VGA Card Buyer's Guide 07/2003

Leadtek WinFast A350 TD MyVIVO

The Leadtek WinFast A250 TD MyVIVO is based on NVIDIA's most recent 3D chip, the GeForceFX 5900, a.k.a. NV35. NVIDIA has addressed all of the drawbacks and problems of its predecessor, the FX 5800 (NV30). Thanks to the 256 bit memory bus, the memory bottleneck is history. Besides, this chip only requires DDR-I memory, also reducing the heat dissipation to more acceptable levels.

Once again, we find Leadtek's innovative aluminum card casing solution, which the card shares with the A300 models: Leadtek has solved the problem of cooling the card in a very unusual and elegant manner. The entire card resides in an aluminum housing that sports a pair of fans. The first of these two fans acts as an intake for cool air, while the second one expels the hot air from within the aluminum casing. Inside, a large heatsink with many fine cooling fins covers both the GPU and the memory chips and dissipates the heat into the airflow created by the fans. This heatsink is designed significantly differently than those of the A300 models, though. The cover on the back of the card acts as an additional large heatsink. Again, like the A300 versions, this card is on the heavy side.