Gigabyte GA660 Turbo Vrs. MSI 3DAGPhantom

Setup, Image Quality and Overclockability

Gigabyte GA660 vrs. MSI AGPhantom

Here is where the REAL differences bewteen these to cards come into play. Although the installation and set up of both cards was very straight forward, the outcome after we had them installed was markedly different. Here's how we set things up.

MSI AGPhantom

We installed the AGPhantom in our test bed machine without a hitch. The card had no problem handling the 124MHz. front Side Bus and the 82MHz. AGP Bus that the Abit BE6 generates at that setting with a 2/3 divider. The card was clocked at a standard 140MHz. Core and 155 Memory Clock. It was perfectly stable at this setting. We were also able to overclock the card up to 165 MHz. Core and 160 MHz. Memory clocks without one lock-up or visual artifact. I was surprised that the memory had such a limited margin but as soon as we took it up past 160MHz., "snow" would occur in 3D games. In general, this card was a stable and competent overclocker and it handled the higher AGP bus speeds well.

One somewhat bothersome issue was the Windows Desktop or 2D image quality. The desktop image was noticably more fuzzy and less crisp in all areas vrs. the GA660 Turbo. This was prevalent with both the stock MSI drivers and the latest reference drivers, so it seems to be a hardware issue. Those running 1024X768 desktops or smaller resolutions, should not have a problem. It was only at 1152X768 or above that the image became unstable.

Gigabyte GA660 Turbo

The Gigabyte GA660 Turbo was a "horse of a different color" all together. Perhaps it is because of it Electric Blue FR4 Material that they make the PCB out of but it goes a little further than that. As you noted in the previous page, the GA660 Turbo comes with two distinct features, the excellent FAN/Sink Combos on both front and BACK sides of the board and the "Turbo Jumper" for the Core and Memory clocks. This is where our fun began. For almost a day and a half I was pulling my hair out on why the GA660 would lock up in Quake2 and Quake3 but boot and run the Windows environment without a hitch. We tried everything including running the card at its standard 135/140 clocks without the Turbo Jumper. Everytime it locked. Then light dawned on our marble heads and we set the FSB clock on the Abit BE6 to 100MHz. which put our Pentium !!! 450 back to its specified speed. Like magic the GA660 ran all apps. without fuss. This allowed the AGP bus on the motherboard to run down at its specified 66MHz. clock. We then bumped up the FSB and left the divider on the BE6 at 2/3. We made it up to 115 MHz. FSB or 76 MHz. AGP bus speed without lock-ups. If we took the GA660 any higher, it would lock. However, we were able to run the board in "Tubo" Mode which allowed for a 156MHz. Core and Memory Clock, once we set the FSB clock back to 115 on the motherboard. Also, the board would not handle a higher core or memory clocks higher than "Turbo Mode" without locking up. Here is a shot of the Gigabyte Clock Slider Drivers in action...

This was a little dissapointing to say the least since we were so impressed by the GA660's excellent cooling solution. I get the feeling the thermal junction between the heat sink and TNT2 chip is not adequate for the application. Finally, the Desktop Image Quality for the GA660 Turbo was superb. It does a great job at displaying crisp text and rich graphics like most TNT2 based boards.

TNT2s Combusting here!