There can be no doubting the ASUS HD6770 DirectCU Silent is a great looking card. Not only that but it is also very effective at cooling, especially if you have a case with moderate airflow. So it's mission successful for ASUS then? Well not quite.
The HD5770 was great, a bargain for the most part and while it was never meant to compete with the big boys, it was quite a capable unit considering the price. Move forward two years to today and we see a rehash of the HD5770 with little performance increase in the form of the HD6770. So while the HD6770 is a good card, it cannot hope to compete with todays mid/high range graphics cards. Not that I expected it to you understand but what worked with the HD5770, bang per buck and able to punch above its weight, todays graphics cards have had two years to improve their performance while the HD5770/6770 have stood still. The gap in performance has therefore widened to such an extent which makes the HD6770 a difficult proposition to recommend. At 1920x1200 the card clearly struggled in most of the tests, I began to test at 2560x1600 for giggles but the encompassing slideshow was just too much for my poor eyes to take. I did run the card at 1680x1050 and it fared much better with most games resulting in playable framerates however, anything above this resolution, especially with AA enabled, the card really began to struggle with framerates dropping below what I would regards as being playable. With today’s most popular resolution (According the Steam) being 1900x1080, the card doesn't quite cut it for the 'majority'.
So who is this card for? Well, I would like to say it's ideal for a HTPC due to the low noise. Note I said low not 0dB for the card did emit a slight electrical buzz when placed under load despite the Super Alloy VRM. Fortunately for ASUS, the case fans in the test rig all but drowned that little noise out but in a HTPC, which are inherently quieter setups than an enthusiast setup, a buzz like that would soon become very irritating. Not only that but the sheer size of the card would restrict its use to a large HTPC chassis.
What the card does offer is very good cooling at (almost) 0dB levels. It can perform adequately at mid-range resolutions and it's also capable of playable framerates in some titles at higher resolutions. Just don't expect miracles, certainly if you value AA in the upper range on the most demanding games. If you are happy at gaming with a resolution of 1650x1080 or below then the card will serve you very well, especially if you value silence above all else. For the enthusiast who is looking to future proof there system then I would recommend you look elsewhere though as for a small increase in budget, the GTX560 or HD6850 make much more sense.
The one area that impressed me most about the ASUS HD6770 DirectCU Silent was the massive heatsink. With a couple of fans on there this would be a phenomenal cooling design and I have little doubt it could easily outperform other custom cooling designs on the market today. Sadly, cooling and looks amount to little if it doesn't have the performance to match so while I am happy to award todays review sample with our creative award for the cooling design, I cannot recommend the overall package as for the enthusiast it just doesn't quite produce the performance required by todays or indeed tomorrows consumer.
Pros:
+Excellent passive cooling
+Great looking
+Class leading packaging
+Small PCB
+Almost silent
+Good overclocking
Cons:
-Poor performance at mid-high resolutions
-Large cooler might be restrictive for some
-Electrical noise under high stress
+Excellent passive cooling
+Great looking
+Class leading packaging
+Small PCB
+Almost silent
+Good overclocking
Cons:
-Poor performance at mid-high resolutions
-Large cooler might be restrictive for some
-Electrical noise under high stress
Click here for an explanation of our awards at Vortez.net. Thanks to ASUS for providing todays review sample.