ZOTAC GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Review
Rakesh Sharma
Nov 16, 2015 3661
ZOTAC GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Review
ZOTAC GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Review
Aiming at budget gamers with entry-level gaming setups that can run titles on 1080P, NVIDIA unveils their GeForce GTX 950 GPU based on the Maxwell GPU architecture. Featuring the GM206 GPU (GM206-250-A1) with six SMM units that house 768 CUDA Cores, 48 texture mapping units and the 32 ROPs.
We like to thanks ZOTAC India for providing us the ZOTAC GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Edition 2GB graphics card for review. The new ZOTAC GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Edition features 1203MHz of Base Clock and 1405MHz at Boost with 2 GB GDDR5 memory clocked at 7020MHz, giving full advantage of Direct X 12 at 1080p moderate video settings.
Now let’s see what this ZOTAC GTX 950 has for us.
Features
Experience 950.
The GeForce® GTX™ 950 is a true gaming GPU gear for every PC gamer. Transform your PC into a gaming rig to take on the latest generation games with Maxwell™ architecture and take full advantage of DirectX 12.
FREEZE
FREEZE is an inspired innovation that will enable powerful video cards to become silent and reduce the wear on the fan system. FREEZE activates when the core temperature is below a set threshold. When the user is not in action, the fans idle so users can enjoy the sound that they don’t hear. This unique feature is applied to all of our GTX 950 graphics cards.
ICESTORM
An enhanced cooling system that goes beyond thermal design to blend extraordinary performance and style into a single architecture. Powerful efficient fans, copper heat-pipes, and a tight array of aluminum fins all combine to reduce noise and accelerate cooling for maximum gaming performance.
CARBON EXOARMOR
A functional aesthetic to the IceStorm cooling system to provide protection and additional durability. The all metal wrap around backplate and metal fan shroud frame with carbon detailing complete the appeal and provide a subtle aggressiveness while still enhancing the performance of the card by reducing vibrations to lower noise further.
PUSH YOUR SKILL
Put your gear to use and push your skills with ZOTAC CUP, your portal for free access to play weekly online tournaments of your favorite games. With players worldwide, watch livecast streams, enter the tournaments, come out on top with more experience and hone your skills to get even better. Learn more at www.zotac-cup.com
FIRESTORM
Extract even more performance from your ZOTAC graphics card with the FireStorm software utility. Tweaking and tuning is quick and easy with an easy-to-use interface that presents users with clock speed adjustments, fan control , GPU monitoring functions, and more.
With the Quick Boost feature, additional power is only a click away.
Specifications
Package
The ZOTAC GTX 950 comes in a black/yellow colured box with securely packaged in. A ZOTAC and amp! Edition graphics and features highlights on front and the back of the box.
Inside the box
Along with the GFX card box also includes driver installation CD, quick start guide, a PCIe Power connector.
Looks
First look at ZOTAC GTX 950 and it gives a rich high quality feel. Card is having a metal fan shroud which is really solid and study. This is not a long card so ZOTAC could have done a price cutting by eliminating the back-plate, instead ZOTAC focused more on maintaining the aesthetics and sturdiness of the graphics card. Great job ZOTAC.
Inside
Removing the cooler reveals a big copper plate with a center copper block which makes a direct contact with the GPU core and memory chips, soldered with two copper heat-pipes of 6mm and connected with an array of aluminum fin stack and dual 90mm fans for cooling.
Component Layout
Detailed PCB layout of ZOTAC GeForce GTX 950 shows that, this card draws power from single 6-pin PCI-e connector to drive a four phase digital power controlled by an ON Semiconductor’s NCP81174 buck controller (the same as on the NVIDIA GTX 980 reference design) . And the onboard GDDR5 memory chips are from Samsung with the model number K4G41325FC-HC28, specified to run at 1750 MHz (7000 MHz GDDR5 effective).
Testing
Test system configuration —
| CPU | Intel Core i5 6600K |
| Board | Gigabyte Z170x G1 Gaming7 |
| RAM | 4 X 4GB HyperX Predator DDR4 3000Mhz |
| SSD | Kingston 120GB SSD |
| Cooler | Cooler Master Nepton 240M |
| GFX | ZOTAC GTX 950 AMP! |
| PSU | Cooler Master CMV750 |
| Display | Acer S220HQL |
| OS | Windows 10 |
| Case | Cooler Master MasterCase 5 |
Benchmarks
Temperatures
Room Temperature: 30C
In idle, the temperature is real good and at full load running 3D Mark Fire Strike temperature was ok and fans were slight loud.
Power Consumption
Wattage reading as per displayed by APC Pro 1000VA (Model no. BR1000G-IN) UPS.
Pros
- Good Factory Overclocked
- 2GB of Graphics RAM
- Fan turns OFF when idle
- Low power consumption
- Great looks
Cons
- Slight Expensive at Rs.15K approx
Conclusion
ZOTAC GeForce GTX 950 is a great looking and solid build card with a high factory overclock out of the box . The ZOTAC GTX 950 AMP! Edition offers a very good gaming experience when played at moderate settings, with higher graphics setting many games results in non-playable frame rates.
At the conclusion ZOTAC GTX 950 AMP! Edition is a fantastic entry-level graphics card with highest GTX950 factory overclocking setting, giving a smooth gaming experience at 1080p resolution, worthy of our PC TeK REVIEWS PERFORMANCE Award.
Manufacturers Info
Site Link
Thanks.
Zotac GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Edition 2GB Review
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Home » Reviews » Graphics Card » Zotac GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Edition 2GB Review – Best GTX 950 in the Market?
by Peter Paul
Last week, NVIDIA released their latest mainstream graphics card, the GeForce GTX 950 offering a cheaper, yet cost-effective solution for PC gamers who are playing MOBAs and other not-so-demanding games. It replaces the (much older) GTX 650 and last year’s GTX 750 (Ti), with faster performance and same technologies that the current GTX 900 series graphics cards have. The GTX 950 is based on the latest Maxwell architecture with the same GM206 silicone that the GTX 960 has, well except for the disabled cores.
Zotac sent us their fastest GTX 950, the Zotac GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Edition, fully armored and ready for battle. Please continue reading our review of the GTX 950 AMP! Edition below.
Zotac released three variants of the GeForce GTX 950, the Zotac GTX 950 (ZT-90601-10L) featuring a single fan design with a tad higher clock speed compared to the reference one; second the GTX 950 OC (ZT-90602-10M) featuring a dual fan design and with a higher clock speed vs the reference; finally the GTX 950 AMP! Edition (ZT-90603-10M) featuring a dual fan design with IceStorm, Freeze and Carbon ExoArmor. It’s also the fastest GTX 950 amongst their line, offering a base clock speed of 1203MHz with a boost clock speed of 1405MHz, and memory is also overclocked to 7020MHz. I haven’t checked all the GTX 950 available in the market, but as far as I know the Zotac GTX 950 AMP! Edition has the highest clock speeds, making it (theoretically speaking) the fastest GTX 950 in the market.
The Zotac GTX 950 AMP! Edition is based on the new GM206-250-A1 silicon featuring 768 CUDA cores, 2GB of GDDR5 memory running on a 128-bit memory. It’s basically the same with the GTX 960 core, but two of its eight streaming multiprocessor units, or SMM, are disabled, resulting in a slower performance compared to the GTX 960. However, the good news is the GTX 950 is cheaper, shares the latest NVIDIA technologies that the current GTX 900 series graphics cards have, and is definitely faster than the GTX 650 and GTX 750 Ti.
All GeForce GTX 950 graphics card includes the following technologies:
Dynamic Super Resolution – This feature can deliver 4K-quality images to 1080p displays for exceptional detail and fidelity.
Multi-Frame sampled Anti-Aliasing (MFAA) – MFAA delivers a 30% boost in performance while maintaining smooth, high-quality edges (reduced “jaggies”) by alternating sample calculations across each frame and each pixel.
Voxel Global Illumination (VXGI) – Part of the NVIDIA GameWorks™ library for developers, VXGI accelerates dynamic lighting effects for a truly immersive, cinematic experience.
GeForce Experience – Optimizes you games and keeps your drivers up to date.
NVIDIA Shadow Play – Let’s you record gaming footage or stream content in real time, with a minimal performance drop to the game. This feature in included in GeForce Experience.
NVIDIA G-SYNC – This display technology delivers the smoothest and fastest gaming experience. G-SYNC’s revolutionary performance is achieved by synchronizing display refresh rates to the GPU in your GeForce® GTX™-powered PC, eliminating screen tearing and minimizing display stutter and input lag. Scenes render instantly, objects look sharper, and gameplay is super smooth, giving you a stunning visual experience and a serious competitive edge.
NVIDIA GameStream – Stream extreme GeForce GTX PC gaming experiences to portable game-playing devices like NVIDIA SHIELD™ with super-smooth, low-latency performance.
NVIDIA GPU Boost 2.
0 – This technology allows gamers to push PC performance to the maximum with precise controls. It monitors work with advanced controls like GPU temperature target, overclocking, and overvoltage to ensure that the GPU works at peak performance.
NVIDIA Adaptive VSync – Nothing is more distracting than frame rate stuttering and screen tearing. The first tends to occur when frame rates are low, the second when frame rates are high. Adaptive VSync is a smarter way to render frames. At high framerates, VSync is enabled to eliminate tearing. At low frame rates, it’s disabled to minimize stuttering.
NVIDIA Surround with up to Four Monitors – Play your favorite games across four monitors. At 5760 x 1080, the expanded field of view fully engages peripheral vision and provides for the most immersive experience in racing and flight simulators.
NVIDIA SLI Technology – SLI technology lets you link up to four NVIDIA SLI-ready cards together for astounding performance.
Yes, you read that right, the GTX 950 is SLI capable, something which the GTX 750 and GTX 750 Ti were not capable of. It also includes PhysX technology, SHIELD ready, GPU Boost 2.0, Direct 12 API feature level 12_1, OpenGL 4.5 and OpenCL. On top of the common features and technologies mentioned above, the Zotac GTX 950 AMP! Edition features IceStrom with Carbon ExoArmor, FREEZE technology and FireStorm utility.
I’ll discuss more of the features of the GTX 950 AMP! Edition on the next page. Below is a specification table of the Zotac GTX 950 lineup with the reference GeForce GTX 950 for comparison.
Zotac GeForce GTX 950 AMP! Edition Specifications
| Specifications | Zotac GTX 950 AMP! Edition | Zotac GTX 950 OC | Zotac GTX 950 | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Model | ZT-90603-10M | ZT-90602-10M | ZT-90601-10L | Reference |
| GPU | GeForce GTX 950 | GeForce GTX 950 | GeForce GTX 950 | GeForce GTX 950 |
| CUDA Cores | 768 | 768 | 768 | 768 |
| Engine Clock Speed | Base — 1203 MHz Boost — 1405 MHz |
Base — 1102 MHz Boost — 1279 MHz |
Base — 1089 MHz Boost — 1266 MHz |
Base — 1024 MHz Boost — 1188 MHz |
| Memory Size | 2GB GDDR5 | 2GB GDDR5 | 2GB GDDR5 | 2GB GDDR5 |
| Memory Clock Speed | 7020 MHz | 6804 MHz | 6610 MHz | 6600 MHz |
| Memory Interface | 128-bit | 128-bit | 128-bit | 128-bit |
| Display Outputs | 1 x DisplayPort 1. 2 (4k @ 60 Hz)1 x HDMI (4k @ 60 Hz) 2 x Dual-link DVI (2560×1600) Quad simultaneous display capable |
Dual Link DVI-I, HDMI 2.0, 3x DisplayPort 1.2 | ||
| HDCP | Supported | Supported | Supported | Supported |
| Cooling | Dual 90mm IceStorm | Dual 80mm fan | Single 90mm fan | single fan |
| DirectX Version | 12 API feature level 12_1 | 12 API feature level 12_1 | 12 API feature level 12_1 | 12 API feature level 12_1 |
| Hardware Features | Freeze Tech / Carbon ExoArmor | Freeze Tech | Freeze Tech | —- |
| OS Support | Windows XP/Vista/7/8/10 ready 32/64-bit | |||
| Power | 350W PSU recommended 90W max power consumption 6-pin PCIE power connector |
|||
| Dimensions | 208mm x 111. 15mm x dual slot |
174mm x 111.15mm x dual slot | 174mm x 111.15mm x dual slot | 4.376 inches x 7.938 inches x dual width |
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Zotac GeForce GTX 950 | 54 factors
37points
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
Why is Zotac GeForce GTX 950 better than others?
- Design requirements for heat dissipation (TDP)?
90W vs 198.08W - GPU memory speed?
1653MHz vs 1561.27MHz - DVI outputs?
2 vs 0.74 - Width?
174mm vs 259.58mm - Height?
111.15mm vs 123.41mm
Which comparisons are the most popular?
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
vs
Nvidia GeForce MX350
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
vs
AMD Radeon RX 570
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
vs
Asus Phoenix GeForce GTX 1050 Ti
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
vs
Nvidia GeForce 405 (OEM)
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
vs
EVGA GeForce GTX 760
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
vs
AMD Radeon RX 580X
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
vs
AMD Radeon HD 6870
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
VS
AMD Radeon HD 7750
Zotac GeForce GTX 950
VS
NVIDIA GEFORCE 940MX
Zotac GeForce GTX
VS
NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX0003
Price Match
User Reviews
Performance
GPU Clock Speed
1089MHz
The Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) has a higher clock speed.
turbo GPU
1266MHz
When the GPU is running below its limits, it can jump to a higher clock speed to increase performance.
pixel rate
34.8 GPixel/s
The number of pixels that can be displayed on the screen every second. nine0003
FLOPS
1.67 TFLOPS
FLOPS is a measure of GPU processing power.
texture size
52.3 GTexels/s
The number of textured pixels that can be displayed on the screen every second.
GPU memory speed
1653MHz
Memory speed is one aspect that determines memory bandwidth.
Shading patterns
Shading units (or stream processors) are small processors in a graphics card that are responsible for processing various aspects of an image. nine0003
texture units (TMUs)
TMUs take texture units and map them to the geometric layout of the 3D scene.
More TMUs generally means texture information is processed faster.
ROPs
ROPs are responsible for some of the final steps of the rendering process, such as writing the final pixel data to memory and for performing other tasks such as anti-aliasing to improve the appearance of graphics. nine0003
Memory
effective memory speed
6612MHz
The effective memory clock is calculated from the size and data transfer rate of the memory. A higher clock speed can give better performance in games and other applications.
maximum memory bandwidth
105.8GB/s
This is the maximum rate at which data can be read from or stored in memory.
VRAM (video RAM) is the dedicated memory of the graphics card. More VRAM usually allows you to run games at higher settings, especially for things like texture resolution. nine0003
memory bus width
128bit
A wider memory bus means it can carry more data per cycle.
This is an important factor in memory performance, and therefore the overall performance of the graphics card.
versions of GDDR memory
Later versions of GDDR memory offer improvements such as higher data transfer rates, which improves performance.
Supports memory recovery code
✖Zotac GeForce GTX 950
The memory troubleshooting code can detect and repair data corruption. It is used when necessary to avoid distortion, such as in scientific computing or when starting a server.
Features
DirectX version
DirectX is used in games with a new version that supports better graphics.
OpenGL version
The newer the OpenGL version, the better graphics quality in games.
OpenCL version
Some applications use OpenCL to use the graphics processing unit (GPU) for non-graphical computing.
Newer versions are more functional and better quality.
Supports multi-monitor technology
✔Zotac GeForce GTX 950
The video card has the ability to connect multiple displays. This allows you to set up multiple monitors at the same time to create a more immersive gaming experience, such as a wider field of view. nine0003
GPU temperature at boot
Unknown. Help us offer a price.
Lower boot temperature — this means that the card generates less heat and the cooling system works better.
supports ray tracing
✖Zotac GeForce GTX 950
Ray tracing is an advanced light rendering technique that provides more realistic lighting, shadows and reflections in games.
Supports 3D
✔Zotac GeForce GTX 950
Allows you to view in 3D (if you have a 3D screen and glasses).
supports DLSS
✖Zotac GeForce GTX 950
DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling) is an AI based scaling technology.
This allows the graphics card to render games at lower resolutions and upscale them to higher resolutions with near-native visual quality and improved performance. DLSS is only available in some games. nine0003
PassMark result (G3D)
Unknown. Help us offer a price.
This test measures the graphics performance of a graphics card. Source: Pass Mark.
Ports
has HDMI output
✔Zotac GeForce GTX 950
Devices with HDMI or mini HDMI ports can stream HD video and audio to an attached display.
HDMI connectors
More HDMI connectors allow you to connect multiple devices at the same time, such as game consoles and TVs. nine0003
HDMI version
HDMI 2.0
Newer versions of HDMI support higher bandwidth, resulting in higher resolutions and frame rates.
DisplayPort outputs
Allows connection to a display using DisplayPort.