Conclusion

General		+	-
ASUS has created quite an interesting little piece of hardware with this DirectCU Mini graphics card. MiniITX are quite famous these days and more and more build logs of compact gaming PC's are emerging these days in hardware forums all around a globe. Therefore it make perfect sense that ASUS makes sure to deliver appropriate hardware for this niche. It's a fact, that graphics cards are the main reason why miniITX gaming PC's can't get anymore compact these days. Overall ASUS did a great job with their ultra compact GTX 670 DirectCU Mini. The small cooler is able to cope with the heat generated by the GK104 GPU but to be realistic we have to say, that it is a bit noisier than what we're used to from ASUS' DirectCU coolers. What we really think should be improved this card is being shipped with. ASUS could at least inclued one game code or maybe some cool, fancy accessories, like for example the door hangers you get with ROG boards these days.		- Design	- Bundle - Price
Cooling / Noise Level		+	-
GPU Temperatures were good with a maximum of 83°C under heavy FurMark load with the fans locked at 30 % fan speed. The noise levels are good too at 30 % (almost noiseless) and 50 % (Silent but audible) fan speed but at full speed the DirectCU Mini cooler is quite loud. Anyway unless you have tropical ambient temperature the fans won't go that high. After one hour gaming BattleField 3 the maximum fan speed measured was 49 % and GPU temperature 74°C. So in the end the DirectCU Mini cooler does a really good job for its size although it's obviously behind than ASUS' fully fledged DirectCU II.
Performance		+	-
Despite the fact, that this card comes with a factory overclocking, it's not faster than our reference GTX 670. This is the case because our reference GTX 670 has a typical boost clock of 1'084 MHz which is only a tiny bit less then what the GTX 670 DirectCU Mini OC from ASUS offers (1'110 MHz). That's why there is almost no measurable difference between these two cards. While taking a closer look at power consumption we noticed, that idle power consumption is very good compared to the reference card. The DirectCU Mini needs five Watt less than the reference model. To our surprise power consumption unter load was just the opposite. This little card was burning 16 Watt more than the fully grown DirectCU II Top card from ASUS!		- Power Consumption in idle	- Power Consumption under load
Recommendation		+	-
If you should be looking for a graphics card for an ultra compact gaming PC, then this card is perfectly suitable and is also the only one of its kind. On the other hand, checking the price reveals that this GTX 670 DirectCU Mini OC is listed for no less than 391 Euro on Geizhals.eu. Considering that the cheapest GTX 670 costs about 312 Euros these days, you have to pay quite a few buck extra to get a smaller PCB.		- MiniITX gaming setup
We gave the ASUS GTX 670 DirectCU Mini a solid 4 out of 5 stars.

Page 1 - Introduction	Page 13 - DIRT Showdown
Page 2 - Technical Data / Specifications	Page 14 - Far Cry 3
Page 3 - Preview & Delivery	Page 15 - Max Payne 3
Page 4 - Test Setup	Page 16 - Sleeping Dogs
Page 5 - 3DMark 11	Page 17 - The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Page 6 - 3DMark Fire Strike	Page 18 - The Witcher 2
Page 7 - Unigine Heaven 4.0	Page 19 - Power Consumption
Page 8 - BattleField 3	Page 20 - Fan Speed / Noise Level
Page 9 - Borderlands 2	Page 21 - Temps - Idle / FurMark / BF3
Page 10 - Bioshock Infinite	Page 22 - Performance/Price & Performance/Watt
Page 11 - Crysis 3	Page 23 - Conclusion
Page 12 - Call of Duty Black Ops 2

Discuss this article in the forums


Author: Christian Ney c.ney@ocaholic.ch