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The Card

The MSI card is a beauty, looking good enough to warrant me buying a new case. The card itself is in traditional MSI colors (namely, red), with the GPU and RAM covered in an all-copper heatsink on both sides. The heatsink cover is translucent, giving it an appeal that attracts shallow people like me who make judgments based on appearances. The heatsink fan, unlike the GeForce FX 5800 Ultra, does not seem to change speed whether you are in 2D or 3D mode. The fan is nearly inaudible, requiring you to put your head close to the card to hear it. The noise is easily drowned out by the CPU heatsink fan and the power supply fans.

In physical terms, the GeForce FX 5600 is slightly larger than the Radeon 9500/9700 family, but much shorter than its larger sibling, the GeForce FX 5900. Unlike both, however, the FX 5600 does not require an external power connector. For those of you upgrading from a GeForce 2 Ultra or GeForce 4 MX, be aware that this card is larger, and may have problems on some motherboards.