Overall and Final Verdict
When I took a look at the GTX 780 at its launch I was impressed both with its performance as well as the overall quality of its design. Improving on both of those was going to be a tall order, but I feel the MSI did a good job on both with their GTX 780 Gaming. The bump in gaming performance that we saw from its overclock was very impressive on top of an already good performing card. Even more impressive was the MSI GTX 780 Gaming’s performance when it came to cooling and noise levels. Not only did MSI improve on the cooling of the card, but they did it while keeping the noise down in comparison to the reference card.
Really my only complaints about the card were trivial in comparison to the cards benefits. For example, one of the con’s I noted was that the PCB isn’t completely black to match the rest of the card’s styling, at the end of the day this doesn’t change its performance and it still looks good. The same goes for the other con noted mentioning the designs higher heatsink height. The additional height isn’t going to affect 99% of the people who will be considering the card. That goes to show you how good of a design MSI put together with the GTX 780 Gaming when that is all I could complain about.
On top of the performance and the cards styling, MSI also bundled along with it their afterburner software suite. With afterburner you can see what your card or cards are up too and also overclock as needed. They also include an easy to use app that lets you select overclock performance for the GTX 780 Gaming in a way similar to the OC Genie that MSI motherboards are known for. If that wasn’t enough, they also include functionality that lets you record your screen, saving you money on Fraps. Nvidia is getting ready to introduce a similar program for their own software as well, but for now MSI has you covered.
So what does all of this cost you? Well stock speed reference cards are running 649.99 and if you look around overclocked reference designs are $10 more at $659.99. So I was a little surprised to see that the MSI GTX 780 Gaming priced at $659.99 as well. It was already a good option but pricing it in line with overclocked reference designs makes this a steal. To give you an idea, currently the only other overclocked GTX 780 with an aftermarket heatsinks are running $679 and $799 (watercooled). If you are on the market for a GTX 780, the MSI GTX 780 Gaming aka N780 TF 3GD5/OC should be at the top of your list to check out.
