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Today we are looking at the Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC Graphics Card which ships with a proprietary cooling system featuring triple fans encased in a metal shroud – this is dubbed the ‘WindForce' which was designed in house by the GB engineering team. The card is also factory overclocked, offering out of the box speeds of 954mhz core and 1,006mhz boost.
In the months since the GTX780 launched, it has proven a popular high end solution for Nvidia lovers. Physically, it is difficult to tell the difference between both GTX Titan and GTX780 reference cards, although the lack of memory chips on the rear of the GTX780 is an immediate indication that you have the less expensive card in your hands.
Sadly there have been no modified air cooled GTX Titan cards, as all Nvidia partners are forced to use the reference cooler. This is not a huge issue, as the reference Nvidia cooler is actually very good, but still we can't help but feel a little disappointed. At least the GTX780 has no such restrictions imposed on the cooling system.
It has been quite some time since we last looked at a Gigabyte graphics card, so we are interested today to see how it fares. The adoption of a triple fan cooler can certainly only be seen as a good move, especially as these can often spin much slower than a single or even a dual fan solution. We will obviously take a closer look at this later in the review.
Specification:-
– WINDFORCE 3X 450W Cooling system
– Black PCB
– GPU: GeForce GTX 780
– Core Base Clock: 954 MHz
– Core Boost Clock: 1006 MHz
– Memory Clock: 6008 MHz
– Memory Size: 3072MB GDDR5
– Bus Type: PCI Express 3.0
– Memory Bus: 384-bit
– CUDA Cores: 2304
– Memory type: 64Mx32
– DirectX 11.1: Yes
– DVI Port: DVI-I /DVI-D
– DisplayPort: Yes
– HDCP: Yes
– HDMI: Yes
We have seen this artwork from Gigabyte before on other products – the all seeing blue neon eye. Not sure it makes any sense, but it looks nice. No picture of the card on the front but the cooler is exposed on the rear.
Our review sample had no accessories bundled, but we received an engineering sample direct from the factory. The retail bundle contains a CD and two 8 pin power converter cables.
The Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC is a heavy card and it looks mean. The black cooler with three black fans is attractive and matches the PCB. This is a dual slot solution. The card is 280 mm long, so it will fit inside most full sized enthusiast grade chassis released today. The card would definitely have looked better with a Gigabyte branded backplate. It wouldn't have added much to the overall cost either.
The Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC graphics card takes power from two 8 pin PCI power connectors.
The GTX780 is SLI capable in 2 and 3 way configurations. In theory you could run 4 of these cards in SLI with the dual connector heads however Nvidia have limited the GTX780 to a 3 way SLI setup. The GTX Titan however can be run in 4 way SLI, a deliberate move by Nvidia. Be prepared to dig deep into that bank balance if you want to run either GTX780 or GTX Titan in SLI.
The card has two DVI ports, a single DisplayPort and a single HDMI port. All outputs can be used simultaneously, so triple monitor gaming is possible with only one card. HDMI is supported by audio, it is HDMI 1.4a compatible.
The cooler is substantial – with 5 very thick copper heatpipes running through the copper base plate and along the full length of the aluminium fins. Personally I like the style of this cooler, as it keeps the heatpipes completely straight along the full length of the card.
An overview of the GTX780 WindForce OC in GPUz. The GTX780 GK110 is built on the 28nm process. It has 48 ROP's and 192 TMU's. The 3GB of GDDR5 (1,500mhz/6Gbps effective) memory is connected via a 384 bit memory interface. The Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC has been overclocked from reference core speeds of 863mhz to 954mhz.
On this page we present some super high resolution images of the product taken with the 24.5MP Nikon D3X camera and 24-70mm ED lens. These will take much longer to open due to the dimensions, especially on slower connections. If you use these pictures on another site or publication, please credit Kitguru.net as the owner/source. You can right click and ‘save as’ to your computer to view later.
For our review today we are using the latest AMD Catalyst 13.8 beta and Nvidia Forceware 320.49 drivers. We have retested the cards in this review today, to ensure they are still relevant with the latest driver fixes and performance enhancements.
If you are interested in buying the Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC Graphics Card then head over to this page on Overclockers UK.
We built a very high end liquid cooled Core i7 3960x system and overclocked it to 4.4ghz.
We paired it up with 16GB of 2,400mhz memory and an ASUS Rampage IV Extreme motherboard.
Test System
Processor: Core i7 3960 X Extreme Edition @ 4.4ghz
Graphics Card: Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC (Forceware 320.49)
Cooler: Antec 920 H20
Memory: 16GB G.Skill 2,400mhz @ 10-11-10-30
Motherboard: Asus Rampage IV Extreme
Power Supply: Enermax Platimax 1250W
Optical Drive: Asus BluRay Drive
Chassis: Lian Li PC-A77FR Aluminium Red Full Tower Case
Boot Drive: Patriot WildFire 120GB
Secondary Drive: 1TB Samsung
Monitors: Dell U3011
Other video cards:
Nvidia GTX Titan
Asus GTX760 Direct CU II OC
Sapphire HD7970 6GB Toxic Edition
Sapphire HD7970 3GB Boost OC
MSI GTX770 TF OC
MSI GTX670 Power Edition
Nvidia GTX760
Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X
XFX HD7870 Core
KFA2 GTX760 EX
VTX3D HD7870 Tahiti LE
eVGA GTX660 TI SC
Gainward GTX660
Asus GTX660 Direct CU OC
Software:
Windows 7 Enterprise 64 bit
Unigine Heaven Benchmark
Unigine Valley Benchmark
3DMark Vantage
3DMark 11
3DMark
Fraps Professional
Steam Client
FurMark
Games:
Alien V Predator
GRID 2
Dirt Showdown
Sleeping Dogs
May Payne 3
Tomb Raider
All the latest BIOS updates and drivers are used during testing. We perform generally under real world conditions, meaning KitGuru tests games across five closely matched runs and then average out the results to get an accurate median figure. If we use scripted benchmarks, they are mentioned on the relevant page.
Unigine provides an interesting way to test hardware. It can be easily adapted to various projects due to its elaborated software design and flexible toolset.
A lot of their customers claim that they have never seen such extremely-effective code, which is so easy to understand.
Heaven Benchmark is a DirectX 11 GPU benchmark based on advanced Unigine engine from Unigine Corp. It reveals the enchanting magic of floating islands with a tiny village hidden in the cloudy skies. Interactive mode provides emerging experience of exploring the intricate world of steampunk.
Efficient and well-architected framework makes Unigine highly scalable:
- Multiple API (DirectX 9 / DirectX 10 / DirectX 11 / OpenGL) render
- Cross-platform: MS Windows (XP, Vista, Windows 7) / Linux
- Full support of 32bit and 64bit systems
- Multicore CPU support
- Little / big endian support (ready for game consoles)
- Powerful C++ API
- Comprehensive performance profiling system
- Flexible XML-based data structures
We use the following settings: 1920×1080 resolution. Anti Aliasing off. Anisotrophy 4, Tessellation normal. Shaders High. Stereo 3D disabled. API: Direct X 11.
The results from the overclocked GTX780 are not a million miles behind the GTX Titan, averaging around 6 frames per second less.
Valley Benchmark is a new GPU stress-testing tool from the developers of the very popular and highly acclaimed Heaven Benchmark. The forest-covered valley surrounded by vast mountains amazes with its scale from a bird’s-eye view and is extremely detailed down to every leaf and flower petal. This non-synthetic benchmark powered by the state-of-the art UNIGINE Engine showcases a comprehensive set of cutting-edge graphics technologies with a dynamic environment and fully interactive modes available to the end user.
We used the settings above at 1920×1080.
The GTX780 scores right at the top of this chart, behind the GTX Titan.
Futuremark released 3DMark Vantage, on April 28, 2008. It is a benchmark based upon DirectX 10, and therefore will only run under Windows Vista (Service Pack 1 is stated as a requirement) and Windows 7. This is the first edition where the feature-restricted, free of charge version could not be used any number of times. 1280×1024 resolution was used with performance settings.
The Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC graphics card scores just over 46,000 points, around 1,000 points behind the GTX Titan.
3DMark 11 is designed for testing DirectX 11 hardware running on Windows 7 and Windows Vista the benchmark includes six all new benchmark tests that make extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading. After running the tests 3DMark gives your system a score with larger numbers indicating better performance.
Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 is the best way to test DirectX 11 under game-like loads.If you want to learn more about this benchmark, or to buy it yourself, head over to this page.
A fantastic result in this Direct X 11 benchmark, scoring around 400 points less than the GTX Titan.
3DMark is an essential tool used by millions of gamers, hundreds of hardware review sites and many of the world’s leading manufacturers to measure PC gaming performance.
Futuremark say “Use it to test your PC’s limits and measure the impact of overclocking and tweaking your system. Search our massive results database and see how your PC compares or just admire the graphics and wonder why all PC games don’t look this good.
To get more out of your PC, put 3DMark in your PC.”
We got great results in this benchmark, with the overclocked GTX780 scoring just over 9,100 points.
Aliens V Predator has proved to be a big seller since the release and Sega have taken the franchise into new territory after taking it from Sierra. AVP is a Direct X 11 supported title and delivers not only advanced shadow rendering but high quality tessellation for the cards on test today.
To test the cards we used a 1920×1080 resolution with DX11, Texture Quality Very High, MSAA Samples 1, 16 af, ambient occulsion on, shadow complexity high, motion blur on.
No performance issues, even at the native resolution of our 30 inch panel.
Sleeping Dogs started development as an original title, but was announced in 2009 as True Crime: Hong Kong, the third installment and a reboot of the True Crime series. As a result of the game’s high development budget and delays, it was canceled by Activision Blizzard in 2011. Six months later, it was announced that Square Enix had picked up the publishing rights to the game, but the game was renamed Sleeping Dogs in 2012 since Square Enix did not purchase the True Crime name rights.
We are using the highest possible image quality settings at 1080p, including the high resolution texture pack.
Excellent results, and one of the few video cards we have tested which can maintain a frame rate of 40 at all times.
After a delayed release from late 2012 to March 2013, the game received much anticipation and hype. Tomb Raider received much acclaim from critics, who praised the graphics, the gameplay and Camilla Luddington’s performance as Lara with many critics agreeing that the game is a solid and much needed reboot of the franchise. Much criticism went to the addition of the multiplayer which many felt was unnecessary. Tomb Raider went on to sell one million copies in forty-eight hours of its release, and has sold 3.4 million copies worldwide so far.
We used the Ultimate quality setting at 2560×1600 with the settings detailed above.
The Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC performs at almost an equal footing to the GTX Titan which is an impressive result.
Max Payne 3 is a third-person shooter in which the player assumes the role of its titular character, Max Payne. Max Payne 3 features a similar over-the-shoulder camera as its predecessors, with the addition of a cover mechanic, while also retaining much of the same run-and-gun style of gameplay. Max Payne 3 also marks the return of bullet-time in action sequences, for which the franchise is notable.
In bullet-time it is possible to see every bullet strike an enemy in detail. New to the series is a “Last Stand” mechanic, which gives the player a grace period after losing all health during which time the player may kill the enemy that wounded them in order to continue playing, however this mechanic is only usable if the player has one or more bottles of painkillers in their possession.
Results almost in line with the GTX Titan again, just a single frame behind.
Dirt Showdown is the latest title in the franchise from Codemasters, based around the famous Colin McRae racing game series, although it no longer uses his name, since he passed away in 2007.
We configured the game at the ULTRA preset with a 2560×1600 resolution and 4x MSAA.
As we would expect by now, the Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC slots in between the Asus GTX780 and the Nvidia GTX Titan.
Metro: Last Light takes place one year after the events of Metro 2033, proceeding from the ending where Artyom chose to call down the missile strike on the Dark Ones. The Rangers have since occupied the D6 military facility, with Artyom having become an official member of the group. Khan, the nomad mystic, arrives at D6 to inform Artyom and the Rangers that a single Dark One survived the missile strike.
4A Games’ proprietary 4A Engine is capable of rendering breathtaking vistas, such as those showing the ruined remnants of Moscow, as well as immersive indoor areas that play with light and shadow, creating hauntingly beautiful scenes akin to those from modern-day photos of Pripyat’s abandoned factories and schools.
We set the resolution to 2560×1600 and the settings shown in the screenshot above.
Great results from the Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC card, averaging 64 frames per second.
Grid 2 is the sequel to the racing video game Race Driver: Grid. It was developed and published by Codemasters. The game includes numerous real world locations such as Paris, numerous United States locations, and many more, and also includes motor vehicles spanning four decades. In addition, it includes a new handling system that developer Codemasters has dubbed ‘TrueFeel’, which aims to hit a sweet spot between realism and accessibility.
We tested at 2560×1600 with 8x AA and ULTRA settings, shown above.
Performance is very strong in the latest Direct X 11 title from Codemasters, averaging 60 frames per second.
The tests were performed in a controlled air conditioned room with temperatures maintained at a constant 24c – a comfortable environment for the majority of people reading this.Idle temperatures were measured after sitting at the desktop for 30 minutes.Load measurements were acquired by playing Crysis Warhead for 30 minutes and measuring the peak temperature.
We also have included Furmark results, recording maximum temperatures throughout a 30 minute stress test. All fan settings were left on automatic.
The cooler handles the temperatures well, peaking at 73c when gaming. Not as good as the ASUS GTX780 Direct CU II OC temperatures however but this could be related to the fan profile.
We have built a system inside a Lian Li chassis with no case fans and have used a fanless cooler on our CPU. The motherboard is also passively cooled. This gives us a build with almost completely passive cooling and it means we can measure noise of just the graphics card inside the system when we run looped 3dMark tests.
We measure from a distance of around 1 meter from the closed chassis and 4 foot from the ground to mirror a real world situation. Ambient noise in the room measures close to the limits of our sound meter at 28dBa.
Why do this? Well this means we can eliminate secondary noise pollution in the test room and concentrate on only the video card. It also brings us slightly closer to industry standards, such as DIN 45635.
KitGuru noise guide
10dBA – Normal Breathing/Rustling Leaves
20-25dBA – Whisper
30dBA – High Quality Computer fan
40dBA – A Bubbling Brook, or a Refridgerator
50dBA – Normal Conversation
60dBA – Laughter
70dBA – Vacuum Cleaner or Hairdryer
80dBA – City Traffic or a Garbage Disposal
90dBA – Motorcycle or Lawnmower
100dBA – MP3 player at maximum output
110dBA – Orchestra
120dBA – Front row rock concert/Jet Engine
130dBA – Threshold of Pain
140dBA – Military Jet takeoff/Gunshot (close range)
160dBA – Instant Perforation of eardrum
Gigabyte have certainly opted for a balance aimed at holding a specific noise level. When idle, the fans only spin at 800 rpm. These rise to around 2,200 rpm when gaming which translates to very low noise levels, although audible if the rest of the system is very quiet. The Asus Direct CU II cooler clearly has an edge, although the Gigabyte card is clocked much higher.
To test power consumption today we are using a Keithley Integra unit and we measure power consumption from the VGA card inputs, not the system wide drain. We measure results while gaming in Crysis Warhead and the synthetic stress test Furmark and record both results.
The Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC demands a little more power than the reference GTX780 design. The GTX Titan demands around 5-10 watts more than this overclocked card when gaming.
We overclocked the card with various software utilities and got the best results with the MSI Afterburner tool, which is based around RivaTuner.
We managed to squeeze another 8.3% from the core before the system would hardlock. There was plenty of room on the GDDR5 memory, peaking at 1,771mhz (7.08Gbps effective).
The decent overclock helped generate almost another 1,000 points over the ‘out of the box' speeds. The final score of 14,313 points is faster than the reference clocked GTX Titan. Impressive indeed!
The Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC is a remarkable graphics card. With the latest Direct X 11 titles, it is only a couple of percent slower than the significantly more expensive GTX Titan flagship.
Gigabyte's Windforce cooler is certainly a talking point. The adoption of three high grade fans means that Gigabyte can adopt a non aggressive profile. At idle, the fans are only spinning at 800 rpm which means the card is almost silent. Under gaming load the fan speeds rise, but noise emissions are always low partially due to the dull, unobtrusive pitch of the three fans.
The Gigabyte GTX780 WindForce OC has received a 10.5% overclock over the reference Nvidia solution (863mhz to 954mhz) and in real world terms this gives it a notable edge at high resolutions with the image quality cranked. Most of our results show very little performance difference between this GTX780 and a reference clocked Titan.
Every video card will overclock to a slightly different level, however we managed to squeeze another 8.3% from the core before the card would hardlock. Headroom on the GDDR5 memory is exceptional, increasing from 1,502 mhz to 1,771mhz before artefacts would raise their ugly head.
We aren't quite sure why Gigabyte didn't decide to increase the memory speeds to support the excellent core clock enhancements. Final overclocking results point to performance in excess of a standard clocked GTX Titan.
Power consumption of the card is a little higher than the reference model, although this is minor and won't have an overly negative impact on an electricity bill, even long term.
There is a price premium for this card right now in the United Kingdom. Overclockers UK have limited stock, priced at £579.95 inc vat. We have seen some GTX780's for less than £550, although considering the clock and cooler enhancements on this WindForce OC model, we feel this is a fair price.
Other options between £500 and £600? Well AMD really have nothing to compete at this price, although OCUK have a deal right now on a special MSI HD7990 which has been reduced to £499.95 inc vat, This really does seems almost too good to miss, although as the HD7990 is a dual GPU design you will need to rely on a Crossfire driver profile to get the most from this card with the latest games. MSI are also going to be releasing their GTX780 Lightning soon, which will be clocked even higher out of the box, at 980mhz.
Pros:
- looks great.
- good out of the box core overclock.
- Faster than GTX Titan when cranked.
- Quiet.
- responded well to manual overclocking.
- power consumption is good.
Cons:
- Expensive.
- memory is reference speed.
- no backplate.
Kitguru says: A truly excellent flagship solution from Gigabyte.
great card, very expensive mind you, but I like their GPU’s. The Lightning from MSI will be better, but likely to be £50 more expensive too.
Way too much cash. The GTX770 is a much better sweet spot IMO.
lo voglio