X-bit labs

GeCube RADEON 9600 XT “Extreme” Graphics Card Review (page 3)

Category: Video

by Alexey Stepin

[ 02/15/2004 | 05:00 PM ]

Closer Look

The cooling system of GeCube RADEON 9600 XT “Extreme” has nothing in common with any other they usually install on RV360-based cards. Frankly speaking, I wouldn’t call this cooling system completely new. It looks more like a variation of the reference cooler installed onto RADEON 9800 XT.

This time we have a smaller fan, while the heatsink is made of aluminum rather than copper. This should be enough, considering the low heat dissipation of the R360. If we dealt with an ordinary RADEON 9600 XT, I would even call this solution superfluous. We deal, however, with an Extreme product, so the choice of the cooling system may be appropriate. We will learn if this is true or not shortly.

The cooling system of GeCube RADEON 9600 XT “Extreme” contacts the VPU surface through a layer of thermal compound, which resembles the Cooler Master Premium stuff from Shin Etsu in its color and consistence. There is also a protective frame that should prevent the fragile edges of the graphics chip against physical damage. That’s good as the cooling system is heavy enough.

The memory chips give their heat to the heatsink through rubber-like thermal pads. I really doubt their heat-conductive properties, but their elasticity helps to create a tighter contact with the chips than when ordinary thermal paste is applied in between. The memory on the backside of the PCB has also been taken care of: a small aluminum heatsink is mounted on each pair of chips. The heatsink is small, but many RADEON 9600 XT-based cards go around without any heatsinks on memory chips at all.

The PCB design of GeCube RADEON 9600 XT “Extreme” breaks away from the original reference design of RADEON 9600 XT:

As you see, nearly every square inch of the PCB has gone through redesign, which is especially visible in the components of the power circuitry (they must have been enforced to provide stability at higher frequencies).

We don’t see a spot for the daughter card, but there’s a landing-place for a Rage Theater chip instead that’s responsible for the VIVO functionality. Curiously, the place for the power connector remained intact, although all RV350/360-based cards don’t actually require external power. The back side of the PCB also differs from the reference design, however slightly: we have different chips and in different locations than by the reference design.

Now about the “Extreme” title. When applied to a graphics card, it usually means that the card works at higher frequencies or has memory with lower access time onboard. In this case, we have both: chips from Samsung with an access time of 2.5ns work at 350MHz (700MHz DDR) (the graphics chip frequency remained standard, 500MHz). Theoretically, this memory can work at 400MHz (800MHz DDR), but the simple PCB design may become a hitch. We will check this out soon.