Inno3D GeForce 7600 GST Review

Conclusions

We were really impressed by GeForce 7600 GST, as it delivers what it promises: it is a video card with a performance level near GeForce 7600 GT but costing less. In almost all scenarios GeForce 7600 GT and GeForce GST achieved the same performance level and when GeForce 7600 GT was faster, it was only around 5% faster. Only in one situation GeForce 7600 GT was really faster than GeForce 7600 GST, and this was on 3DMark03 at 1600×1200 enabling the maximum image quality settings (the performance difference there was of 14%). We must make it clear that GeForce 7600 GST has nothing to do with the regular GeForce 7600 GS. As you can see on our results, the performance difference between them is huge: 20%, 30%, 40%, 50% or even more, depending on the program and configuration.

Also, GeForce 7600 GST achieved a performance similar to high-end video cards from NVIDIA’s previous family, like GeForce 6800 GS and GeForce 6800 GT. GeForce 7600 GST also kept Radeon X1600 XT eating dust.

With this video card you will be able to play games in high resolutions enabling video quality settings a little bit. Of course if you want to play at 1600×1200 or above with all image quality settings enabled with a very high performance, you will need to by a high-end – and more expensive – video card.

The magic behind GeForce 7600 GST is quite simple. Inno3D got a 7600 GT PCB and memories and soldered a cheaper GPU, GeForce 7600 GS, on it. You won’t achieve the same overclocking level on a regular GeForce 7600 GS simply because you won’t find the 1.4 ns Infineon memories on any GeForce 7600 GS. The specs are completely different: while on regular GeForce 7600 GS the memory runs at 800 MHz, on this VGA the memory runs at 1.4 GHz, a 75% clock increase. The memory chips that come with the regular GeForce 7600 GS simply can’t support this overclocking.

We have already stated that we think GeForce 7600 GT is definitely the best mid-range VGA card available today. As the price difference between GeForce 7600 GST and GeForce 7600 GT can be huge depending where you quote them (GeForce 7600 GST has a suggested price of USD 169 as GeForce 7600 GT average price is of USD 211.50 – you can find it around USD 180 on TigerDirect.com, though), buying this GeForce 7600 GST is a no-brainer if you want a performance almost like GeForce 7600 GT and want to save some money. However, if you find GeForce 7600 GST costing more than its suggested price, forget about it. In this case we recommend you to buy a real GeForce 7600 GT at TigerDirect.com.

The problem with GeForce 7600 GST – and that’s a huge problem – is that it is very hard to find this video card in the USA. Inno3D sent us a list of official distributors in the US and none of them were carrying this VGA. Actually no US-based price comparison websites (Shopping.com, PriceGrabber.com and Pricewatch.com) list Inno3D products. Froogle.com does but for a Hong Kong-based on-line store that has presence in the US but isn’t carrying this video card.  Oh yes. Besides Hong Kong – Inno3D’s hometown – we found it being sold in Australia.

InnoVision, the company behind Inno3D, has to solve this huge distribution issue if they want to grow.

The bottom line: great product if you are able to find it.