We recently explored Sapphire's FleX edition of the new HD 6770, a black sheep in the new Northern Islands family still running on a Juniper-based core. Though it has a great value, the true entry-level cards for the 6xxx series are the 6450, 6570, and the 6670. Today we'll be sitting down with the latter of the three, to see if Sapphire adds a little extra value to the package.
The graphics card industry has undergone more than a few changes in the first half of 2011, including a branding shift within AMD itself. At the end of April, the manufacturer announced plans to introduce an updated version of their popular HD 5770 and HD5750. That upgrade has us today taking a look at the HD6770. In this case we will be taking a look at Sapphires FleX version of the card. Some of you may remember that we took a look at the HD5770 FleX last August, along with just about every other FleX model in between. The HD5770 FleX was given our Editors Choice; will its replacement do the same? In order to do that the HD6770 will still have to maintain a great price to performance ratio, something that may be hard to do with all of the great competition.
When a new series of video cards is launched it’s easy to get distracted by the new flashy cards and their amazing performance. The problem is when it comes to mid-range and lower cards sometimes last generations cards perform as well or better at similar price points. This can mean a simple decision on a video card for a budget build could have tens or hundreds of options to choose from. To give you another option Sapphire has brought back their HD5800 series cards with new Xtreme Edition series. They introduced today both the HD5830 and HD5850, of which we will be taking a look at the HD5850. Let’s take a look at what is different with this reintroduction and how it affects the budget gamer.
The proverbial ink has hardly dried on our review of Sapphires HD6870 Flex and we are already introducing another member of the Flex family. That’s because Sapphire is hoping to give everyone the option to go Flex no matter the budget or performance requirements. This also happens to be the first HD6950 to come through our office, finally giving us a chance to check out the performance of AMD’s third in command. Talk about killing two birds with one stone, let’s take a look at the Sapphire FleX HD 6950 2Gb.
It seems like it was only a few weeks ago I was talking about Nvidia’s latest card the GTX560 Ti. Now here we are launching our review of the GTX550 Ti, the little brother to the GTX560 Ti. The GTX550 Ti fills the gap between the GTS 450 and the GTX 460, with its eye directly on AMD’s popular HD5770. With aggressive performance and pricing, Nvidia hopes to capture the budget market playing the same game AMD plays. How will it hold up against the aging HD5770, let’s take a look.
When you are looking for video cards there are so many things to consider it can be very over whelming. Even after you have picked the model you are going to go with, what brand do you pick? Overclocked? Something has to stand out from the crowd or you’re more likely just going to pick the cheapest card available and go on with life. Sapphire has a product line that hopes to do just that. The Flex edition cards are designed to be more functional than a standard card and depending on the situation they can be a MUCH better deal. Today I am going to take a look at their HD6870 Flex edition and explain why you should consider a Flex card next time you are on the market.
With the introduction of the GTX 460 last July, Nvidia changed the game entirely. The 460 showed amazing performance and overclockability while being priced for someone looking for a budget build. The GTX 460, seven months later, is still exactly that. With the introduction of the GTX 500 series cards recently, Nvidia is now introducing the GTX 560 Ti. While not a replacement for the GTX 460, the GTX 560 Ti occupies the position just above it. Nvidia told us that with the GTX 560 Ti the “sweet spot” just got sweeter, let’s dive in and find out.
It was only a few months ago when everyone found out that AMD’s HD6800 series would not be their flagship, rather a performance/price sweet spot. Today we finally have the chance to take a closer look at the new HD6970, AMD’s most powerful single GPU graphics card. Sapphire sent out one of their Radeon HD6970 Battlefield Bad Company 2 Vietnam – Gaming Edition, a mouthful to say the least. But will the performance live up to the oddly long name? Let’s find out.
Only a few weeks ago AMD introduced their 6800 series cards featuring both the 6850 and 6870. We covered the 6870 with both Single and Dual card reviews. It didn’t take long to see non-reference designs coming from Sapphire with their Toxic HD6850 being announced today. We have had the pleasure of putting the card through its paces to see how it compares to the 6870 in both price and performance. With the GPU being clocked at 820MHz over the stock 775MHz and a memory frequency bump of 400MHz, from 4000Mhz to 4400MHz it should perform well. But with a few less shaders, compaired to the HD6870, will it hold its own? How will it compaire to Nvidia's offerings?
Shortly after working on our original review of the HD 6870, I was surprised by the FedEx guy showing up late Wednesday evening with a HD 6870 from Sapphire in hand. Who needs sleep right? I didn’t waste any time firing our test bench back up to put the card to the test. The best part? Because I happened to have two cards sitting here I went ahead and threw them together in Crossfire for a little multi-card action. Of course you have to click the link below to find out how both performed.
Earlier this week the rumors of an upcoming AMD video card line was finally confirmed with their HD 6800 series. They will be starting things off with both the HD6870 and HD6850. This time around the x800 cards are AMD’s “sweet spot” cards, with a flagship card to follow. Today we will be taking a look at the HD6870, specifically Diamond Multimedia’s Overclocked version. How will the HD6870 hold up? I can’t contain myself anymore, let’s jump in!
Having taken a look at the GTX 460 only a few weeks ago, I was left impressed with its performance as it overpowered the HD 5770’s that we have always recommended. My only complaint was that NVidia’s lowest Direct X11 card would not run in my Shuttles because of the dual 6 pin connectors. With their newest addition we finally have a NVidia solution that not only has just one 6 pin, but comes in at just under 130 bucks.· Today we will be taking a peak at Gigabytes version of the GTS450 along with the reference card from NVidia to see both the difference between the two and the GTS 450’s SLI performance.
As much fun as it might be to play on three monitors using Eyefinity, the biggest hurdle to cost is the cost of three monitors, an Eyefinity enabled video card, and an active display port to DVI adapter. Two weeks ago I took a look at the HD5770 Flex from Sapphire that didn’t require an active adapter. Today AMD announced their newest active adapters, at 30% of the cost it should help keep the cost down.
Although we have reviewed countless ATI cards recently, we weren’t deaf to the recent release of NVidia’s GTX460. With people calling it the best mid-range gaming card on the market, I had to get my hands on one. After a few emails, Sparkle was nice enough to send one out to us to take a look. Using the reference design, we should get a good idea of their overall performance while also being able to compare it to my current favorite, the HD5770.
With a bump from the original DDR2 and DDR3 to GDDR5 on both its HD5550 and HD5570 cards ATI obviously hasn’t forgotten about its budget models. We have taken a look at their HD5550 twice before with both the ultimate edition and overclock edition from Sapphire. Today we get to take a look at both the HD5550 and HD5570 in their standard reference card configuration to see if there is much of a difference.
Over the past few months I haven’t hidden the fact that my favorite video card for a gamer on a budget is ATI’s HD5770. You even have the ability to run Eyefinity! The problem is, Eyefinity requires that you pick up an active adapter unless you are lucky enough to have a monitor with a display port connection. An active adapter can run you up to $100 unless you decide to go with a VGA model. Sapphire has introduced a cure for those budget minded gamers looking for their triple monitor goodness. The cure is their HD5770 Flex, let’s take a look at it.
There is no disputing ATI’s HD5770 is one of the best buys right now for both pure gaming value. Of course some manufactures don’t leave well enough alone and love to tweak a little more performance out of their cards. Today we are taking a look at Gigabytes HD5770 SOC, SOC standing for Super Over Clock. With a 50MHz bump over the standard offering we are curious how much of a performance boost you will see. The only way to find out is to toss it in our test rig and use it as an excuse to play a few games. Let’s jump in!
ATI has been sure to cover every possible price and performance range with its HD5000 series cards. We have taken a look at Sapphire’s HD5550 Ultimate with a full gig of ram and today we have the chance to look a little closer at Sapphires HD5550 OC. With an overclock of just over 18% on the GPU, Sapphire is trying to give this sub $100 card the performance of it's faster siblings.
The “Ultimate” product line from Sapphire covers more than just the 5550 that we recently took a look at. Today we are taking a look at their HD5670 Ultimate that sports a similar heatsink design as the HD5550 but with the obvious performance increase from the faster 5670 lineup. The HD5670 line is touching on budget gaming performance more than the limited performance we saw out of the HD5550. With Crossfire and Eyefinity capability it could be a hidden gem, the only way we can find out is to put it to the test. Let’s jump in.
Having already tested out the 5770 recently, I was excited to find out that we had a 5870 coming in to try out. The 5770’s performance was impressive; imagine what the 5870 can do. This is also a chance to try out Eyefinity, multiple monitors finally being used for gaming! The 5870 is from PowerColor with their PCS+ cooling solution. Let’s find out how it performs!
