by Alexey Stepin , Yaroslav Lyssenko
11/15/2009 | 10:52 AM
The year of 2009 has not been a very lucky one for Nvidia as the company has been losing its ground all along unable to hold back the onslaught of AMD’s graphics department. The release of the Radeon HD 4890 and Radeon HD 4770 in the spring and the crushing blow of the new Radeon HD 5x00 generation in the fall have passed unanswered as the G200b core, which is not commercially optimal, remains Nvidia’s only weapon. Yes, the GeForce GTX 295 is still the fastest graphics card available but by a small margin over the Radeon HD 5870 whereas the latter is free from the drawbacks of dual-processor solutions and supports DirectX 11, all of which make it a much more appealing buy.
Whether Nvidia can produce a worthy response to AMD’s attack is yet to be learned as the GeForce 300 series is going to be announced in late November. So far, if you need high performance in games, but do not like ATI Radeons for some reason and do not want to put up with the drawbacks of a multi-GPU solution, the only choice that remains is GeForce GTX 285. This graphics card is fast and supports PhysX technology which is unavailable on AMD’s products. Moreover, Nvidia offers a better GPGPU support as yet, although the fifth generation of Radeons may change this situation.
The majority of GeForce GTX 285 cards are nothing but copies of the reference sample. To be exact, they are manufactured at contracted facilities for Nvidia and then sent to Nvidia’s partners for distribution. The partners do not contribute much to the manufacturing process. They usually limit themselves to changing the sticker on the cooler’s casing and, occasionally, pre-overclocking the card (e.g. the EVGA GeForce GTX 285 SSC). It doesn’t make the cards any worse, especially as the common manufacturing source means a tougher quality assurance control, but the hardware reviewer can hardly be interested in such uniform products.
Therefore, it is indeed a pleasure to meet an original exception such as the ASUS Matrix GTX285 that we are going to discuss today. The Matrix series is targeted by ASUS at dedicated gamers and overclocking enthusiasts. This series features custom-designed PCBs and unique cooling systems as well as a lot of overclocking and fine-tuning features (like the option of adjusting the voltage of the GPU and memory). At the moment the Matrix GTX285 is the senior and highest-performance model in the ASUS Matrix series. Let’s have a closer look at it.
The manufacturer positions this graphics card as an exclusive G200b-based solution and has done a good job on the card itself as well as on its packaging. The box is not as large as some earlier products from ASUS used to come in, but its design is top class. Perhaps the dark color scheme may look gloomy, but we guess that the positioning of the product prohibits the use of gaudy and unserious colors.
There is no information on the box other than the card’s name, but its front panel can be flapped back to open a window through which you can see the card as well as a lot of marketing info touting the advantages of the Matrix GTX285 over the reference GeForce GTX 285. Technical information such as the type and amount of graphics memory can be found on the back of the box. There is no mention of the GPU and memory clock rates there, though.
The colorful box is a kind of a wrapper, actually. Inside it, there is a golden-embossed black cardboard box. ASUS’ EAH4890 was packaged in a similar way. The graphics card is fixed in a foam-rubber tray and is additionally wrapped into an antistatic bag. There is a compartment with cables and adapters nearby. More accessories can be found below the graphics card. Here they are:
This is a good selection of accessories for a graphics card positioned as a unique solution for gamers and overclockers, but we guess it would be even better with a copy of some popular game.
The manufacturer offers a utility called iTracker 2 for overclocking and monitoring your Matrix GTX285.
Unlike many other similar utilities, iTracker 2 can change the card’s GPU and memory voltages, adjust the fan settings, monitor temperatures, create profiles and even fine-tune memory timings. Moreover, iTracker 2 is a “hardware” utility as it can write new settings into the graphics card’s BIOS or restore the BIOS after incorrect reflashing. We have not seen such functionality in other makers’ tools. The user interface may look rather too gaudy, but the functionality is very broad. Of course, iTracker 2 requires support on the graphics card’s side and is only compatible with ASUS’s Matrix series products. This might have been expected. For example, Gigabyte’s GamerHUD utility has limited compatibility, too.
So, the ASUS Matrix GTX285 gets our praise for its packaging and accessories but it is to pass its main examination yet. We are going to see how unique the graphics card is, how good it is at overclocking, and what it is capable of in real games.
The ASUS Matrix GTX285 is very different from Nvidia’s reference sample. The difference is as big as possible considering the cooling system with a blower and solid plastic casing. This casing has a relief surface, a red “Republic of Gamers” logo, and a protrusion in the top part that we will discuss shortly. The fan has a red impeller, which is an unusual color for top-end Nvidia-based solutions. The ASUS card has a metallic back-plate while the reference GeForce GTX 285 has none.
Asus Matrix GTX285 (left), EVGA GeForce GTX 285 reference design (right)
We took the cooler off to see the most interesting things. The cards seem to be very similar at first sight, but you can see on closer inspection that the PCB of the Matrix GTX285 was developed by ASUS from scratch, especially in terms of GPU and memory power circuits. Such differences as the lack of a bonding pad for a DisplayPort translator are obvious.
Asus Matrix GTX285 (left), EVGA GeForce GTX 285 reference design (right)
The reference GeForce GTX 285 has a 6+2-phase power circuit, meaning that there are six power phases for the graphics core and two power phases for the memory chips. Developing this special version of the card, ASUS decided to reinforce the power circuit to increase the card’s overclocking potential. As a result, the Matrix GTX285 has an additional couple of phases in the GPU voltage regulator. ASUS claims the new circuit helps lower voltage ripple in the power circuits of the Matrix GTX285 by 15% but we can’t check this out without necessary equipment.
Each of the ten phases, including the memory voltage regulator’s, have four power MOSFETs, which seems like overkill even for an overclocker-friendly version of GeForce GTX 285. On the other hand, you can’t have too many of power phases. The single drawback of such design is that it is costlier to manufacture.
The photo above shows that the power transistors are managed by uP6281 drivers from uPI Semiconductor. Two chips from the same maker, uP6208 and uP6205, are used as controllers. The former is an advanced 12-phase controller designed for modern mainboards. Its most interesting feature is that it supports software-based voltage control. That is, you can change the voltage of the graphics core from a program rather than by modifying anything in the card’s hardware. The uP6205 is responsible for the memory voltage regulator.
Additional power is attached to the card via two connectors, one of which is of the 8-pin variety. An 8-pin power cable must be connected although this limitation can be bypassed by means of a simple strap closing the two outermost “ground” contacts.
The Matrix GTX285 can indicate the level of its load by means of color LEDs placed in the protrusion of the cooler casing. This curious, even though practically useless, feature looks like that:
The word Matrix is highlighted in different colors signaling GPU load at work. The highlighting is green in ordinary mode but changes to blue and violet and, finally, to red under load. This seems to be a purely aesthetical, rather than practical, element. The highlighting is going to look beautiful in system cases with a transparent side window whose owners are in the target audience the Matrix GTX285 has been developed for.
The memory subsystem consists of 16 GDDR3 chips (Hynix H5RS5223CFR-N3C) organized into a 1GB bank with 512-bit memory bus. Such 512Mb chips (16Mb x 32) are also used on the reference GeForce GTX 285. The N3C suffix denotes the fastest variety in the series. It is designed for a voltage of 2.03V and a frequency of 1300 (2600) MHz. The memory frequency of the reference GeForce GTX 285 is 1242 (2484) MHz and, although the ASUS Matrix GTX285 is not a standard graphics card, it has the same memory frequency as the reference sample, delivering a peak memory bandwidth of 158.9GBps, which is somewhat higher than that of the ATI Radeon HD 5870. Running a little ahead, we can say that our attempt to overclock the card’s memory was successful as you’ll learn shortly.
The core is an ordinary G200b. Its marking coincides with the marking we’ve seen on such chips before: G200-350-B3. This sample was manufactured on the 7th week of 2009, i.e. in early February. The GPU-Z tool correctly reported the tech process, transistor count, die size and core configuration, but thought that the chip was revision B1 whereas the marking on the die says B3. The graphics core has a standard configuration with 240 unified shader processors, 80 TMUs, and 32 RBEs. Its frequencies differ from those of the reference card, though. The shader domain is clocked at 1476MHz whereas the main domain is clocked at 662MHz. Thus, the main domain is pre-overclocked from 648 to 662MHz while the shader domain frequency has been left intact. Of course, this can hardly affect the card’s performance, but we will check our sample of ASUS Matrix GTX285 at more serious overclocking in the next section of the review.
The card offers a standard selection of connectors including two dual-link DVI-I ports and a universal 7-pin analog video output. Besides, there are two traditional MIO headers on the PCB, so you can build a 3-way SLI subsystem out of three Matrix GTX285. As our earlier tests showed, such a subsystem is often faster than a quad-processor configuration with two GeForce GTX 295, particularly due to the larger amount of graphics memory available for 3D applications. Besides, there is a Safe Mode button on the card’s mounting plate. If the card’s BIOS has been reflashed incorrectly or with frequencies that exceed its capabilities, pressing this button automatically restores the default BIOS with default frequencies. This is going to save a lot of trouble for an unlucky or too impatient overclocker.
The Safe Mode technology is implemented by means of two SST25VF512 flash memory chips. Next to them there is a Winbond W83L786G chip that provides the extended monitoring options of the ASUS Matrix GTX285.
The cooling system of the ASUS Matrix GTX285 is just a variation of Nvidia’s reference design, differing from it with but a few details.
Particularly, the cooler uses larger heat pipes (8 instead of 6 millimeters in diameter), a larger copper base contacting with the GPU’s heat-spreading cap, and a different material of thermal pads for cooling the memory and NVIO chips as well as the voltage regulator’s power transistors. The photograph shows the interior of the above-mentioned load monitoring system. It is a small card with color LEDs connected to the main PCB with a cable that ends in a 6-pin connector. The fan is the same model as on Nvidia’s reference sample but with a different color of the impeller.
Summing it up, there is nothing extraordinary about the cooling system of the ASUS Matrix GTX285 but it should do no worse than Nvidia’s reference cooler. And now we end the theoretical part of the review and proceed to practical tests.
ASUS claims the Matrix GTX285 is cooled 12% more efficiently thanks to the heat pipes having a larger diameter (8 rather than 6 millimeters as is standard in most modern coolers). Of course, we wanted to check this claim out in practice. Here are the results:
As you see, there is no growth of efficiency. On the contrary, the GPU temperature is 5°C higher than that of the reference GeForce GTX 285 in idle mode. The difference is smaller under load, yet the ASUS Matrix GTX285 is still 2°C hotter. Our measurements do not claim to be highly accurate for we used an ordinary computer built in a Chieftec LBX-01 system case instead of a special thermal chamber.
However, most users are going to run this graphics card under similar conditions for playing games, etc., but not for temperature tests. Notwithstanding the difference from the reference cooler, the cooler of the ASUS Matrix GTX285 coped with its job well enough. The card was absolutely stable both at its default frequencies and when overclocked with an increased GPU voltage.
Now, we want to check out the noisiness of the card, too. Although the ASUS Matrix GTX285 is targeted at overclockers who but seldom care about making them systems as quiet as possible, perhaps ASUS has managed to improve the already good acoustic characteristics of the reference GeForce GTX 285? We performed a standard measurement procedure using a digital noise level meter Velleman DVM1326. When a passively cooled graphics card was installed into our testbed, the noise level meter reported 43dBA. When we installed the ASUS card, we had the following results:
The ASUS Matrix GTX285 proved to be an extreme device indeed. The chokes of its 10-phase power circuit would produce a distinct squeaking sound under load. And the computer’s power supply increased the speed of its fans for some reason. We were quite surprised at that fact as our Enermax Galaxy DXX EGX1000EWL cannot be called a weak PSU and the GeForce GTX 285 is not the kind of a graphics card to load it that much. So, we either had a defective sample of the Matrix GTX285 or this behavior was due to its power circuit design. The card also emits a sound with an onboard tweeter when the computer is starting up or shutting down.
Finally, there is the option of overclocking with a slight increase in the GPU voltage. The included ASUS iTracker 2 tool allows setting the GPU voltage at 1.2V and we used that opportunity. The memory timings were left at their defaults as incorrect timings may bring more harm than benefit. But we have no doubt some enthusiasts will spend hours trying to find the optimal combination of settings to squeeze some more speed from the device.
After a while we found the GPU and memory frequencies the card was absolutely stable at.
The maximum GPU frequencies were 740/1625MHz which is but slightly higher than the frequencies of 720/1624MHz we achieved with an EVGA GeForce GTX 285 SSC. So, that’s a good but not extraordinary result.
The memory chips overclocked better. When we increased the memory voltage from the default 2.05V to 2.135V, we managed to achieve a memory frequency of 1461 (2922) MHz. With a reference GeForce GTX 285 we could only achieve a memory frequency of 1400 (2800) MHz. Clocked at 1461 (2922) MHz and accessed via a 512-bit memory bus, the memory subsystem delivers a peak bandwidth of 187GBps, which is considerably higher than that of the Radeon HD 5870 but lower than that of ATI’s and Nvidia’s dual-processor graphics cards.
The ASUS Matrix GTX285 is designed for overclocking and we did achieve good overclocking results from it, so we benchmarked the card at 740/1625MHz GPU and 1461 (2922) MHz memory frequencies. Now it’s time to test the Matrix GTX285 in real-life applications.
We are going to test the performance of Asus Matrix GTX285 graphics solution using the following universal testbed:
The graphics card drivers were configured in the following way:
ATI Catalyst:
Nvidia GeForce:
The list of benchmarks includes the following gaming titles and synthetic tests:
First-Person 3D Shooters
Third-Person 3D Shooters
RPG
Simulators
Strategies
Semi-synthetic Benchmarks
We selected the highest possible level of detail in each game using standard tools provided by the game itself from the gaming menu. The games configuration files weren’t modified in any way, because the ordinary user doesn’t have to know how to do it. We made a few exceptions for selected games if that was necessary. We are going to specifically dwell on each exception like that later on in our article.
Besides Asus matrix GTX285 we have also included the following graphics accelerators to participate in our test session:
We ran our tests in the following resolutions: 1280x1024, 1680x1050, 1920x1200 and 2560x1600. Everywhere, where it was possible we added MSAA 4x antialiasing to the standard anisotropic filtering 16x. We enabled antialiasing from the game’s menu. If this was not possible, we forced them using the appropriate driver settings of ATI Catalyst and Nvidia GeForce drivers.
Performance was measured with the games’ own tools and the original demos were recorded if possible. We measured not only the average speed, but also the minimum speed of the cards where possible. Otherwise, the performance was measured manually with Fraps utility version 2.9.8. In the latter case we ran the test three times and took the average of the three for the performance charts.
Starting from version 1.3 the game allows to record and reproduce a demo. Unfortunately, this method does not report the bottom frame rate.
Even when overclocked with a GPU voltage increase, the ASUS card cannot do more but compete with the Radeon HD 4890 at resolutions up to 1920x1200 inclusive. There is no talking about any competition with the new generation of ATI graphics cards. The Matrix GTX285 can only be credited with being much better than the Radeon HD 4890 at 2560x1600, especially when overclocked.
The Matrix GTX285 performs very well in this test, being only second to the Radeon HD 5870 when overclocked. The only exception is the resolution of 2560x1600 where the overclocked frequencies cannot help the G200b-based solution match the Radeon HD 4890.
We disabled the integrated frame rate limiter in the game console for the sake of comparing the cards. The game’s built-in benchmarking options do not provide information about the bottom speed, so there is no such info in the diagrams.
Overclocking does wonders to the ASUS card, helping it beat the Radeon HD 5870 at the two lower resolutions. Starting from 1920x1200 AMD’s solution goes ahead, though. The gap increases more at 2560x1600. Despite the impressive result, there is no practical sense in overclocking for Quake Wars even if you’ve got a 30-inch monitor. The difference between 70 and 90 frames per second cannot be observed due to the frame rate limit set at 30fps.
Far Cry 2 is a much more modern game. No wonder the new flagship product from AMD takes first place here. The overclocked Matrix GTX285 gets very close to the Radeon HD 5870 at 2560x1600, though. The difference is a mere 5% while the ASUS card has a higher bottom speed, which makes it a perfect choice for this shooter.
The game runs on the Source engine and has an integrated benchmark, but the latter does not report the bottom speed information.
If it were not for the Radeon HD 5870, the ASUS Matrix GTX285 might be called the best single-processor graphics card. Anyway, the overclocking with a software-based GPU voltage increase is rewarding: the average frame rate is 80fps at 2560x1600 which is more than enough even for a most demanding gamer.
To achieve a playable speed in this game we disabled FSAA and such resource-consuming options as Sun rays, Wet surfaces and Volumetric Smoke. We use the Enhanced full dynamic lighting (DX10) mode for our test and additionally enable the DirectX 10.1 mode for the ATI cards.
Enjoying a 12-16% lead over Nvidia’s reference sample depending on the resolution, the overclocked Matrix GTX285 nearly delivers a playable frame rate at 1920x1200. The software control over the GPU voltage does not open new opportunities here. Perhaps another sample of the card would have better overclockability.
The overall picture is the same as in Quake Wars. The overclocked ASUS is competing with the Radeon HD 5870 at low resolutions but the newer architecture eventually gains the upper hand. Every card makes the game playable even at a very high resolution, though.
The overclocked ASUS feels all right in Resident Evil 5, being almost as fast as the Radeon HD 5870 even at 1920x1200. The gap between them grows to a considerable 11% at 2560x1600 only. On the other hand, no gamer will ever feel the difference during actual gameplay.
We can only see a considerable difference between the overclocked Matrix GTX285 and Radeon HD 5870 at 2560x1600. But when it comes to practice, even the ordinary GeForce GTX 285 is quite enough for comfortable play.
When overclocked, the ASUS beats the Radeon HD 5870 at 1280x1024, but the latter goes ahead at 1680x1050 and leaves its opponent far behind at the higher resolutions. Overclocking brings a practical benefit for the Matrix GTX285 as its bottom speed grows up well at 2560x1600.
We use the in-game benchmarking tools that do not allow to measure the bottom frame rate. We also enable DirectX 10.1 support for ATI’s solutions.
H.A.W.X. is incompatible with AMD’s Adaptive AA algorithms, so Nvidia’s solutions are unrivalled here. The ASUS Matrix GTX285 wins easily, accelerating by 7-9% at resolutions up to 1920x1200 and by 15% at 2560x1600 when overclocked.
We turned on DirectX 11 support for the Radeon HD 5870.
Oddly enough, it is the GeForce GTX 285 that looks preferable for BattleForge due to the higher bottom speed, which makes playing the game much more comfortable. Overclocking the Matrix GTX285 does not provide conspicuous benefits even though the average frame rate grows up by 12-16%.
Amazingly, overclocking helps the ASUS card beat the Radeon HD 5870 in every resolution including 2560x1600. The gap is small, about 5-8%, but the older architecture is ahead of the newer one despite the latter’s advantage in computing resources. Both cards make the game playable at resolutions up to 1920x1200 inclusive.
We minimize the CPU’s influence by using the Extreme profile (1920x1200, 4x FSAA and anisotropic filtering). We also publish the results of the individual tests across all display resolutions to provide a full picture.
For all its PhysX support, the overclocked ASUS cannot match the Radeon HD 5870 with its 1600 ALUs. The overclocking at a higher GPU voltage does ensure a nice addition to the card’s score.
The individual tests do not show anything new. We can only see that the overclocked ASUS Matrix GTX285 is less than 1fps behind the Radeon HD 5870 at 1680x1050. The Nvidia G200 architecture has clearly exhausted its potential and cannot match AMD/ATI’s new architecture.
The ASUS Matrix GTX285 has performed well in our tests, although it is overall slower than AMD’s new single-chip flagship Radeon HD 5870. We did not focus on comparing them directly, though. Instead, we tried to see what unique features and opportunities the Matrix GTX285 could offer and we did find them. ASUS’ development team have come up with a truly unique GeForce GTX 285 that differs from most other G200b-based products available on the market today.
First of all, this product is unique as it comes from the Matrix series with its extended management capabilities. You can overclock and monitor the card’s parameters, control its GPU and memory voltages, fine-tune the memory subsystem and write your own settings into the BIOS with the option of rolling back in case of a failure. All of this makes the ASUS Matrix GTX285 a highly appealing choice for every user who likes to experiment with computer hardware. Here, your experimentation is going to be safe as opposed to, for example, hardware modification of a graphics card’s power circuitry.
Particularly, we easily boosted the performance of the Matrix GTX285 by 12-14% relative to Nvidia’s reference sample by simply using the iTracker 2 capabilities.
With this performance boost, the ASUS card was confidently first among single-chip DirectX 10 solutions, being just slightly inferior to the Radeon HD 4890 in certain tests and at certain resolutions, e.g. in Call of Duty: World at War and BattleForge. We want to remind you that other sample of Matrix GTX285 can be better or worse in terms of overclocking because overclocking is largely about luck.
We have to mention the drawbacks of the device, too. We don’t mind that the card proved to be somewhat hotter and louder than the reference GeForce GTX285 but the squeaking of the voltage regulator’s chokes and the odd behavior of our testbed’s PSU after we installed our Matrix GTX285 into it are a problem. Perhaps we had a defective or presale sample of the product, but we have to mention this anyway.
Summing everything up, the ASUS Matrix GTX285 is an exciting version of GeForce GTX 285 with lots of extra features that make it appealing for overclockers. Although it is not a premium-class solution after the release of the Radeon HD 5800 series anymore, it is an original graphics card that will surely find its customer.
Highs:
Lows: