ASUS has launched a graphics card based upon the AMD Radeon R7 265 GPU using its popular and well respected DirectCU II cooler design. It's notable because ASUS usually reserves this cooler design for its mid-to-high market segment cards. However the card's appeal will depend a lot on how much of a premium ASUS charges for this Direct CU II model.
ASUS crows that its Radeon R7 265 DirectCU II model uses the "exclusive DirectCU II cooling technology delivers 20 per cent cooler and 3X quieter operation". So in theory this card should offer buyers a more stable system and full HD game graphics that you enjoy seeing and not hearing.
Accompanying the popular cooler design ASUS also uses "Super Alloy Power components for up to 2.5X longer lifespan". We are told that ASUS has chosen "Solid-state capacitors, concrete-core chokes and hardened MOSFETs… all designed to withstand much greater stress with the application of specially-formulated materials."
Elsewhere the ASUS Radeon R7 265 DirectCU II follows standard specs from the AMD reference model as follows:
- AMD Radeon R7 265 GPU
- PCI Express 3.0
- OpenGL 4.3
- 2048MB (2GB) GDDR5 memory
- 925MHz boost clock, 900MHz base clock
- 5600MHz (1400MHz GDDR5) memory clock
- 1280 stream processors
- Connect via: 1x DVI-D, 1 x DVD-I, 1 x HDMI output, 1 x DisplayPort
The ASUS Radeon R7 265 DirectCU II also ships with the firm's 'unique' GPU Tweak software. If you've used this before you will know it is useful for tweaking GPU and video-memory clock speeds and voltages, cooling-fan speeds and power-consumption thresholds – all in real time. You will also be able to use the ASUS GPU Tweak Streaming tool to share your on-screen action over the internet in real-time.
We don't have info about the availability or price of ASUS's Radeon R7 265 at this time. However we do know that ASUS charges a price premium on its Direct CU II cards – as much as £75 extra on the ASUS Radeon R9 290X DirectCU II OC but a more reasonable £35 on the ASUS GeForce GTX 650 Ti Direct CU II TOP. But looking at the tests published on HEXUS yesterday, of the Sapphire Radeon R7 265 Dual-X which costs just £115, it was found that the Dual-X cooler offered "practically silent" gaming and was more than enough for this mainstream GPU.
