EVGA e-GeForce 9600 GT SSC

In stock form, the GeForce 9600 GT is a pretty potent performer, besting the GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB in performance despite the fact that it sports just 64 shaders. But with a little bit of overclocking, the 9600 GT can nearly match the performance of the more expensive, 112 stream processor GeForce 8800 GT 512MB! This is precisely what EVGA’s GeForce 9600 GT SSC accomplished in our GeForce 9600 GT Performance Preview article a few months ago.

The e-GeForce 9600 GT SSC is EVGA’s flagship GeForce 9600 GT card, it boasts the fastest clocks they offer. Specifically the card is clocked at 740MHz on the GPU – nearly 100MHz higher than the stock GeForce 9600 GT – while its stream processors operate at 1850MHz. Finally, the card’s memory runs at 975MHz, a clock speed which is 75MHz higher than the stock GeForce 9600 GT reference specifications.

The card relies entirely on NVIDIA’s reference board design and cooling for the GeForce 9600 GT. Hardware-wise, EVGA makes no modifications to the design of the board itself. The reference cooler is the same one used on the GeForce 8800 GT, so it’s essentially overbuilt for the 9600 GT, which consumes less power and thus generates less heat than the 8800 GT. Here it’s important to note that the cooler is based on NVIDIA’s second-gen 8800 GT fan, and not the original fan that was notorious for running hot. The 2nd-gen fan is a little larger than the original, yet still operates at the same RPMs so noise output is similar.


Besides the SSC, EVGA produces three additional GeForce 9600 GT SKUs.

Sitting just below the SSC is the e-GeForce 9600 GT with dual-slot cooling. This board is designed for enthusiasts who want even better cooling than the stock 9600 GT cooler and don’t mind giving up an expansion slot to accomplish this. EVGA actually produces two dual-slot 9600 GT cards, one with 512MB of memory and a second card with 1GB of memory. Both cards run at the stock GeForce 9600 GT speeds though, so technically the SSC is EVGA’s fastest 9600 GT variant, although obviously with dual-slot cooling the idea is that you could potentially OC these boards to SSC speeds, yet remain at lower temperatures. The SSC card actually sells for slightly less than EVGA’s dual-slot 9600 GT card right now, so if you crave performance, you may actually want to save a few bucks and get the SSC.


While EVGA has bundled Crysis with many of their cards in the past, to keep costs down EVGA skips a game bundle for all of their GeForce 9600 GT boards. Hardware accessories bundled with the card include two DVI adapters, a component video cable, S-Video cable, and power cable.