Be quiet
The consumer-focussed graphics-card market has gone a bit flat in recent months. AMD's already launched 6-series GPUs and NVIDIA has transitioned its mainstream parts to the GeForce 5xx line.
While waiting for the next iteration of graphics chips to be launched, add-in card partners have ample time to tweak existing designs, to offer something new.
Heavyweight manufacturer ASUS has taken on the silence challenge - no, that's not a monastic undertaking - by strapping on a huge heatsink on the Radeon HD 6770 1GB GPU.
The big beastie of a heatsink uses ASUS' direct-touch technology, where the four copper heatpipes are in physical contact with the GPU core. Looking to be a triple-slot-taking design, it does seem overkill on a GPU that's decidedly mainstream in nature.
Radeon HD 6770 is nothing more than a rebrand of the near-two-year-old HD 5770, plus some minor video-related improvements, and it seems a little strange that ASUS would go to this effort on an older GPU.
Still, if you're in the market for a solid card and need the PC to be as quiet as possible, this one deserves to be put on a shortlist. No word on pricing or availability, and we'll update the article as soon as those come to hand.
