The first thing we noticed was the width of the card. There is a 20mm extension to the standard width of a GTX970 which houses a slanted light unit fully integrated into the design of the card. the brace that holds the three fans in place is reminiscent of carbon fibre with the outer most fans having light ID inserts.


The rear of the card carries on the Carbon fibre theme this time on the back of an aluminium backplate protecting most of the components beneath. There are some cutouts though allowing us to see the 3 Power Boost modules and OC+ unit.


The card measures at the longest points 300mm in length and 120mm in width which is both longer and wider than most graphics cards in the market today.




The inner most fan is shaped slightly different to the two outer fans which have a defined twist to the fan blade profiling.


To power this graphics card you will need a PSU rated to 500W and while ZOTAC provide two twin 6pin-8pinPCIE power cables which is fine for moderate use, if you intend on overclocking heavily we would recommend a beefier power supply with dedicated 8pin cables.


As with other GTX 970's, the AMP! Extreme is multi SLI capable.


The I/O area differs from most GTX 970's in that this version features 1xHDMI, 3xDP, 1x DVI.


One of the endearing attractions of this card and specifically the 'Ice Storm' cooler is the Light I.D feature. A simple yet effective LED effect alternates between green and red to indicate idle and load states. If you're not a fan of LEDs lighting up your GPU then this can of course be turned off via software and the card doesn't look any worse for it, just a lot more discreet.

Overall, we really liked the look of this card. Be under no illusions that this card is huge but in terms of length and girth but we feel this only adds to the appeal regardless of the excessiveness. The carbon fibre effect compliments the aesthetics with the black trim rounding off a very polished looking product.