Palit NEB1080H15P2-1040G GameRock Premium Edition NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 GDDR5 Graphics Card - Black

I should start out by acknowledging that this GPU is pricey, as is almost any GTX 1080 currently on the market. Consumer attention on Amazon appears (by the number or reviews) to have fallen on this card's little brother, the regular Gamerock 1080 ( Palit GameRock NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 GDDR5 Graphics Card ), currently around 7% cheaper. But if you are willing to spend the extra cash, Palit's 1080 Premium edition is, in my view, the better choice.The Palit Gamerock Premium GTX 1080 is not entirely perfect (and there are some disadvantages, as I shall outline below) but it is a very decent GPU that, on looking at the paper specs, appears to outperform many other big brand GTX 1080s, some of which are considerably more expensive. The base clock on this GPU is 1747 MHz while the boost clock is a whopping 1886 MHz. Memory is also overclocked to 10512 MHz. In contrast the MSI Gaming X ( MSI NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 GAMING X 8GB GDDR5X Graphics Card - Black ) for example, has a base clock of 1708 MHz, a boost clock of 1847 MHz and a memory frequency of 10108 MHz - and this is when running in its 'OC Mode'. When you consider that the MSI Gaming X costs £45 more and offers poorer (but still incredibly good) performance, one wonders why people aren't lining up in their droves to buy the Gamerock Premium instead. Even the Gigabyte G1 ( GIGABYTE NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 G1 GAMING ), at the same price point, fails to meet the on-paper performance of the Palit Gamerock Premium.But does the Gamerock Premium actually deliver on its paper specs? Yes, and then some! If anything, Palit's paper specs are too conservative. When gaming, this GPU regularly clocks in above 2000 MHz; for example, while currently playing Watch_Dogs 2 this card is running at 2012 MHz and it is still very quiet. The GPU temperature is sitting at 63 Celsius, and while providing this kind of performance, that is very impressive indeed. When in normal desktop use, the temperature idles around 34C. The fans don't even run at all unless they need to (when the GPU temp exceeds 60C), meaning that the card is completely silent when idle.The Gamerock Premium, like its brother card, features LED lighting, which can be customised with Palit's 'Thunder Master' utility. The LED can be set to show a rainbow of alternating colours, any still RGB colour, or temperature-based lighting that changes from scales of green to red as the GPU temperature rises. I opted for a still colour (a strong red to match my fans and CPU cooler) and was glad to find an option to 'power-on default color'; some PC components with LED configurability boot with their factory default colour and only switch back to the colour you've set once Windows boots and the configuration software loads your settings, but I'm glad this isn't the case here. The Thunder Master utility also allows customisation of fan speed and overclocking. It is not my favourite utility, but it does just about everything I would want it to do.For me, the downsides to this GPU are negligible but I shall outline them anyway. Firstly, this GPU is enormous. One of the reasons the Gamerock Premium is able to offer the level of performance that it does is that it has plenty of space for cooling, and this is because it occupies the space of 2.5 PCI slots (as opposed to 2 slots like most other GTX 1080s). If you have a small case or you intend on running two GTX 1080s in SLI mode, you might find you won't have enough room. If you have a decent case and you only intend on using one GTX 1080, you should not have any problems; I certainly have plenty of room left in my case (a Corsair 780T) and have no interest in running two GTX 1080s in SLI in the future.The second issue with this GPU might not be an issue, depending on your fashion sense and the extent to which you are bothered by the look your components. If you don't have a see-through case panel, the aesthetics of the GPU are not likely to matter to you at all. But if you can see your components all the time, you may want to ensure that you like the way they look. The white, black and blue look of this GPU is pretty unique to the market, but not entirely to my taste. I don't much like the 'Game Rock' text printed in large font on the backplate either. But when fitted in my case, the white underside of the GPU is not visible; all that can be seen is the top of the GPU with its LED lighting.The packaging for this GPU is pretty straightforward. The box contains the GPU (in sealed anti-static bag) and a dual 6-Pin PCI to 8-Pin PCIE Power connector (which you probably won't need). All in all, I am very happy with this purchase and I would certainly recommend the Palit Gamerock Premium GTX 1080 to anyone looking at upgrading to the GTX 10 series. It offers excellent performance above that of any competitor at its price point, and many other GTX 1080s around the £700 mark.Pros:Excellent performanceExceeds 2Ghz without overclockingLow temperaturesVery quietUnique aestheticCons:Unique aesthetic that may not appeal to your tastes, or match the colour scheme of your other componentsOccupies three PCI slots and so may rule out SLI for some people

great card but i should have waited for the 1080Ti version nevertheless for 180W great performance