XFX GeForce 9600GT XXX Edition Video Card Review

Final Thoughts and Conclusion

The XFX 9600GT XXX Alpha Dog Edition provides a solid performance/price card that easily fits into most gamer gamer budgets. Given it’s minimal power requirements and single-slot cooler, the 9600GT would be at home in the meekest OEM computer or a mid-range custom gaming computer. The XFX 9600GT XXX Alpha Dog Edition is definitely not the fastest option available on the market but it is one of the better buys when you are trying to get the best bang for your buck. If you are gaming at 1280×1024 I would highly recommend the 9600GT as a solid purchase that will hold strong for another 12 months with medium to high quality settings in current and upcoming titles.

Installing the card was a very simple task however the moment you power on the fan you’ll notice an immediate problem. Since the card utilizes a single-slot cooler, it has a high-speed fan that upon startup emits a high pitched whine and even in Windows at 25% fanspeed still emits an audible noise above the heatsink and hard drive drone. Those of you that are looking to run this in an HTPC may want to either invest in an aftermarket heatsink or utilizing Rivatuner to manually adjust the fanspeed to a more tolerable setting.

Legit Bottom Line:The XFX Alpha Dog Edition 9600GT puts the “bang” in bang for buck. Priced at $160 for this particular variant, the card is a fantastic buy for the mid-range gamer looking for a quick boost in performance.