Card I
The relative width of the card shows just how much PCB estate NVIDIA have needed to house all of the NV35's components. A myriad of power-smoothing capacitors line the right-hand side. The prodigious width of the card, at 21cm, matches the width of any regular ATX motherboard.
We've seen a Molex power connection on the original FX5800 Ultra (NV30) and Radeon 9800 Pro cards, so its presence here is expected. Due to the card's width, it has to be placed perpendicular to the PCB. NVIDIA, wisely, recommend the use of a 300w+ PSU with the 5900Ultra. The NV35 will most probably be housed in a high-performance system, so ensure your PSU is a top-notch affair.
The original NV30 was much-maligned for having cooling that, frankly, was disturbingly loud. NVIDIA tried to temper the sound by only invoking the fan during 3D operations. What most commentators agreed upon was the need to reduce the overall sound and heat output of the 500MHz core monster. NVIDIA had to address the sonic problem, because no matter how good a card's performance, it won't readily be considered in OEM machines if the sound is above 'reasonable levels'. This time around, NVIDIA choose the same RAM-cooling system but do away with the OTES-like FXFlow GPU cooling.
The NV35's cooler is still a meaty, heavy affair. This time they've opted for discrete cooling for the GPU and memory respectively. The height of the central heatsink is enough to warrant the use of 2 PCI slots, again. We wonder if NVIDIA would have been better off employing the services of Zalman, for they seem to be experts in large dissipation area cooling. Nonetheless, the overall cooling is far less imposing than that of the NV30's. It's also interesting to note that the aero-type fan doesn't sit directly over the GPU. Instead, it pushes air out over to the large fins, which in turn help transfer the heat away from the GPU. We've been unable to find out the transistor count of the NV35. Expect it to comfortably surpass 100 milion.
So how does it sound? Significantly quieter than the racket-making NV30, thankfully. The fan gives off a loud vibe on first appearance but appearances, as we all know, can be deceiving. Initial booting causes the fan to spin at its maximum RPM. Then, much like the NV30, it quietens down in 2D OS mode. The fan's RPM speed appears to be proportional to the GPU's temperature in 3D gaming. That's another thing, the NV35 seems to run much, much cooler than its predecessor. Both the front and back of the card are lukewarm to the touch; not the finger-burning heat emitted by the NV30. In 3D mode, the fan is a couple of notches louder than, say, a Radeon 9800 Pro's. It would just fit into the 'reasonable' category we alluded to earlier, it seems.
