Gigabyte GTX 560 Ti SOC
The part that prompted today’s roundup, Gigabyte’s “Super Overlocked” part number GV-N560SO-1GI received kudos in its first appearance for its ability to mimic a far-more-expensive GeForce GTX 570 in some games. Its SLI capability is still limited to a maximum of two cards however, since all GeForce GTX 560 Tis only support only a single bridge connection.
This might also be one of the most decoratively-styled GeForce GTX 560 Ti products, with a canted-fan quad-heat pipe cooler designed to increase inlet space between cards and air velocity towards the exhaust.
Gigabyte’s design resembles that of its rival Asus, right down to power connector placement and phase count, though enough exceptions exist that we can tell this is also an independently-produced part.
Extreme overclocking would be needed for Gigabyte to legitimize its performance claims, and this card's GPU is pushed nearly 22% beyond the GeForce GTX 560 Ti’s standard frequency. The memory, however, is only 14% over stock, so it’s unlikely that real-world games will scale as well as the aggressive graphics processor overclock.
We looked up e-tail photos of the GV-N560SO-1GI to confirm that Gigabyte is indeed supplying this card with a mini-to-full HDMI cable, rather than an adapter block, along with a DVI-I to VGA adapter block and two four-pin-to-PCIe power adapters. Our early sample was shipped prior to the final packaging, leaving us without a photo of our own.