MSI N260GTX OC V3 Review - PAGE 1

The PC gaming gods have been in a benevolent mood lately. They have recently bestowed on us Street Fighter IV, Arma II, Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood, Ghostbusters, Prototype -- and not to mention, the Fallout 3 mods are still coming on strong, and Batman lurks right around the corner. And if there is just only one thing that the PC gaming gods ask for in return, it is a good gaming video card to keep these games running smoothly.

In an effort to to help you appease the gods, today we will be looking at a new video card. This time around it is a GTX 260, from MSI.

Fortunately it is not merely another GTX 260. MSI has put some elbow grease into delivering a enhanced GTX 260 -- a little something they like to call the N260GTX OC V3 T2D896. This is not MSI's first N260GTX however -- don't be confused with earlier stock that still may be on store shelves, which is based much more closely on the reference design, and has a stock cooler. Today's N260GTX has a pretty mean cooler on it, a trick or two up its sleeves, and certainly more interesting to talk about.

The GTX 260 cards are NVIDIA's first line of defense, it seems, on the video card shelves. Ever since the early boost NVIDIA gave the GTX 260, when they unlocked some more of the GPU, giving it 216 shaders instead of the earlier 192, the GTX 260 has been in the battle against ATI's HD 4870, and to a much lesser extent, the HD 4890. There is never a clear winner in these struggles -- it always comes down to the card themselves. This extra-fierce competition has lead to some remarkable video card designs this generation of cards, with all companies pushing their limits to try to deliver eye-catching products.

MSI looks like they really put some extra hours in, to come up with today's N260GTX. So let's put on our favorite monocle and check it out.