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THE
BOARD:
Physical
inspection of the Leadtek Winfast GeForce 3 reveals
some welcome findings...
Looking at the front
plate, you'll see that this board is equipped with a
standard DB15 analog monitor connector, a TV-Out
connector and a DVI connector. Of special
interest is the newer Conexant encoder which allows
for maximum TV-Output resolution of 1024x768.
We did not test the TV-Out function, but commend
Leadtek for taking this extra step...most other
GeForce 3s are only capable of a maximum resolution
of 800x600 when outputting to a television.
Another, very obvious
feature of the Leadtek Winfast GeForce 3 TD is it's
oversized heatsink / fan combo. Leadtek has
outfitted this board with a very large aluminum
cooler, mounted with two plastic spring clips at
opposing corners.
A
heatsink / fan combo's effectiveness can be greatly
enhanced, or hindered, depending on what Thermal
Interface Material (TIM) is used. When we
removed the heatsink from our board we were very
pleased to find thermal grease! And for once,
an adequate amount was used to allow for proper
contact between the core and heatsink! We
applaud Leadtek for taking this simple, yet very
effective extra step.
In the
picture of the GeForce 3 chip above, you'll also
notice the extra etching of Leadtek's website found
on the RAM heatsinks. What's so special about
that? Well, nothing, but if we didn't remove the cooler we
would never have seen these etchings. They
don't perform any function, but it is the attention
to detail that pleased us.
While we're on the
subject of Leadtek's RAM-sinks, we must mention they
are probably not as effective as those found on
many other GeForce 3s because they lack any fins and
are relatively small. With a much smaller
surface area than the RAM-sinks found on most other
GeForce 3s, their ability to cool the RAM is greatly
reduced. This is not necessarily a problem though.
Our Gigabyte GeForce 3 sample did not have any
RAM-sinks and it was just as stable and reached
similar overclocked speeds.
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3DMark 2001,
Quake 3, FSAA, Aquanox and Dronez Testing |
