I fear that in a OC to OC head to head battle with the 7970 it will lose on raw performance, seeing how much of an OC beast the 7970 is, but based on these cool features it may just be worth it either way.

I may just have to pick up one of these.
 
Brent_Justice said:
I posted this in another thread, and I want to post it up front right now to head off any questions.

Just keep in mind, as Kyle as already stated, we put a lot of work into it for what's there, and we have tons more planned in separate articles to flesh out specific features and testing so they get more attention and better focus from us. We can often do more in separate articles, rather than cramming it all into one big article at launch. Much much more to come.

We will look at SLI performance in its own article. I will then look at GPU Boost/Overclocking and Adaptive VSYNC in its own article. We will cover these things in more detail, just give us the time to properly look at them.
Click to expand...

Brent,
Excellent. Always informative and enjoyable to read your GPU articles. I look forward to the follow up articles on SLI, VSYNC, and GPU Boost.

P
 
I have mixed feelings on the GTX680

On one hand I'm impressed that a card that was supposed to replace the 560Ti can manage to take on the 7970.

On the other hand. This card was supposed to be under $300 bucks, but since its so good it carries a higher price tag.
 
Reality said:
Not a chance in hell AMD drops their $550-570 card to $400 3 months after release. I'll eat my mouse if that happens, they're gonna just have to suck it up for a while until they feel it's feasible to drop their prices. I'd be pissed if I were a 7970 owner and they dropped the price by $150 3 months after buying the card
Click to expand...

My last response to this might have been a bit crass as noted. But I did want to get back to this post. When has this not happened over and over again in the competitive computer electronic environment? Also this wouldn't be a surprise, just for everybody that talked about the high price of the 7970, there was three posts explaining, that the 7970 was priced against its current competition and not future ones that we had no idea where it stood. That once Nvidia released it new series expect AMD to reevaluate its pricing based on new competition.

It doesn't make sense for AMD not to change its pricing, now that it knows where it sits at least compared to the 680. Expect another change if 670 launches and beats it or nears it in price.

This is a great day in the computer adapter market. It should celebrated that not only is it faster, and cheaper then the pricing of its nearest competition, that by being that way, it will also force a pricing change on other products, for the better. There has always been an earlier adopter fee, and the 1% of the market that would spend $550-$600 on a card got roughly top of the line, current generation performance, three months ahead of everyone else, for a $150 mark up. For some people it was worth it, for everybody else, they should have heeded the words of the sensible people out there and held out.
 
The EVGA's a KR, though it does seem to have a 3 yr warranty which isn't too bad.

I've recently moved to a Corsair 550D and wouldn't mind going back to a card that doesn't spew all over the CPU, haha!

Gonna wait it out a few days and wait for some deals! Wouldn't mind a triple slot external exhaust.
 
Once again, awesome review dudes :) The dynamic clocking is a brilliant idea, as Zarathustra noted, but may become a burden for those with 120mhz/3D setups. 3D still being a gimmick, it's a damn awesome move by nVidia.

I didn't expect it to perform that well with the res cranked up but this card seems just as good as the 7970 at multi-monitor setups despite having 1GB lower vRAM. I think the only question here would be how long will that 2GB be viable in those high res scenarios down the line as the progression towards hogging up graphics cards resources becomes ever more frequent.

couple of reviews for comparisons sake

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/nvidia-geforce-gtx-680.html

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5699/nvidia-geforce-gtx-680-review

The gaming performance is awesome, unfortunately it seems they've sacrificed openGL/directcompute performance as a result. The smaller die size is probably the biggest win here
 
I noticed a lot of questions about screen tearing, but I didn't see any mention of using a 120Hz display for 2D testing. Have you guys considered this (obviously not for high resolution, but for 1080p)? Or do you cover this when looking at 3D performance?

I can imagine situations where having more than 60 FPS would be preferable having higher IQ, especially in faster paced games like BF3.

Or does it not really make much of a difference? Because performance would be so high anyway, being limited to 1080p.
 
excellent review! looks like it's time to upgrade. 'been waiting for nvsurround on just one card...

also: typo.

last sentence, second-to-last paragraph, last page: "NVIDIA’s GeForece GTX 680 has delivered a more efficient GPU, lower in TDP, that is better or competitive in performance, at a lower price."
 
I'm looking forward to this card when I get my hands on one. I really like the power consumption of this card especially since I only have a 750w power supply
 
Stoly said:
I have mixed feelings on the GTX680

On one hand I'm impressed that a card that was supposed to replace the 560Ti can manage to take on the 7970.

On the other hand. This card was supposed to be under $300 bucks, but since its so good it carries a higher price tag.
Click to expand...

and?

something has to cover the R&D costs + the failed and continuing R&D costs of what should of been the GTX 580 replacement. not to mention keeping the share holders happy. but quite frankly at this point i'm more then happy the GK110 failed, i really do hope the GTX 680 succeeds even though i probably won't be buying one and that it makes Nvidia realize they don't need to constantly release these power hungry flag ship cards (gtx 480/580/590/295/280/9800GX2/8800GTX).
 
Very nice! Will wait for the factory OC'ed better cooling solution models to hit the market before purchasing :).
 
NEED OVERCLOK RESULTS! lol.

With how close the cards are @ stock we really need to see how well the 680 clocks since we know the 7970 overclocks like a champ. If the 680 doesn't overclock well the 7970 could still be the better card.
 
Could [H]ardforum post some graphs of the vram usage at 5760x1080?

I constantly exceeded 2.7 GB (2.8GB at times) on my 3-way GTX 580s w/3GB of ram, which I just sold off in anticipation of the GTX 680s. But that 2 GB ram limit really has me concerned, especially after seeing what happened with vram limits with my previous 2-way 470s with only 1.2 GB of ram - the system would play nicely at 50 to 60 FPS, and then drop to the 20s at times, then back up to 50s - just like the graphs here show for the single card GTX 680 at 5760x1080.

I'm wondering if it is bumping up against the vram limit with the Ultra bitmap settings.
 
5760x1200 YES! Love to see that resolution in the review, great job [H]!!!

Honestly wasn't expecting it to do that well at that resolution with 2gb.

When do the OC vs OC test come. and please do 5760x1200 again.

Keep up the great work, you guys rock!
 
Months later and the same performance once in the higher resolutions in majority of new games. Something crazy is going on with Skyrim or the 580 has some insane unlocked potential.

Price is nice though, gotta love that.

Must see OC results though, I'm guessing there won't be much OC headroom on the 680 but the MSI 7970 they were able to up the AA level on the OC'ed card in BF3.

And looking at some other reviews, any chance of getting Crysis and Civ 5 tossed in?
 
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I expect the 7970 will drop to $450 which would make it more attractive. There's really no reason for it to drop much further. The performance difference between it and the 680 isn't that large.
 
It's easy to get caught in the trap of "chasing the rainbow" vs making a move and I can argue this both way on myself.

I bought a GTX 8800 when they first came out, a GTX 280 when they first came out, and a GTX 480 when they first came out. I'd say the GTX 480 was the first time in that pattern where I ended up with some regret because it's a strong card but damn there's some downsides that I don't need to preach to anyone here.

I'm not sure how to gauge this market at this point. Is the 680 truly the flagship? The 480 experience makes me more inclined to consider waiting for the "refresh" of the 680 but on the other hand I sure as hell wouldn't mind getting away from the 480 and it's obvious this is an appreciable upgrade across the boards.

I'm a little surprised they didn't put out a 3GB variant. I have to believe that's coming.

Being the first kid on the block with the new toy has its pros and its cons.

I don't know what the hell to make of it.
 
Interesting, in Surround tests the 2GB limit doesn't seem to be hurting the 680, even in games with high-res texture packs:













EVGA Jacob has said the 4GB cards in a couple of months.
 
pelo said:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/nvidia-geforce-gtx-680.html
Click to expand...

Thanks!

"There are changes in terms of power saving, too. Older graphics cards, when connected to two monitors, could not switch to the power-saving mode and worked at their Low 3D frequencies instead, which led to higher power consumption and temperature in idle mode.

The new graphics card has fewer limitations in this respect. It can now switch to power-saving mode even with four monitors attached if all of them use the same display resolution. But if there is at least one monitor whose resolution differs from the others', the graphics card will use the Low 3D frequencies instead."

Glad to see that's fixed!
 
I bought my two 7970s with some misgivings. Like many I was grousing about how the cards were probably 10% slower than they should have been and certainly that each card was overpriced by $50-100. That plus the bad driver support (I am still stuck with the damn preview drivers!) plus the way NVidia "tweaks" games will almost certainly have me dropping team Red next time around.
 
The adaptive Vsync feature looks very interesting to me. Nothing more annoying than dropping a little below 60fps only to see it smack to 30fps just because of vsync. Nvidia definitely sets an example with its drivers (though everyone has bugs from time to time), hopefully their effort will result in both companies having increased standards for future releases.
 
So, the 580 had 16 SMs and the 680 has 8 SMXs. I would not be surprised if GK110 has 16 SMXs. How insane of a card would that be?

Re: Price--if all is true about this originally being a midrange card, I bet nVidia could cut this all the way down to the originally rumored $300 and still make a profit. No way AMD could do that with the 7970. They (nVidia) have the best card and are still offering it lower than the 7970, because they have so much margin to play with they may as well capture instant market share, and they're still ready to cut, cut, cut going forward.

Re: VS. OC'ed 7970--Sorry, AMD boys, if you read the article closely, GPU Boost is allowing the 680 to clock up to 1200-1300MHz territory already at stock TDP. How high do you think it can go with a 133% TDP? We'll see in a few days, but I don't think you'll like the answer, unless you sell your 7970s now while there are still a few buyers out there willing to drink the koolaid.

Dynamic vsync=no tearing with no downside. GPU Boost=overclocking without wasted wattage and no laborious manual tweaking. No voided warranties, no cooked cards. Single-card surround is now there if I ever decide I want it. TXAA sounds awesome, and hopefully some current games can be patched to enable it. Just win, win, win.

Kyle and Brent, I'm glad you took a side-note to gloat about your testing methods. You deserve it after all the work and expense you've put into this for ten years. Nvidia has introduced tech that has been needed for years now, that makes canned benching completely invalid from this point forward.

Awesome article, can't wait for what's to come.
 
Having only 256bit lanes along with only 2GB vRAM and a smaller die size will likely mean that nVIdia will be able to beat AMD in pricing no matter how low AMD decides to drop their cards MSRP.

I still can't get over nVidia having beaten AMD in efficiency... seriously, what the hell is going on? :p
 
Amazed at how excited folks get at paying $500 for an extra 5-10fps over what they got with their previous purchase.

All I'm seeing is a kind of ceiling being reached with what the current GPU trends can do with form factor, wattage etc.
 
eduncan911 said:
Could [H]ardforum post some graphs of the vram usage at 5760x1080?

I constantly exceeded 2.7 GB (2.8GB at times) on my 3-way GTX 580s w/3GB of ram, which I just sold off in anticipation of the GTX 680s. But that 2 GB ram limit really has me concerned, especially after seeing what happened with vram limits with my previous 2-way 470s with only 1.2 GB of ram - the system would play nicely at 50 to 60 FPS, and then drop to the 20s at times, then back up to 50s - just like the graphs here show for the single card GTX 680 at 5760x1080.

I'm wondering if it is bumping up against the vram limit with the Ultra bitmap settings.
Click to expand...

seconded.

plus, could we have some compute benchmarks using blender/cycles renderer?
 
Drown Babies said:
I noticed a lot of questions about screen tearing, but I didn't see any mention of using a 120Hz display for 2D testing. Have you guys considered this (obviously not for high resolution, but for 1080p)? Or do you cover this when looking at 3D performance?

I can imagine situations where having more than 60 FPS would be preferable having higher IQ, especially in faster paced games like BF3.

Or does it not really make much of a difference? Because performance would be so high anyway, being limited to 1080p.
Click to expand...

I would say that you can extract 120Hz performance from 2D results already posted for the resolution you interested in. Not really any great examples here because they choose to go for best gaming environment (where I believe and I know most will agree) that playable resolution matters more then anything else. Even for the big believers in 120Hz, there is a severely sharp law of diminishing returns in IQ buy pushing FPS past 60, then increasing playable resolution. For now and forever, resolution is king. So if your review is about getting a feeling of what is the max resolution and settings to create the most enjoyable environment, 120hz has to take a back seat to resolution.

But for reviews that have more common 1080p tests you should be able to see how close the card will come to 120 FPS in whatever games you play. Though I am disappointed with how after years of doing this here at HardOCP, finding a place that does FPS graphs is nearly impossible.
 
Definitely a nice card for the price. To bad the nvsurround performace wasn't better. Maybe due to only 2GB ram?
 
R3MF said:
seconded.

plus, could we have some compute benchmarks using blender/cycles renderer?
Click to expand...

Anand has compute benchmarks and they don't look good. openCL/directcompute performance looks to be beneath GTX580 levels. This card doesn't look to improve upon nVidia's compute advantage but rather a stall whereas GCN was a big bump in that respect. It's definitely going to get interesting in the HPC segment.
 
To Kyle and or Brent: After re-reading your intro page I was reminded that FXAA is an NVidia created AA tool. Most of your tests seem to rely on FXAA. Would it be possible to get more 2560 or 5760 tests just using straight 4x MSAA or 8x MSAA?
 
One hell of a card. Looks like Surround gaming in multicard is leaning towards AMD, but not by much. I'm going to wait for a good real world testing review to compare surround numbers in multicard between the 2 offerings. Overclocking will play a factor too, I'll just have to wait and see before I pull the trigger. AMD can make things interesting with a price drop and the release of their 7980 card.
 
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