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Dismantling The Card
Gainward used a unique heatsink mount system on this. The heatsink in the front of the card is attached to a backplate via four arms, locked into place by pins under tension. Although it looks complicated, it is very easy to dismantle.
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The backplate |
All four corners locked |
As you can see, the pins that lock into the arms at all four corners provide the necessary tension to keep the heatsink in place. All we needed to do was disconnect the pins by depressing them a little and moving them out of the locking notch on the arms...
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One corner unlocked |
The backplate removed |
... and voila! the heatsink is loosened and removed! The backplate itself isn't made entirely from aluminium. It has a layer of rubber on the underside to prevent the aluminium backplate from shorting the circuits on the PCB.
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The heatsink removed |
In the nude! |
So, there you have it - the BLISS 7300 GT PCX minus its thermal armour. Doesn't look like much. But we will see just how fast it is in the benchmarks.
But before that, let's take a look at the various components of the card...
The GPU
Here's a closer look at that GPU. Doesn't look like much, all smudged up in thermal paste, but that's the spanking new GeForce 7300 GT right there.
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Because the GPU is packaged using the flip-chip method, it's rather susceptible to physical damage during the heatsink installation process. Therefore, it isn't surprising to see NVIDIA put a shim around the flip-chip die.
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