Even though NVIDIA's GeForce GTS 450 was only launched on Monday, we've already seen a plethora of cards of all speeds and sizes. It should come as no surprise then that Palit has stepped forward with the first low-profile take on the GPU.
The card runs at reference speeds of 783MHz, 1,566MHz and 1,804MHz for the GPU, Cuda cores and memory, respectively. Considering that a lot of low-profile cards are down-tuned to compensate for the reduced cooling, it's good to see this card running at normal frequencies.
Even though it's not as bad as some of the earlier Fermi-based cards, the GTS 450 still generates a bit of heat, so this model has been equipped with a fairly substantial heatsink. Thankfully, unlike some alternatives, the fan exhausts hot air out of the back of the card. Considering that this is likely to end up in a fairly cramped case, it should help to keep system temperatures nice and low.
Obviously there have been some sacrifices in terms of outputs, but Palit has smartly chosen HDMI and DVI. This should give users flexibility regardless of whether they are hooking the card up to a HDTV or a monitor.
The GTS 450 low-profile will provide an excellent alternative to the similarly performing low-profile Radeon HD 5750 - and a significant upgrade to NVIDIA's previous low-profile champ, the GTS 250. Palit's card should be available in the UK soon and although no pricing details have been released, it is currently available in the US with a MSRP of $146, which works out to around £115 including VAT.
