AGP 7600GT w/ Zalman cooler (Galaxy A76GT-Z/256D3)

[chancy]

I’ve been scouring eBay and the web for a suitable upgrade from an AGP GeForce 6800 (NU) to something around a 6800GT, but with a quiet cooler. The options are pretty limited as there are very few cards selling on eBay with aftermarket Zalman or Arctic Cooling coolers. Buying a regular 6800GT and a new cooler is not terribly attractive as the cost totals about 60-70% of the price of a new Leadtek AGP 7600GT. The Leadtek is a better card, comes with a warranty, and supposedly has a quieter-than-usual (30dB) fan.

Well, now it looks as though my prayers have been answered as Galaxy appears to be coming out with an AGP version of their Zalman-cooled 7600GT. I’ve only found references in non-English websites so far, but the model number appears to be A76GT-Z/256D3, which seems easy enough to decipher, AGP 7600GT Zalman 256MB GDDR3.

This Polish site has some specs that seem to indicate there will be an AGP 7600GS running at 500/1450, and AGP 7600GT running at 560/1450 (though the pics look like they’ve been Photoshopped).


I also came across a Chinese site with good pictures of a large Zalman-like cooler. Galaxy has a smaller cooler pictured on their AGP 7600GT page. I recall some months ago when Galaxy had no 7600 products with Zalman coolers on their website, despite the fact I could already buy their PCIe Zalman 7600GT locally in Australia. Hopefully this means that their products are making it onto the market before they are announcing they are available.

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Well, at the time I posted the above I had no idea of what ATI was cooking up. It was a few days later when I heard about the Powercolor X1950 Pro AGP. 7800GS+ performance at not a lot more than 7600GT AGP prices, with a silent Accelero X2 cooler. Looking forward to it.