ECS 9800GTX+ Hydra Pack

Justin Robinson discovers that good things come in incredibly large packages.

Hey you! Enthusiast! Tired of the same old single-card boxes? Fed up with receiving stock coolers and small packaging? Then this is the one product you need.

Similar to the multi-headed Greek water serpent of the same name, the Hydra is a dual-graphics card watercooled bundle (okay, well, not entirely similar –ed). When we first got the box for this behemoth of a pack, we almost thought we’d been sent a monitor due to the immense size of the box itself. This is because of all the included goodies, which include the two 9800GTX+ cards (complete with waterblocks and active fans), a Thermaltake 760i Bigwater watercooling system (coincidentally the same system that we looked at in Issue 90), and all the power connectors that you need to set it up.

Installation is quite straightforward, and is guided by the massive laminated instruction sheet that measures roughly 50cm squared. The instructions take you through installing the gear in an SLI-compatible mobo, while the main unit (a pump, radiator, fan and reservoir) is installed in two 5.25in drive bays.

Once installation was done (and the manual flung carelessly over our shoulder), our benchmarks were fired up and some pixels began to flow. We recorded an idle temp of only 34 degrees, which is very good. Even more astounding, this only jumped by seven degrees under load, reaching a peak of 41 degrees – perfect for overclockers or gamers who need stability and a cool environment while playing.

This temperature comes at the expense of some noise, with the pump producing 57.5dBA and some vibrations that would almost certainly translate into rattling noise in a case. Each card also has a fan that, albeit slightly pointless, moves air at 54.7dBA, and lights up with blue LEDs. The tubes of the loop became slightly warm under use, but only just above room temperature.

Both of the cards are running the G92b core, a 55nm revision of the 65nm G92 that saw use in the 9800GTX. This smaller process has allowed the core speed to be bumped up to 740MHz, and the shader increased to 1,836. A 256-bit memory interface joins the 512MB of GDDR3 on each card, providing a decent amount of bandwidth, especially with the memory running at a high 2,200MHz. PhysX support is also available on these cards.

Performance of the cards is solid, returning good scores in both 3DMarks, and a decent playing experience in Crysis and Company of Heroes. These cards will be overclockable past these already high stock settings, and the watercooling will keep the temps down in style.

While most of the system seems quite good, with dual cards and watercooling, there are a few niggling issues. The main unit, while nice and compact, can only fit a single 120mm radiator – this might begin to struggle with overclocked cards during summer. The waterblocks on the cards themselves are full-sized, yet there are many places where they simply don’t touch the memory chips at all – a confusing oversight and pointless waste of extra material.

However this isn’t a bad product, with watercooled SLI action now more accessible to everyone.