Why it matters: Nvidia's RTX 40 series reference cards and their many AIB incarnations all feature large cooling solutions that make them harder to fit in some PC cases. Even models branded "Slim" from companies like MSI are still too fat for some Mini-ITX cases. The first single-slot RTX 40 series card is on the way thanks to Galax, and we can only hope this will inspire other companies to come up with similar trimmed-down designs.
We gamers now live in a world where graphics cards are beefy monsters that take up to four slots of space inside a PC case and need support brackets to prevent sagging and even outright cracking of the graphics card PCBs. It's also getting harder and harder to build a small form factor PC for people looking to maximize available desk and floor space or enthusiasts who are into the minimalistic look of SFF rigs.
However, there is some hope thanks to small companies like Galax. As long as you're content with a mid-range card like Nvidia's RTX 4060 Ti, there will soon be a single-slot version of it on the market. Galax says its RTX 4060 Ti Unparalleled Max is the perfect single-slot card for people who are into blower-style designs. It's also the first RTX 40 series graphics card with a slim profile.
The RTX 4060 Ti Unparalleled Max is only 20 mm thick and its cooling system consists of a vapor chamber paired with a copper heatsink. Also worth noting is that Galax opted to use the 16-gigabyte version of the card, with no plans to build a one-slot version of the regular RTX 4060 Ti or the non-Ti variant, both of which are equipped with only eight gigabytes of GDDR6 memory.
GALAX claims the card supports overclocking, but it will come with standard clocks out of the box (2310 MHz GPU game clock and 2535 MHz boost) and a power target of 165 watts. Given the low-profile, single-fan design and the 6+2 VRM configuration, it's doubtful you'd be able to raise the clocks to a degree where it will have a noticeable effect on gaming performance.
Related reading: Everything You Need to Know About SFF PCs
Even if you ignore these shortcomings, a potential problem with the RTX 4060 Ti Max 16GB Unparalleled Max would be that while some Galax cards do get imported to Europe and the US, many models are limited to the Chinese market. There's also no word on pricing as of writing this. Meanwhile, the price of regular RTX 4060 Ti models hovers around $450 on Amazon and Newegg, and we can only hope it will gradually descend toward a more reasonable $350 in the coming year.
In related news, Asus is preparing a blower-style RTX 4070 Turbo 12GB that also caters to people with small PC cases and SFF systems as well as those who wish to fit several units in a server rack.
https://www.techspot.com/news/101089-galax-made-single-slot-rtx-4060-ti-mini.html
