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To see it in person you can’t help but feel a sense of awe and wonder. This card comes in at about 13 inches in length and takes up three PCI expansion slots. At this size there aren’t a lot of cases that will even accommodate this beast. For our testing purposes we had it set up on our open air test rig. This is how we usually test new cards, but this time it was also one of the only ways we could have tested it.
This card also weighs more than any other card we’ve ever tested. We didn’t actually take the time to weigh it, but I’ve been doing this for a while now and this is definitely the heaviest card I’ve ever held. I really wouldn’t feel comfortable having this hanging off of a vertically standing motherboard. I’m not saying that the weight of the card would damage your motherboard, but I just wouldn’t feel too comfortable putting that much stress on it. This card really should be installed on a motherboard that will be sitting in a horizontal position. This is also how our test bench is set up as well.
Asus has really gone all out in terms of the way this card looks and how it’s cooled. You can see their ROG branding all over it. This card also features a very nice dual cooling solution with dual 120mm fans. For the heat sinks there are lots of copper pipes and aluminum fins to draw the heat away from the dual GTX 580 GPUs that this card features. This not only looks good, but is absolutely necessary to provide proper cooling for these hot GPUs. This card’s cooling solution is also a big reason on why it’s so heavy and why it needs to take up three expansion slots. You can really feel and see the quality that Asus put into this amazing card.
As I’ve already stated, this is a dual GPU card that features two GTX 580s in SLI. This card isn’t for the budget or value oriented consumer. This card is strictly marketed toward the extreme enthusiast and the collector. Asus has produced a limited number of these cards for this reason. They know that there aren’t going to be very many that will even be able to purchase, let alone use a card like this. It’s absolutely enormous and the fact that it requires three 8 pin power connectors proves that this is going to need a quality power supply and good air flow to run it properly. If you happen to be looking for a card that will really make your rig stand out, and you don’t mind paying a premium price for it, then this card is definitely for you. Just make sure that your rig is able to meet the necessary requirements. I wouldn’t look at using anything less than a good full tower case and at least a 900 watt power supply.
