Nvidia Releases Flagship GeForce GTX 590 Graphics Card

Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 590 GPU is aimed at gaming enthusiasts, yet it leverages Nvidia’s parallel processing capabilities with its combined 1024 CUDA cores. The 11-inch GTX 590 card comes with a 384-bit memory interface, 3 GB of GDDR5 memory, dual slots, and four video outputs. Users will be able to play DX11 games on up to four different displays at 2560x1600 pixel resolution, or on up to three 3D displays at 5760x1080 pixel resolution using Nvidia 3D Vision and Surround technology.

"The GTX 590 is the best dual GPU product ever built," said Drew Henry, general manager of GeForce GPU business at Nvidia, in a statement. "With leading performance, support for multi-monitor 3D gaming, Quad SLI, and an acoustic envelope that begs to be heard for how quiet it is, the GTX 590 epitomizes what a perfect dual graphics card looks, performs, and sounds like."

Nvidia’s GTX 590 comes with an optional Quad SLI gaming mode for gamers leveraging two units for additional graphics performance, as well as a cooling system and dual vapor chambers to keep the powerful card from becoming too loud or over-heating. Nvidia says its GTX 590 is 2x quieter than it’s competitor’s cards, presumably AMD’s dual-core Radeon family, running at about 48 decibels of sound.

Taiwanese manufacturer Asus launched its own version of the GTX 590 GPU at a suggested MSRP of $699 to customers in North America. Asus is distributing Nvidia’s new flagship graphics chip alongside Asus motherboards with support for NVIDIA’s Quad SLI technology.

Although Nvidia said distributors including EVGA, Gainward, Gigabyte, Inno3D, MSI, POV, Palit, and Zotac will offer the GeForce GTX 590, Asus said it holds exclusive rights with Nvidia in the North American market. “I will note we are excited at being a co-exclusive vendor in North America for Nvidia’s new flagship GPU,” said Jose Guerrero III, Senior Technical Marketing Specialist, in an e-mail to CRN. “This continues ASUS focus on bringing the premier graphics cards in the industry to market. In addition, it continues to show we are premier partner with Nvidia in delivery there latest technologies to the marketplace.”

Asus earlier this month launched its own version of the main competitor to Nvidia’s high-end GeForce GTX 590, namely AMD’s flagship Radeon 6990 GPU , which belongs to the Antilles family of AMD graphics cards. In comparison to Nvidia’s new offering, Radeon AMD’s Radeon 6990 card features 3,072 stream processors, 192 texture units, 64 ROPs, and 830-MHz core clock speed, and starts at the same price as Nvidia’s GTX 590: $699.