KitGuru KitGuru.net – Tech News | Hardware News | Hardware Reviews | IOS | Mobile | Gaming | Graphics Cards
Sparkle. Not a name that may immediately spring to mind when discussing a new video card release, however there was a time when they had some market presence in Europe. The company are refocusing their strategy and relaunching their brand name with a series of exciting, upcoming video cards. Today we are looking at their GTX650 OC Dragon Series, which is supplied in a pre-overclocked state. This card looks to be ideal for a high performance, cool running media center and today we put it through the paces.
It may not be well known however Sparkle have been used as an OEM for EVGA, Chaintech and Point of View solutions in the past.
They clearly have some talent when it comes to producing graphics cards so today we aim to find out if the GTX650 OC Dragon Series is worth the modest £90 asking price.
While it is always fun to review £500 flagship graphics cards, the sub £100 market is one of the most important for both AMD and Nvidia. Remember, they sell a huge volume of video cards to a wide audience who just want an inexpensive, yet capable video card.
The Sparkle GTX650 OC Dragon Series solution looks to be ideal for a low cost enthusiast gaming system or media center, but can it power gaming engines at true 1080p resolutions? Today we aim to find out.
| Product | Nvidia GTX670 | Gigabyte GTX 660 Ti OC Windforce | Sparkle GTX650 OC Dragon Series | MSI GTX660 OC Twin Frozr |
| Transistors | 3540m | 3540m | 1300m | 3540m |
| Core Clock | 915 mhz+ | 1033 mhz+ | 1058mhz (1098mhz) | 980mhz+ (1033mhz+) |
| Memory clock | 1,502mhz | 1,502mhz | 1250mhz | 1502mhz |
| Shaders | 1344 | 1344 | 384 | 960 |
| ROPs | 32 | 24 | 16 | 24 |
| Memory | 2GB | 2GB | 1GB | 2GB |
| Memory bus width | 256 bit | 192 bit | 128 bit | 192 bit |
The Sparkle GTX650 OC Dragon Series is supplied in an overclocked state , with a core clock increase from 1,058mhz on the reference card to 1,098mhz. The card ships with 1GB of 1,250mhz GDDR5 (5GBps effective) which is connected across a 128 bit memory interface.
Seems like a decent card for the money. good for a media center, but may they will bring out a single slot version.
Its a good point, I remember when a low end card struggled to get good frame rates at 1280×1024.
> It is worth pointing out that onboard graphics solutions just don’t make the grade for me, as I crave the highest image quality possible, only achievable from either Nvidia or AMD discrete solutions.
This might be about to change with the release of AMD’s desktop trinity parts (rumoreded for the 1st of October)
I would really like to see this card tested at more appropriate resolution and details. Its a $100 card its not meant to push 8AA@fullhd res.
The fact it can though is pretty incredible ! I was amazed to see it can cope with many engines at 1080p. I dont know anyone who games at 720p anymore anyway. but you can be sure it will cope with it if it can at 1080p