Modern graphics cards are notorious for their massive cooling systems and dimensions that are hard to fit into mainstream PC chassis and almost impossible to fit into compact PC cases that are rather popular among gamers. MSI this week attempted to address these concerns by announcing a family of GeForce RTX 40-series graphics cards called Gaming Slim that are meant to be slimmer than a typical add-in-board. But are they?

Judging by MSI's GeForce RTX 4070 Ti Gaming X Slim (which measures 307×125×51 mm and weights 1086 grams), it is indeed considerably more compact than MSI's GeForce RTX 4070 Ti Gaming X Trio (337×140×62 mm @ 1594 grams). What is no less important is that the Gaming Slim is nearly as fast as its full-fat counterpart with its maximum 2745 MHz GPU clock vs. 2760 MHz.

With that said, despite the "slim" designation, we're still looking at a graphics card that is 2.5 slots (51 mm) wide. So the most densely packed of systems that can't take a card over 2 slots will still need to look elsewhere. For everything else, it will certainly be easier to assemble a PC with MSI's Gaming Slim graphics card due to its squeezed dimensions.

MSI says that its Gaming Slim-badged graphics cards will provide signature features of its Gaming-branded graphics cards, including factory overclocked GPU and enhanced cooling system, but will be thinner and lighter, enabling 'flexible system assembly.' MSI further noted that it would offer all of its Gaming GeForce RTX 40-series products in Gaming Slim flavor, including GeForce RTX 4090, RTX 4080, RTX 4070, and RTX 4060.

MSI says that its Gaming Slim graphics cards will come in black and white versions, will use the company's latest cooling solutions (Tri Frozr triple-fan cooling system with Fan Torx Fan 5.0 fans and up to eight pipes), and addressable RGB LEDs.

For now, the company has Gaming Slim versions of GeForce RTX 4070 Ti, GeForce RTX 4070, and GeForce RTX 4060 Ti, so the higher-end products will probably be available at a later date. Meanwhile, we can only wonder how compact will MSI manage to get NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 4090 and whether the company's GeForce RTX 4090 Gaming Slim will be more compact than NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition.

Source: MSI

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  • Dante Verizon - Thursday, August 31, 2023 - link

    That's not slim in any of the other parallel realities...
  • Hifihedgehog - Thursday, August 31, 2023 - link

    Check again. Specifically, the mirror universe where Spock has a beard…
  • Jad77 - Sunday, September 3, 2023 - link

    Yeah, smaller is somewhat more appealing... not enough to overcome sticker shock or a free game as an 'incentive'. Nvidia sucks.
  • abufrejoval - Monday, September 4, 2023 - link

    I use PNY Verto cards to save on slot space, 3 for the 4090 and 2 for the 4070, the latter also shorter with only 2 fans, none with LEDs or other frills.

    I tend to swap bottleneck parts not build from scratch so cases are "ancient" and packed, but it's also the theoretical ability to use multiple GPUs for CUDA which has me favor space economy.

    At least PNY doesn't charge extra for that and I've not noticed any noise penalties.
  • brucethemoose - Monday, September 4, 2023 - link

    That full size 4070 TI is bigger than my 3090 FTW3, which is definitely not a small card.

    The "slim" model is the same length as the FTW3, and only somewhat thinner in the other two dimensions... But still too big for a Node 202 without modification.

    This is crazy. The ATX standard needs to change. Maybe GPU PCBs can run parallel to to the motherboard with a standard heatsink mount like CPUs get.
  • Dante Verizon - Tuesday, September 5, 2023 - link

    Right... It should be next to the dimension where companies deliver exactly what they advertise in their marketing.

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