Math Geek :
turkey3_scratch :
I want to see the actual power consumption of these tested, and I'd also like to see if any troubles arise if users decide to OC it themselves; it may be too much current for the PCIex16 interface to handle.
the asus ones are locked at the 75w the pcie can handle. this is not an overclocking gpu for sure. if you wanna do that , then get a better psu and buy one you can oc. power saving and oc are 2 concepts that do not belong in the same sentence!!
Your typical user will not know that, though. Plus the Asus ones wouldn't be locked to the 75W of the PCIe cable, because even cards with PCIe cables still get a lot of current from the PCIex16 slot, which means the Asus card is technically safe for up to 150W.
What concerns
me is that your average user will not know these cards aren't meant for overclocking any further, and they may try doing so and have too much current through PCIex16 slot, whereas if they had a 6-pin cable it could share that load. I am not sure if there is some form of PCIe slot overcurrent protection employed by motherboards, but if such a thing is not present, then damage could occur to the motherboard.
I'm also curious if something like a GTX 970 downclocked to like 450Mhz would do, and if that could have no PCIe cable requirement. Not sure if that's a possibility or what?