Most technology companies have made reasonable efforts to do their bit for the environment. Low power CPU's, memory modules, graphics cards and even hard drives have cropped up in the last year, to the extent that an article is now just incomplete with rudimentary powerdraw readings. Going toward the very high-end of the market however and energy usage becomes subservient to sheer visceral power. In terms of present graphics cards that pertains to the GeForce GTX 295 and Radeon HD 4870 X2 editions. Launched at the beginning of the year, the twin GPU powered GeForce GTX 295 took the performance crown back. In an effort to reduce costs, we're seeing a few single PCB based versions turning up. - Hexus

Inno3D GeForce GTX 295 Platinum Style Card Review

The older GeForce GTX 295 version, taken on in reference form by the majority of NVIDIA's partners, ships with each of the two GPU's on an separate PCB facing one another. While now NVIDIA has transitioned that process to a single PCB, akin to most other graphics cards and these new GeForce GTX 295 dimensions stay the same more of less and it remains a dual slot design. What's somewhat disappointing is that the specifications remain the same though. In effect, it's the GeForce GTX 295 card as we know it, albeit presented in a slightly different form factor. And one can add a second GeForce GTX 295 for quad SLI usage.

The Inno3D GeForce GTX 295 Platinum graphics card is the first that we've seen using a single PCB for housing two GT200b chipsets, where previous single slot cards have used two PCB's. The manufacturing change results in a lighter board and we can intimate that it's slightly cheaper to produce for NVIDIA's partners. Construction aside, there's very little that's new. The GeForce GTX 295 remains the fastest graphics card currently available and it should be so until both NVIDIA and ATI release their next generation architectures in autumn this year. Costing around $550, the Inno3D single PCB card is one of the cheaper models around.

Fast as it may be, blazing through benchmarks the graphics card value is always in doubt, because two GeForce GTX 260's offering broadly similar performance in SLI config can be purchased for $400. If Inno3D really want to shift some of these high power cards we suggest an etail price of $495 all in or less. The single PCB based Inno3D GeForce GTX 295 Platinum's cosmetic differences and relatively attractive price are enough to entice buyers who would have this GeForce GTX 295 on their shortlist. For everyone else, we would suggest waiting for prices to drop just before the next generation parts hit the shelves.