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Graphics Card Reviews: 2007 - 2011 >
Régis Jehl
Test date: July 28, 2010
The card at a glance

For the tests, we used the Zotac GeForce GTX 465 GT. No extras here. This model exactly mirrors the stock card design. The only difference being the Zotac sticker.

There are two DVI connectors and a mini-HDMI connector. There's not a great deal bundled in either: power supply adaptors, a DVI-VGA converter, a CD - better to go for the latest drivers on NVIDIA's site - and a rapid installation guide.

NVIDIA advantages

The strong point of NVIDIA cards is of course the compatibility with other "in-house technologies". 3D Vision first of all allows you to do your gaming in 3D. For this, you'll also need a 3D screen aswell as the 3D Vision kit that includes the obligatory glasses. Note however that we would advise a more powerful graphics card for 3D, without which you'll struggle to get your framerate up in some games.

Next comes PhysX support that allows you to add more elaborate graphics effects in several compatible games.

There's also another innovation: 3D Vision Surround which is the NVIDIA version of ATI Eyefinity. It allows you to do your gaming across 3 screens simultaneously. The drivers allow you to fuse the screens you have to give a higher definition display area.

3D Surround and 3D Vision can be combined. You do however need at least two GeForce GTX 470s for a 3D three screen set up, as well as the 3D Vision kit. Only for a handful of wealthy nutters then!

Finally NVIDIA also highlights the acceleration of processing for various pieces of software that allow you to use the graphics card to carry out the processing. While individual consumers rarely use this type of application, the enterprise market does, with 3D rendering, photo and other software.


Third model in NVIDIA's Fermi range, the GeForce GTX 465 is targetting the ATI Radeon HD 5850. DirectX 11, PhysX and 3D Vision are of course advantages with NVIDIA cards but is that enough to unsettle the competition, already on the market for several months?

Size, noise and heat generation

Identical in appearance to the GTX 470, the 465 measures 24.5 cm in length. The cooling system is identical and still double decker. Note however, it looks as if this standard cooler is rapidly being replaced by the manufacturer's own models. Something to keep an eye on.

Although the GeForce GTX 470 and GTX 480 were certainly not quiet, here things are different. Far from being inaudible, the fan on this model is much easier to bear. At idle, we took a reading of 42.8 dB(A), identical to the GeForce GTX 470. In intense 3D activity, we took a reading of 54.8 dB(A) which is pretty good and won't be too disturbing for anyone in the same room as you.

Energy consumption

No miracles in terms of power consumption - what we have here is quite a high energy consumption graphics card. At idle, we scored it at 102W for the whole configuration and 332 W in intense 3D load. No comparison to the 84 W and 266 W readings we took for the Radeon HD 5850.

Gaming performance

Generally speaking, the GeForce GTX 465 1 GB offers slightly lower performance to the ATI Radeon HD 5850 1 GB. In absolute terms it remains a good performer and gives plenty to run the most demanding games in very good conditions.

Overall performance average
Click on the image to gain access to our readings
and compare this model to other cards

In Battleforge (DX11) for example, with a 1920 x 1200 pixel resolution, all filters activated, we measure the GeForce at an average of 22 fps against 33 fps for the Radeon. In some of the other games the NVIDIA card takes the lead, such as with Far Cry 2, with 52 fps against just 45 fps for the the ATI.

As ever, we invite you to take a look at our graphics card face-off for a breakdown of our test results in detail. You'll find the results for each card across a panel of 9 games and 3 resolutions, with and without texturing filters. Data on energy consumption, noise and heat is also available. Finally a summary table of performances is also available.

In conclusion, the GeForce GTX 465 is one more card in the Fermi series that still has the same bagage in terms of advantages (see inset) and disadvantages at the higher-end 470 and 480. The pure performance of the card places it a long way behind the Radeon HD 5850 and aggressive pricing will be needed if NVIDIA really hopes to push this model.

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Pluses

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Good performance in games

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DirectX 11 compatible

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3D Vision and 3D Surround

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Acceleration of processing with CUDA compatible applications

Minuses

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High energy consumption

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Heats up

4
It's not certain that the GeForce GTX 465 will find a big customer base. Dominated by the Radeon HD 5850 in gaming and in terms of economy of energy, it will only make up any ground though the popularity of third party NVIDIA technology (3D Vision etc.) Will only be worth a punt if the price comes down.

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