Introduction

Dusk

Dusk is Dawn's twin sister

Shake your groove thang Dusk

After publishing our GeForce FX 5900 Ultra Performance Preview one month ago, the most popular question we’ve received is “when will this card be available?” After GeForce FX 5800 Ultra failed to hit the market in significant quantities, a lot of you were wondering if the GeForce FX 5900 family would succumb to a similar fate.

Based on what we’ve seen, the answer is a definite no. eVGA’s GeForce FX 5900 Ultra has already been spotted at some e-tailers for $550 (including VIVO). NVIDIA has definitely delivered the goods this time around.

However, there aren’t many consumers willing to shell out $500+ for the latest graphics card. Only the most extreme of the hardcore crowd is what we’ve found in the past. If an alternative was available that delivered most of GeForce FX 5900 Ultra’s performance, but at a lower price point, a larger demographic of gamers would be able to afford NVIDIA’s latest and greatest graphics chip. That’s where NVIDIA’s GeForce FX 5900 128MB comes in.

Dusk is having a good time

More groovin

Dusk wireframe

Based on the same graphics core as GeForce FX 5900 Ultra, GeForce FX 5900 128MB offers all the graphical eye candy of NVIDIA’s flagship, but at a much lower price: $400 MSRP. $400 is still a lot to pay for a graphics card, but when you factor in the plethora of third-party board partners NVIDIA has on tap for GeForce FX 5900, prices will steadily fall to lower levels. MSI is one of these card manufacturers, and as we’ve seen in the past, they make some pretty outstanding graphics cards.

Butterflies

Dusk with more butterflies

Still dancing

Rather than relying solely on NVIDIA’s reference design for its products, MSI has implemented its own unique cooling system, known as T.O.P. Tech. T.O.P. Tech coolers incorporate copper cooling, rather than aluminum, for its superior thermal transfer properties. To increase the effectiveness of the graphics card’s fan, MSI mates the copper heatsink to a plastic duct which the hot air is directed through. This innovative design allows MSI to use a slower fan than other manufacturers, which typically operates around 2700 RPM, the end result is a graphics card that’s considerably quieter than other cards, in fact noise output is similar to the fan you’d find on your typical motherboard’s chipset!

MSI is back again with another distinctive cooling solution for GeForce FX 5900. In fact, they’ve put together quite an eye-catching package overall.

Dusk up close

Gotta love that outfit