The first thing a new Viper owner will discover as they install the card is the thoroughness with which Diamond has developed its drivers.

Named "In Control 99" the driver-based application/utility sets a new standard in user interactivity and customizability while retaining high degrees of friendly intuitiveness. We haven't seen as unique of a driver implementation since Canopus introduced the industry to how drivers should really be done with their own stellar driversets from years past.

Diamond has included every possible setting under the sun in their In Control 99 drivers, including a feature that's new to the standard features: Turbo Boost.

Visually resembling a car's tachometer gauge, the Turbo Boost setting allows a user to take their ViperV770 from its stock speed of 150MHz and set it up to a maximum level of 175MHz. It does this by having five preset options (creatively numbered from one to five) that a user can select, each offering a 5MHz incremental jump upward as the number approaches the maximum "5" setting.

We immediately set the Turbo Boost guage to "5" after our initial tests at the default level of "1" in order to determine if Diamond had really encountered heat-related issues during the testing of their cards at 175MHz.

Initially, and throughout the benchmarking process, the 5 Turbo Boost setting offered seamless performance and a strong rise in frame rate results versus the card's preset level of 1. However when we probed the limits of the card we found that any looped benchmark (particularly the Quake2 Crusher demo) would cause the Viper to lock up the system if the benchmark was sustained for medium to long periods of time without rest.