The fifth card based on the GK104 GPU makes an appearance

May 29, 2012 06:54 GMT  ·  By

NVIDIA has yet to release all of its Kepler-based graphics adapters, which means that the web is on the lookout for whichever video card is set to arrive next.

The Santa Clara, California-based company has already launched four boards based on the GK104 graphics processing unit.

The consumer-oriented ones are called GeForce GTX 680, GTX 670 and GTX 690 (dual-GPU), while the fourth, Tesla K10, is built for supercomputing.

For those who need a recap, GK104 is the first 28nm graphics processor that NVIDIA produced. Its full might is unleashed only in the GTX 680 and the dual-chip GDTX 690 though.

The GTX 670 and GTX 660 use those processors that come out of the assembly line with slight imperfections, which means they need some of their die sections sealed off.

Kepler is still Kepler however, so even the GTX 660 should have a more than decent performance.

What we have in that photo up there is a GTX 660 made by Micro-Star International, one of NVIDIA's OEMs.

Discovered by VR-Zone, the picture shows the card resting on top of its cardboard box. All required logos are there, as well as the 3DMark 11 brand that NVIDIA wasn't so happy to see during the period when it had GeForce 500 cards facing AMD's Radeon 6000.

It is said that the company is no longer threatening to remove marketing funding to AIB (add-in-board) vendors if they strap that logo there, as NVIDIA's marketing team is happy with the way GTX 660 compares to AMD alternatives.

At any rate, the product should become available during Computex 2012 (June 05-09), a time when we will also get to view the card without photoshopping to get in the way. In the image here, the lower part of the bracket is absent and there is a six-pin connector drawn on the top of the heatsink. The latter was added to show that the maximum TDP of the adapter is 150 Watts.

Note that previous information on the GTX 660 said the GK106 would be used instead of GK104. That means that, if this newer rumor is true, the specs of the adapter won't be the same as those we wrote here.