Official GTX 590 Review Thread (23 reviews at this time)

[Aristotelian]

I'm a bit disappointed with the 590, though I wonder what an EVGA 590 watercooled card would be able to achieve re: overclocking.

 

[MrK6]

Well, I wonder. Do you think it has gone unnoticed that one of the biggest AMD fans on this forum started the "Official" GTX590 launch/reviews" thread? and then the next 22 out of 24 posts were AMD fans? That's just page 1. I know you'll think it perfectly normal, but it isn't. AMD fan starts the thread of a launch this big, so it doesn't seem like the swarm of AMD fans descending on the thread are crapping on the whole launch. And you know the OP won't report derailment.
Good Move. I'm impressed.

Echoing other posters, get off the Kool-Aid. There's no huge conspiracy or gang war going on here. We're having discussions of new hardware and the fact that it isn't impressive to most and no one is praising it doesn't mean we all ganged up to troll: it's simply an unimpressive product.

The simple fact is, most people on this forum aren't vested in their hardware beyond what is giving them the best experience for their hard-earned money at the time. If people want to be a cheerleader for a company for whatever reason, fine, whatever floats their boat. I don't understand it, but I don't understand spectator sports either. Either way, sometimes the "home team" drops the ball, and drops the ball hard. Accept it and move on. Jesus.

 

[wahdangun]

Well, I wonder. Do you think it has gone unnoticed that one of the biggest AMD fans on this forum started the "Official" GTX590 launch/reviews" thread? and then the next 22 out of 24 posts were AMD fans? That's just page 1. I know you'll think it perfectly normal, but it isn't. AMD fan starts the thread of a launch this big, so it doesn't seem like the swarm of AMD fans descending on the thread are crapping on the whole launch. And you know the OP won't report derailment.
Good Move. I'm impressed.

its not about AMD fanboy starting the thread (and for GOD sake he own 3 GTX 480 SLI), and isn't HD 6990 was started with nv fanboy too ? as a mod you shouldn't take it personally, and please don't accuse other as a fanboy if they stating some fact(as long as they don't derail the thread or insulting other member).


and this must be nvdia PR nightmare its even worse than FX 5800 launch, i mean 5 dead card in the hand of REVIEWER, i never seen something like this happen before.

and for ppl that saying that overvolting an extreme high end card like this is stupid so why asus said something like this in their boxes :

and i lol about DX 11 and crysis2 int the same sentence

 

[Jionix]

its not about AMD fanboy starting the thread (and for GOD sake he own 3 GTX 480 SLI), and isn't HD 6990 was started with nv fanboy too ? as a mod you shouldn't take it personally, and please don't accuse other as a fanboy if they stating some fact(as long as they don't derail the thread or insulting other member).


and this must be nvdia PR nightmare its even worse than FX 5800 launch, i mean 5 dead card in the hand of REVIEWER, i never seen something like this happen before.

and for ppl that saying that overvolting an extreme high end card like this is stupid so why asus said something like this in their boxes :

and i lol about DX 11 and crysis2 int the same sentence

And I'm sure that little writing underneath the voltage feature says something to the tune of "your warranty will be voided". It should say "..And your card might also blow up".

 

[Lonyo]

Overclocking capability may be varied by different cards and platforms. Extreme cooling is required to achieve 50% faster

Is what I make it out to be, nothing about warranty. That probably comes inside/on the warranty card.

 

[wahdangun]

look at this :

110 degree Celsius !!!!!!!!!! on PCB alone !!!! wow, maybe that is the thing that make the VRM goes ka boom

link

 

[SirPauly]

The episodes are certainly worthy of discussion to me and something to watch with newer drivers and in gamers' hands but to me, break it down like this:

5970 vs ____________!

6990 vs GTX 590!

There was no choice to worry about, complain about, cherry pick, hype, love, hate, marvel, loathe. Now, there is!

 

[notty22]

The 590 even with 20% down clocked cores competed with and sometimes beats almost full speed Cayman cores on the 6990. That has got AMD fans scrambling. So all fingers are pointing to the damaged cards.
The same thing happened when 1156 launched, here at Anands he blew up almost all his 1156 motherboards, and started a scare that lasted only until the software (bios's) were modified. Even now, most o/c's with a 1156 board could go in to our bios's and apply settings and then run software that could probably fry our setups. Do we setup cameras and do that ? Not anymore, because we know why it happens. Same will shake out here, and the people pointing to the same blown up boards again and again will go away.
Its hard to say a 700 dollar video card is a good deal, but it sort of is, in the face of no one believing that Nvidia would deliver dual 580's for less than omg'z a 1000 dollars!

 

[wahdangun]

The episodes are certainly worthy of discussion to me and something to watch with newer drivers and in gamers' hands but to me, break it down like this:

5970 vs ____________!

6990 vs GTX 590!

There was no choice to worry about, complain about, cherry pick, hype, love, hate, marvel, loathe. Now, there is!

yeah is like watching reality show lol

btw its look like the world have turned upside down, i mean usually nv fanboy always said maximum performance(and alot of noise), and amd fanboy always said low performance (and low noise) but now hd 6990 have maximum performance (and maximum noise) and GTX 590 low noise (and low performance). its really make me lol

 

[Grooveriding]

yeah is like watching reality show lol

btw its look like the world have turned upside down, i mean usually nv fanboy always said maximum performance(and alot of noise), and amd fanboy always said low performance (and low noise) but now hd 6990 have maximum performance (and maximum noise) and GTX 590 low noise (and low performance). its really make me lol

Looks like Crytek took on the wrong sponsor

Or maybe not, seeing as Crysis 2 is Maximum Console and you can max the thing out on a GTX 460.

 

[Nemesis 1]

Nice try though. This card, whether you want to hear it or not, is an engineering marvel. Runs mid 80's under load and hums the fans at 50%.
Look man, you should really end trying to capitalize on this too much. I could see a little bit, like "Haha look at the 590 burn up" but then you'd think you would come to realize that this isn't the norm. Reviewers and testers took it too far. The 267.84's are out and has enhanced protection like the retail cards should use.
I know I can't make you hate less, just make it a bit less obvious. Kudos.

This has got to be the all time classic video card topic ever. It has it all I mean it lacks nothing. This is classic!

So in all do respect I offer my view on both cards in this topic. One guy got caught but the fact is both cards are a steaming pile of BS. I couldn't think of away to express myself till I recalled this thing . The first part is about te cards. NV is the defendent.

The second part is a draft inductee That be you Keys the sargent that be NV.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmyXTOHC3w8

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

I think the 590 is a good deal at $700 as long as you get a good warranty and don't plan on overclocking at all. If I had the 590 I wouldn't even touch the clocks and definitely wouldn't overvolt. I think nvidia needs to reevaluate who they send cards to for testing. Putting 1.2v on a single GTX 580 is absurd but to do it on a dual gpu is just retarded. I have a non reference GTX 580 and I've owned a reference GTX 580 too. I have my non reference at 1.1v and it has a 3 slot cooler on it and you couldn't pay me to put it at 1.2v. I wouldn't even run a single reference GTX 580 at 1.1v because the temps were too high.

 

[wahdangun]

Looks like Crytek took on the wrong sponsor

Or maybe not, seeing as Crysis 2 is Maximum Console and you can max the thing out on a GTX 460.

yeah lol. and look like nv investment is going thrown out of window, i mean $ 2 million for DX9 and console port game !!!!!!!!!!!

I think the 590 is a good deal at $700 as long as you get a good warranty and don't plan on overclocking at all. If I had the 590 I wouldn't even touch the clocks and definitely wouldn't overvolt. I think nvidia needs to reevaluate who they send cards to for testing. Putting 1.2v on a single GTX 580 is absurd but to do it on a dual gpu is just retarded. I have a non reference GTX 580 and I've owned a reference GTX 580 too. I have my non reference at 1.1v and it has a 3 slot cooler on it and you couldn't pay me to put it at 1.2v. I wouldn't even run a single reference GTX 580 at 1.1v because the temps were too high.

the fact is even PCB is hot like hell, i mean over 100 Celsius, and it will surely effecting the card life span

 

[-Slacker-]

Hmm..

I want to say that 19 review sites with 5~10 cards that blew up isn't a big enough sample to make a judgement weather nvidia messed up or not, but, having said that, if I were in the market for this card, I definitely wouldn't want to jump on the *add to cart* button just yet.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

yeah lol. and look like nv investment is going thrown out of window, i mean $ 2 million for DX9 and console port game !!!!!!!!!!!



the fact is even PCB is hot like hell, i mean over 100 Celsius, and it will surely effecting the card life span

I'll agree Crysis 2 was a joke. Didn't buy it and don't plan on buying it until it goes for $20.

As far as the hot pcb that's why I said I would only buy one with a great warranty. If you run the card stock and it burns up on you hey have no choice but to replace it for free. If that costs nvidia money tough luck.

 

[bryanW1995]

Official statement for those who missed it and always will miss it.

“The few press reports on GTX 590 boards dying were caused by overvoltaging to unsafe levels (as high as 1.2V vs. default voltage of 0.91 to 0.96V), and using older drivers that have lower levels of overcurrent protection. Rest assured that GTX 590 operates reliably at default voltages, and our 267.84 launch drivers provide even more additional levels of protection for overclockers. For more information on overclocking and overcurrent protection on GTX 590 please see our knowledge base article here: http://nvidia.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/nvidia.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=2947.”

Also it turns out that these reviewers who killed their cards were WARNED not to use the old AIC drivers that did not have protection in them. They did anyway, and videotaped the second one just for the hell of it. Nice.

W1zzard didn't videotape anything, in fact he still wrote an impartial article imho. Incredibly so, considering the circumstances. If he had any pro-AMD bias he would have spent a LOT of time bashing nvidia over this, instead he only briefly mentioned it. Additionally, the sweclockers weren't the only other reviewers to have failure. And what about 6990, did none of these reviewers overclock/overvolt that card when they reviewed it? Don't get me wrong, the gtx 590 isn't necessarily a whole lot worse than 6990 (you know that I don't really like either one much, anyway), and the lower noise of 590 is nice, but I'm extremely surprised that nvidia would put a card like this in reviewers hands without making sure that all their ducks were in a row. This has "JHH wants this card out NOW, no excuses!!!" written all over it. One of nvidia's big selling points for many of us, me included, is that their drivers have generally been equal to or, usually, better than amd's over the long haul. When things like this happen it can cause many otherwise loyal nvidia customers to rethink their position in the future. I don't know if heads are gonna roll over this, but whether they do or not I think that it would behoove JHH to listen a little bit better to his team next time.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

What is W1zzard gonna complain about? You can't even overvolt GTX 580's to 1.2v with afterburner. The limit is 1.15 and I believe you have to do a bios flash for 1.2v. If anything he should admit what a dumbarse he is for thinking he could just overvolt it much higher than is even acceptable for a single GTX 580.

 

[wahdangun]

I'll agree Crysis 2 was a joke. Didn't buy it and don't plan on buying it until it goes for $20.

As far as the hot pcb that's why I said I would only buy one with a great warranty. If you run the card stock and it burns up on you hey have no choice but to replace it for free. If that costs nvidia money tough luck.

yeah but its not worth the hassle, i mean its a "premium" product not lower end card so we deserve the best

W1zzard didn't videotape anything, in fact he still wrote an impartial article imho. Incredibly so, considering the circumstances. If he had any pro-AMD bias he would have spent a LOT of time bashing nvidia over this, instead he only briefly mentioned it. Additionally, the sweclockers weren't the only other reviewers to have failure. And what about 6990, did none of these reviewers overclock/overvolt that card when they reviewed it? Don't get me wrong, the gtx 590 isn't necessarily a whole lot worse than 6990 (you know that I don't really like either one much, anyway), and the lower noise of 590 is nice, but I'm extremely surprised that nvidia would put a card like this in reviewers hands without making sure that all their ducks were in a row. This has "JHH wants this card out NOW, no excuses!!!" written all over it. One of nvidia's big selling points for many of us, me included, is that their drivers have generally been equal to or, usually, better than amd's over the long haul. When things like this happen it can cause many otherwise loyal nvidia customers to rethink their position in the future. I don't know if heads are gonna roll over this, but whether they do or not I think that it would behoove JHH to listen a little bit better to his team next time.

but to be honest AMD has lost its soul with HD 6990, its really noisy card i even can't stand the noise when i see it in the store display, but atleast they don't cheapen out the component they even use exotic phase change thermal paste (do anyone know where i can buy this thermal paste ???) and state of the art component

 

[bryanW1995]

Kinda like how people praised the 5870 after the hotter, noisier, yet faster GTX 480 was released?

So... GTX 480 was blasted for being faster, yet louder and ran hotter.

So... The HD 6990 should be blasted for being faster, yet louder and hotter.

clearly you didn't check out those thermal images of 6990 vs gtx 590. ~ 20c lower temps on the actual card for 6990... As I've stated many times these past couple of days, I think both of these cards are poor, but it is becoming clear now that nvidia took some serious shortcuts with gtx 590 that should actually preclude high end buyers from even considering it all unless they go straight to WC.

 

[bryanW1995]

According to sweclockers the 590 looses its warranty if oc'ed too... To bad.

"Den som planerar att överklocka bör dessutom se till att ha god ventilation i chassit och vara medveten om att garantin inte gäller om frekvenserna höjs över specifikationerna."

You can translate it yourself(swedish) but the short version is:
You need good ventilation in the chassi and that the warranty is void if spesifications are exceeded.

No bonus for nVidia there.

EVGA specifically AR models has lifetime warranty + you can overclock. In the past you could even mod the card (replace cooler or whatnot) and still have it warrantied, though they've made some changes over the past year so I'm not sure if that's still the case. Generally speaking, EVGA has the best warranty protection/customer service and they are an nvidia exclusive. Their card was not EVGA so what they said is correct for that specific card.

 

[AtenRa]

I will not say this card is faster or the other card is better, but I will say the following,

I would prefer AMD and NV to make a special Bundle BOX with dual cards. AMD could make a CF BOX with dual HD6970 say at $649.00 and NV could make an SLI BOX with dual GTX580 at $799.00.

I still have a GAINWARD 6600GT 128MB PCI-e SLI Bundle BOX

 

[bryanW1995]

c'mon will, we get that you love AMD no matter what

this would be a nice time for wreckage to make a comeback... the unintentional comedy would be off the charts... Having said that, this launch just illustrates how urgent it is that TSMC get their act together ASAP b/c our current sandwich offerings are either poop salad from the red team or chicken s**t from the green team. There are lots of zoners in here laughing/clapping at the 590's travails, but honestly who here would buy a 6990 and happily live with a jet engine noise in your case? On a rating scale from 1-10 I'd give gtx 580 sli and 6970 xfire an 8, but give 6990 a 2 and gtx 590 a .5.

 

[Stoneburner]

So the cards are basically even, I'm not going to buy either, and most of the people arguing over the cards won't be buying either.... either.

 

[1h4x4s3x]

What is W1zzard gonna complain about? You can't even overvolt GTX 580's to 1.2v with afterburner. The limit is 1.15 and I believe you have to do a bios flash for 1.2v. If anything he should admit what a dumbarse he is for thinking he could just overvolt it much higher than is even acceptable for a single GTX 580.

Wow, what a ridiculous statement. Most people are grateful for what he does but if you want to stay uninformed, don't read reviews. Simple as that.

i run a lot more voltage through other cards during testing and this never happens .. on gtx 590 with nvidia's power capping feature which is designed for that purpose it doesnt work. i think it's my obligation to tell you, no ?

 

[ViRGE]

look at this :

110 degree Celsius !!!!!!!!!! on PCB alone !!!! wow, maybe that is the thing that make the VRM goes ka boom

link

That picture doesn't make any sense. The PCB is a heatsink, so something hotter than 110C would have to be generating that heat. Considering that the GPUs aren't getting that hot (thermal cut-off is 97C), I can't fathom what could be operating at 110C and overall generating enough heat to bring the whole card to approximately that temperature.