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The nVidia GTX460 has been well received both by the enthusiast community and hard to please critics. It is the first card in the Fermi range that everyone seems to agree is a fantastic buy, even when against competition from ATI.
We have already looked at the excellent GTX460 Superclocked Edition from eVGA and today we are going to analyse the newest offering from MSI, the N460GTX Cyclone which features 1GB of ram on a 256 bit memory interface (768mb version is 192 bit).
This Cyclone edition comes with a 51mhz overclock on the core (726mhz) with memory running at 900mhz (3600mhz effective).
The card features a rather eye catching circular ‘Cyclone' cooler, very reminiscent of a Zalman design. On a positive note you will be pleased to hear that all this modded goodness still hits a sweet spot of £200 including VAT. Actually just as we were going to press with this review the price dropped even further and you can pick it up now in the UK for just over £190 inc vat. Wozzers.
First, let us have a quick recap as to how this particular product compares with other cards in the nVidia line up.
| Model | Geforce GTX 460 768MB | MSI N460 GTX Cyclone 1GD5 | Geforce GTX 465 | Geforce GTX 470 | Geforce GTX 480 |
| Graphics Processing Clusters | 2 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 4 |
| Streaming Multiprocessors | 7 | 7 | 11 | 14 | 15 |
| CUDA Cores | 336 | 336 | 352 | 448 | 480 |
| Texture Units | 56 | 56 | 44 | 56 | 50 |
| ROP Units | 24 | 32 | 32 | 40 | 48 |
| Graphics Clock (Fixed Function Units) | 675mhz | 726mhz | 607mhz | 607mhz | 700mhz |
| Processor Clock (CUDA Cores) | 1350mhz | 1451mhz | 1215mhz | 1215mhz | 1401mhz |
| Memory Clock (Clock Rate/Data Rate) | 900mhz/3600mhz | 900mhz/3600mhz | 802mhz/3206mhz | 837mhz/3348 mhz | 924 mhz/3696mhz |
| Total Video Memory | 768MB | 1024MB | 1024MB | 1280MB | 1536MB |
| Memory Interface | 192-bit | 256-bit | 256-bit | 320-bit | 384-bit |
| Total Memory Bandwidth | 86.4GB/s | 115.2GB/s | 102.6 GB/s | 133.9 GB/s | 177.4 GB/s |
| Texture Filtering Rate (Bilinear) | 37.8 Gigatexels/sec | 37.8 Gigatexels/sec | 26.7 Gigatexels/sec | 34.0 GigaTexels/sec | 42.0 GigaTexels/sec |
| Fabrication process | 40nm | 40nm | 40nm | 40nm | 40nm |
| Connectors | 2x Dual Link DVI-I1x Mini HDMI | 2x Dual Link DVI-I1x Mini HDMI | 2x Dual Link DVI-I1x Mini HDMI | 2x Dual Link DVI-I1x Mini HDMI | 2x Dual Link DVI-I1x Mini HDMI |
| Form Factor | Dual Slot | Dual Slot | Dual Slot | Dual Slot | Dual Slot |
| Power Connectors | 2x6pin | 2x6pin | 2x6pin | 2x6pin | 1x6pin, 1x8pin |
| Recommended Power Supply | 450 watts | 450 watts | 550 watts | 550 watts | 650 watts |
| Thermal Design Power | 150 watts | 150 watts | 200 watts | 215 watts | 250 watts |
| Thermal Threshold | 104c | 104c | 105c | 105c | 105c |
That card is extremely impressive, the GTX460 pricing is so good too.
MSI are kicking ass in 2010, no doubt about it. loved all the products you guys have reviewed here in the last couple of months.
Very good review, and what an overclock!
The cooler looks very like a Zalman design, glad you spotted that also. Wonder if they had a hand in this card. Where the hell are Zalman lately anyway?
Its hard to fault the GTX460 and these third party designs are pushing the box even further.
Wicked, very good price for such a modded design.
MSI are really using high quality components arent they? shows in all their products we are seeing lately.
Well this is my new card, once I can find it for sale.
Love the design, remember my zalman GFX cooler years ago, this looks very similar.
Damn, thats a sexy card. the price makes them such a good deal, not far from hd5850 in highly overclocked states either.
I would never have contemplated MSI for a graphics card, not until recently anyway.
Seems like a good value for money video card. the market is so competitive in 2010, I love to see it.
This card overclocks like a mofo, wonder if they hand picked it for kitguru however ?
Great review and I love the look of this baby.
This is a lovely looking product and well priced. I hope to see more from MSI in the future in this price point.
That is such a well made product really but they have stiff competition from other GTX460 makers
Well im glad to see the 1gb version has keep the MSI flag flying high, the 768mb model got good reviews also.
This begs the question, why the hell did nvidia make a 768mb version anyway, it seems so pointless really.
This seems to be a good price for value for money, under 200 now gives such good offerings to the end user. over 200 seems pointless unless you need 30 inch screen resolutions when gaming.
Seems a good first choice this, ATI are weak at 199. which is weird for them. 5850 needs to drop to 200 now.
Very nice product that. good pricing from MSI also, should sell well cause I want one 🙂
It actually shows how competitive the market is in 2010 at this time, 3 years ago, a card like this would have been a high end board.
ROP of GTX 460 1GB GPU should be 32 units.
Texture Filtering Rate (Bilinear) should be 37.8 as well.