Thoughts, awards, right2reply, where2buy
Obvious analysis out of the way first. XFX has acquired some tasty G71-based cores and GDDR3 memory, most likely those designated for 7900 GTX 512s, and based a passive solution around them. We'd imagine the cores are going rather cheaply now, with G80 all primed to hit the tech. press, so XFX's has released a SKU that's 7900 GTX 512 in breeding, but lowered the core clock, added a huge double-sided heatsink, and re-badged it as a 7950 GT super-duper edition. There's nothing wrong with that at all, and it's the fastest GeForce 7950 GT that we've seen thus far; a fact that's all the more impressive considering the passive cooling employed.XFX, as you would expect, is charging a premium for this special SKU. Our research indicates an e-tailer price of £246, which is up to £50 more than a regular, reference-clocked GeForce 7950 GT and bordering on faster-clocked GeForce 7900 GTX 512 money.
After ruminating on it for a while, here's how we believe this package pans out with respect to its near-£250 asking price. If you simply want to game with a low-noise PC, go for the cheapest GeForce 7900 GTX 512 you can find. The impressive cooler on all reference models is eerily quiet in 2D and, really, not all that noisy in 3D. It'll be faster in games, thanks to its 650MHz core and identically-clocked memory.
However, if you crave a silent a PC as possible, and you'd be the kind of person who enjoys listening to the birds tweeting in your garden whilst playing games, the silent XFX GeForce 7950 GT XXX Edition has no current peer. In that case, the ~£250 asking price becomes almost an incidental issue. HDCP support for upcoming high-definition playback doesn't hurt the attributes list either, we suppose.
In summary, a product whose appeal is limited to a minority of people. If you happen to be one of them, this card is a current no-brainer. If you don't mind a bit of PC noise, like most, NVIDIA's own GeForce 7900 GTX 512 and ATI's Radeon X1950 XT offer better value for money.
HEXUS Awards
The XFX GeForce 7950 GT XXX Edition is awarded the HEXUS Gaming Innovation gong for being the fastest passively-cooled graphics card we've come across. It's not recommended to all and its appeal is somewhat limited, sure, but, we feel, there's definitely a market that laps up this kind of innovation.
XFX GeForce 7950 GT XXX Edition 512MiB
