The Sparkle GeForce GT 520 is the most affordable GPU in the Geforce 500 series.Sparkle GeForce GT 520 features a single SM unit with 48 stream processors and a single 64-bit bus, which connects 1 GB of DDR3 memory to the core. The Sparkle GeForce GT 520 perfectly suited for home theater PCs or as an upgrade from integrated graphics. It is ideal for video playback acceleration and some casual gaming at around 1680×1050 with eye-candy disabled. Enable antialiasing or fancy effects and the GPU struggles.
The Sparkle GeForce GT 520 card is tiny and takes up only one PCIE slot. The cooler is a tiny aluminium heatsink fitted with a fan that cools only the GPU. The heatsink doesn’t cool the underlying memory chips. The rear panel sports D-sub, DVI and HDMI video outputs. Since the power requirement is very less, the card draws power entirely from the PCIE slot. The Sparkle GeForce GT 520 card is built perfectly, but the only glitch we see is the exclusion of a low-profile bracket in the package, which could be needed for building HTPCs.
This Sparkle GeForce GT 520 card scored 8128 points in 3DMark Vantage (Entry mode). At 1680×1050, and with all effects and AA disabled, Crysis Warhead ran at 24 fps and Mafi a II ran at 10 fps. However, HD video and Blu-ray playback was super-smooth. If you’re considering a low-budget video card for HTPCs, this Sparkle GeForce GT 520 card will fit the bill, but note the absence of a low-profile bracket. You could also consider a fully passive design.
Specifications of Sparkle GeForce GT 520:
- GPU: Nvidia GeForce GT 520
- Memory: 1 GB DDR3
- Memory bus width: 64-bit
- Speed (Core | Memory): 810 MHz | 500 MHz
- Stream processors: 48
- Video outputs: D-sub, DVI and HDMI
Subscribe to email feed
