Review ZOTAC GeForce GTX 580 – The Fastest Single-GPU Card, Plus a Worthy Bonus

Except for the stickers on their coolers’ body, reference cards generally look identical to one another. The new GeForce GTX 580 is no exception. When you put these cards side-by-side, it becomes clear that every brand basically uses the same board design. Therefore, to increase the overall value of their reference-based products before the eyes of prospective buyers, some graphics card manufacturers rely on above-average accessory bundles. Zotac is trying to do just that with their GTX 580 by including some interesting items inside the box. Before we discuss their bonus in detail, let’s take a look at the card’s technical specification first.

Specifications

	NVIDIA GTX 580	ZOTAC GeForce GTX 580
Codename	GF110	GF110
Fabrication Process	40 nm	40 nm
Transistors	3 Milyar	3 Milyar
Die Size	320 mm²	320 mm²
Core Clock	772 MHz	772 MHz
Stream Processors (CUDA Core)	512	512
Shader Clock	1544 MHz	1544 MHz
Texture Units	64	64
ROPs	48	48
Memory Type	GDDR5	GDDR5
Memory Size	1536 MB	1536 MB
Memory Clock (effective)	4008 MHz	4008 MHz
Memory Interface	384-bit	384-bit
DirectX Version	11	11
Shader Model	5	5
Power Connectors	8-pin + 6-pin	8-pin + 6-pin
Min Recommended Power Supply	600 Watt	600 Watt
Bus Support	PCIe 2.1 x16	PCIe 2.1 x16
TDP	244 Watt	244 Watt
GPU Thermal Threshold	97 C	97 C

Zotac uses reference specification for their GeForce GTX 580 product. Every detail looks similar to NVIDIA’s standards.

Sales Package and Contents

This is the package box, bearing Zotac’s usual black-orange color theme design.

You will find these contents inside the box. Zotac provides two kinds of PCI Express power converters (molex to 6-pin and 2x 6-pin to 8-pin) along with a handy mini-HDMI to HDMI converter. Is that all? No, look at below pictures.

Zotac’s Boost Premium software bundle can be found inside the driver disc. It consists of several softwares, including vReveal (free), Nero Vision Xtra (30-day Trial), Cooliris, XBMC, Kylo, and ZOTAC FireStorm.

Tucked somewhere among the items is the “Prince of Persia: the Forgotten Sands” computer game. Since you’re going to spend a good couple of hundred dollars for a GTX 580, the game makes a very nice addition to Zotac’s overall package.