EVGA GTX 1080 Classified Video Card Review

The EVGA GTX 1080 Classified comes equipped with the EVGA ACX 3.0 cooling solution.  Much like ACX 2.0 the design features optimized swept fan blades, double ball bearings and extremely low power motors for more air flow using less power.  ACX 3.0 also brings with it an improved heatsink array with more heatpipes and larger copper contact area.  Simply put higher heat capacity.

Flipping the card over normally gives you a chance to check out the circuitry however with this card you will find a custom EVGA back plate with Classified graphics in the corner and some great looking red mesh accents.  Some of the surface components are still visible through the backplate however the bulk of the VRM is now hidden.

EVGA has completely redesigned the overall look of the ACX cooler to give it considerably more surface detail and to make way for the integrated RGB lighting effects.  The logo across the top of the card is backlit with RGB LEDs along with the meshed panels on the front of the card.  These panels are translucent to help defuse the lighting.  The red mesh tends to disappear while the lights are on and help to give the card some color when they are off.

Video output is comprised of a single dual link DVI video output combined with a single HDMI and three Display Port connections.  Four of these can be used at the same time allowing you to run 3-way surround and still have a spare monitor for use outside of the game.

3-way and 4-way SLI are possible using the GTX 1080 Classified given the dual SLI bridge connections found at the top of the card.  While running more than two cards is possible there has been a fundamental change in how NVIDIA supports SLI which limits full support to only two cards.  This was done to facilitate the use of HB (High Bandwidth) SLI bridges that require both SLI fingers and to increase quality by supporting the configuration most gamers use.

Like with previous Classified cards you’ll need two cards of equal height to use solid bridges including the new HB Bridges you can buy with the fancy EVGA logos.

Included with each card you will get two 6-pin PCI Express to 8-pin PCI Express power converters Thermal strip, Driver disk and two EVGA Mod Rigs stickers.

You will also get a large "Arm Yourself with EVGA" poster which is actually quite cool.  Posters like this have come with other EVGA graphics cards before and while folding makes them easy to put in the box the creases are difficult to remove if in event you want to frame them.