Conclusion
The GeForce 9600 GSO 384MB is a bit of an oddity, being based upon a high-end core that has been significantly crippled to hit a specific price and performance point - born of marketing more than engineering.
Yet the way NVIDIA has handicapped the G92 core to reach these performance levels and price point, by artificially reducing clockspeeds, means that there's a good degree of untapped potential in the cards, which is something XFX has chosen to exploit with the XXX Edition.
Available for the bargain-friendly price of £66.93, the GeForce 9600 GSO does prove itself to be a real mid-range monster when unleashed in XFX's XXX Edition, outgunning some more-expensive alternatives.
The limited framebuffer of 384MB does hold back performance in a number of games, so depending on your game preferences you may be better looking towards less-compromised alternatives.
Ultimately, the XFX 9600 GSO XXX Edition is a somewhat imbalanced card, yet one that really shines given the right situation.
HEXUS.certification
The XFX Geforce 9600 GSO XXX edition 384MB receives the HEXUS.labs certification for successfully completing our benchmark suite without issue.
HEXUS Awards
The XFX 9600 GSO XXX Edition is not the perfect graphics card for all situations, with the 384MB frame buffer proving insufficient in some of our tests, leading to inconsistent results.
That said, for the most part, when the XFX 9600 GSO XXX Edition is on form it offers performance that belies its humble price-tag and offers exceptional value-for-money.
As such, further to HEXUS.labs certification, it receives the HEXUS.gaming award for good value.
XFX GeForce 9600 GSO XXX Edition 384MB
HEXUS Where2Buy
The XFX 9600 GSO XXX Edition 384MB is currently available for £66.93 from SCAN.
As always, UK based HEXUS.community discussion forum members will benefit from the SCAN 2HEXUS Free Shipping initiative, which will save you a further few pounds plus also top-notch, priority customer service and technical support backed up by the SCANcare@HEXUS forum.
HEXUS Right2Reply
At HEXUS.net, we invite the companies whose products we test to comment on our articles. If any XFX representatives choose to respond, we'll publish their commentary here verbatim.
