MSI N550GTX-Ti Cyclone II 1GD5 Pro Reviews

The MSI N550GTX-Ti Cyclone II is an impressive video card for what it is. MSI has taken the GeForce GTX 550 Ti GPU and created a great video card package around it. It is compact and features an attractive and very effective cooling device. MSI has incorporated its Military Class hardware on board, so that it will run stable, and run for a long time. The cooler MSI has outfitted on this video card works well, and keeps the video card cool under hot conditions. In terms of performance, when paired up and running in an SLI configuration to further accelerate 3D gaming, the worthiness of its competitiveness is debatable. In the five games we tested, the MSI N550GTX-Ti Cyclone II SLI option was faster than less expensive options in two games, slower in two games, and close to even in the last. But even aside from how it performs in terms of framerates and image quality in real-world gaming situations, its high power consumption in SLI casts long shadows on its competitiveness. For gamers who are already packing an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 550 Ti based video card, adding an MSI N550GTX-Ti Cyclone II for SLI operation is a great option to improve performance for a relatively cheap price. It will get you in the ball park of cards like the HD 6950, GTX 570 and overclocked GTX 560 Ti. It can be purchased right now for $129.99 with rebates. This also means that this is by far one of the cheapest entry configurations for NV Surround, running multiple displays. Since you need two cards to set this up, MSI N550GTX-Ti Cyclone II is the cheapest entry level NV Surround setup you can get, for multiple display gaming. For gamers looking for video card options between $250 and $300, there are better upgrade paths. The AMD Radeon HD 6950 is extremely affordable right now. Now would also be a good time to buy an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570, which prices are finally starting to fall under $300 with rebates. The $250-$300 market is an interesting bracket of video cards, and this goes to show there are more than just single video cards able to compete in this price range.

The GeForce GTX 550 Ti’s performance fell right in-line with expectations. Throughout our battery of tests, the GeForce GTX 550 Ti, whether running at reference frequencies or overclocked from the factory like our ZOTAC, Asus, and MSI cards, clearly outpaced the GeForce GTS 450. The GeForce GTX 550 Ti could not keep pace with the GeForce GTX 460, however. The performance of all of the GTX 550 Ti cards we tested also scaled as expected. The highest clocked card, the ZOTAC GeForce GTX 550 Ti AMP! Edition led the pack, followed by Asus’ offering and them MSI’s. Although, MSI’s higher-clocked memory versus the Asus card gave it an edge in a couple of tests, like AvP.

NVIDIA continues progress with the Fermi architecture by moving the GTX 500 series of cards down into another new price range. Unfortunately, the previous generation of parts from its own lineup are keeping the card from looking as good as it could. Going against the AMD Radeon HD 5770 and the NVIDIA GTX 460 cards shows that while the GTX 550 Ti can keep up, it doesn't stand out among the crowd like NVIDIA hoped it would. If you can find the MSI GeForce GTX 550 Ti Cyclone OC model on sale for $130 or so then it would make a great budget graphics card with an impressively efficient cooler that provides low noise levels and added room for overclocking. If prices stay as advertised out of the gate, we recommend sticking with the other options for now.

The MSI N550GTX-Ti Cyclone II OC is another great example of a custom GeForce GTX 550 Ti video card that costs less than $150 and performs very well!

The MSI N550GTX-Ti Cyclone II OC might be the slower of the two, but it is a better all-round performer. Where raw frame rates are concerned, it’s marginally slower than the Palit card - by around 5% - but it makes up for it with its much lower operating temperatures and power consumption figures. Thanks to the improved Cyclone II cooler, the MSI was a staggering 22 degrees Celsius cooler when running at load. This also translated to a better overclocking performance, as the MSI card managed a maximum stable overclocking state of 1100MHz at the core and 4900MHz DDR at the memory. Furthermore, despite all the added features of the card, it still comes in at US$159, which makes it a terrific buy if you are in the market of a GeForce GTX 550 Ti card.

As far as the physical card itself, MSI states that the solid capacitors make no noise, but I did hear a noticeable "cricket chirp", as I like to call it, while playing games and even through Photoshop (uses GPU acceleration). It's not an annoyance as it can be expected with most video cards now, but I did find it more noticeable than other cards that don't advertise quiet capacitors. However, the overclockability of this card amazed me! I was able to reach into the fastest three core clocks on the graphs with stock voltages and drove it all the way up to the number one position with adding a slight increase in voltage — all while staying cool. For what this card is worth, it is an excellent buy. We see noticeable increases in performance over the GTS450 and no drawbacks in sight. Even though I might be spoiled with higher-end hardware, I'll be recommending this card to the next budget build for sure!

The MSI N550GTX-Ti was between 4% and 10% faster than the standard GeForceGTX 550 Ti, and since it comes with a better cooling solution and is only USD 5 more expensive than the standard GeForce GTX 550 Ti, it is a good option if you are thinking on buying a video card based on this latest GPU from NVIDIA.

Strong performance for one of the most popular monitor sizes and an aggressive price tag make this a model that'll attract a lot of people. Companies like MSI, though; releasing these upgraded versions from launch is going to be the icing on the cake. The decent out of the box overclocks from day one are going to impress people and with NVIDIA saying 1GHz is an easy task, this is going to be a really fun model to play with when you fire up Afterburner for some overclocking fun.