It really doesn’t seem like it’s been all that long, but it’s been nearly a year and a half since NVIDIA has had a dual-GPU card on the market. The GeForce GTX 295 was launched in January of 2009, the first card based on the 55nm die shrink of the GT200 GPU. For most of the year the GTX 295 enjoyed bragging rights as the world’s fastest video card; however the launch of the Radeon HD 5000 series late in 2009 effectively put an end to the GTX 295’s run as a competitor.

Even with the launch of the GTX 400 series in March of 2010, a new dual-GPU card from NVIDIA remained the stuff of rumors—a number of rumors claimed we’d see a card based on GF10X, but nothing ever materialized. Without a dual-GPU card, NVIDIA had to settle for having the fastest single-GPU card on the market through the GTX 480, a market position worth bragging about, but one that was always shadowed by AMD’s dual-GPU Radeon HD 5970. Why we never saw a dual-GPU GTX 400 series card we’ll never know—historically NVIDIA has not released a dual-GPU card for every generation—but it’s a reasonable assumption that GF100’s high leakage made such a part unviable.

But at long last the time has come for a new NVIDIA dual-GPU card. GF100’s refined follow up, GF110, put the kibosh on leakage and allowed NVIDIA to crank up clocks and reduce power consumption throughout their GTX 500 lineup. This also seems to have been the key to making a dual-GPU card possible, as NVIDIA has finally unveiled their new flagship card: GeForce GTX 590. Launching a mere two weeks after AMD’s latest flagship card, the Radeon HD 6990, NVIDIA is gunning for their spot at the top back. But will they reach their goal? Let’s find out.

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