Zotac Readies a Dual-GTX 460 Graphics Card, PCB Pictured

Over the short time that passed since first introduced, Nvidia's GTX 460 graphics core proved to be one of the best mainstream choices available around, so the fact that Zotac though of building a dual-GPU graphics card based on the GTX 460 GPU doesn't come as a huge surprise.

Actually, rumors about a dual-GPU GTX 460 video card started circulating over the Web ever since Nvidia launched this graphics processor and, although they stated this will come as an official solution dubbed the GTX 490, there's no denying the fact that dual-GTX 460 solutions will actually hit the store shelves.

Moving to the board itself, it becomes fairly clear, from the pictures provided by EXPreview, this is into quite an advanced development stage, the all black PCB coming with a non-standard form factor in order to make room for the PWM circuitry needed by their dual-GPU solution.

Taking a closer look at the board you will notice, apart from the two GTX 460 cores, a Nvidia NF200 bridge chip as well as the two 8-Pin PCI Express connectors needed in order to provide all the juice this thing needs.

The NF200 bridge chip is what makes this dual-GPU bonanza possible in the first place, this bridge chip allowing Zotac's card to be installed even in systems that don't support the SLI technology.

What you actually don't see is that Zotac also placed a Proadlizer capacitor on the back of the card, this also being used in the Zotac GTX260 Extreme Edition, in order to improve the boards stability at high frequencies, so it should allow for higher overclocks if the capacitor works as advertised.

Since these are actually two GTX 460 working in SLI, the Zotac GTX 460X2 comes with 2GB of GDDR5 memory (although a 4GB version could also be launched) as well as 3D Vision Surround support since the graphics card is equipped with 4 DVI connectors as well as a HDMI output.



Details such as pricing and availability are not yet known, but this should cost a bit lower then buying two distinct GTX 460 graphics cards since Zotac is saving some money by going with a single PCB and a single cooling solution.