NVIDIA's current flagship GPU is the GT200. It is used on the GeForce GTX 260 and GeForce GTX 280. Only recently NVIDIA has added a third card design to that lineup. The GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 still uses the GeForce GTX 260 naming, but comes with an increased shader count of 216 shaders. Leadtek has decided to call their product the GeForce GTX 260 Extreme Plus. The Extreme probably stands for the 216 shaders, while the Plus stands for an overclock out of the box. As we mentioned in our first GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 article, we find NVIDIA's naming scheme a bit confusing. Something like GeForce GTX 270 would have made more sense to facilitate the buying process. - techPowerUp

Leadtek GeForce GTX 260 Extreme Plus Card Review

The Leadtek package comes really with a lot of bling that will surely catch your attention on a crowded store shelf. The yellow sticker clearly shows what specs you can expect from this card. Great job here, many other manufacturers offer less info on their packages. The card looks just like any other GeForce GTX 260 model. It uses two slots to accomodate the big NVIDIA cooler. The card has two DVI ports which the standard output configuration nowadays. The heatsink is a complex piece of engineering, it uses a copper baseplate to transfer heat away from the GPU efficiently, which is an excellent choice on this cooling solution.

As you can see from the white thermal pads, the memory chips and voltage regulation circuitry is cooled as well. You may combine two or three of these cards in SLI for increased performance or better image quality. The card has two 6-pin power connectors and both are required for operation. The GDDR3 memory chips are made by Hynix and have a latency of 1.0ns, they should be good for at least 2000MHz. The graphics processor in use is the same GT200 as on all other GeForce GTX 200 series cards. And the final overclocks of our board are 688MHz core and 2602MHz memory, with shaders at 1377MHz.

Considering that the card is already overclocked, this is some nice additional headroom. However, in previous articles we have also seen several GT200 cores that handle up to around 715MHz. But of course maximum overclock varies from sample to sample and your mileage may vary. The expected street price of the Leadtek GeForce GTX 260 Extreme Plus will be around $315. Under immense pressure from AMD, NVIDIA has reduced the price of their GeForce GTX 200 series bit by bit. But apparently that was not enough, so they release a third product that sits between the GeForce GTX 260 and GTX 280 versions.

While the choice of naming is not so ideal, the rest of the product is great. The card offers enough performance to play all games at good resolution with all the eye candy turned on. And if you need just a little bit more performance, you can overclock the card even more. What we would also like to mention is that the fan noise of the video board is refreshingly quiet, especially when considering its performance class. Another important factor is the fairly low power draw. When combined into a performance per watt metric, this Leadtek GeForce GTX 260 Extreme Plus can claim the number one spot of all cards in our test group.

If you are looking for the best bang for the buck in the high-end segment, then the regular GeForce GTX 260 with 192 shaders is the better deal, it is almost $100 cheaper but only a bit slower. Still, the Leadtek GeForce GTX 260 Extreme Plus is a solid choice for the gamer who has a respectable budget but doesn't want to break the bank but wants a great performer.