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The folks at Asus are never ones to shy away from a challenge -- this time around, they decided to take up the test of releasing something just a little bit different. A little something they like to call the EAH3850 X2.

The EAH3850X2 is the first available model of ATI's HD3850X2 video card. For those of you that do not read hardware reviews as often as you should be, I'll describe the HD3850X2 in very general terms for your benefit: the speediest single-GPU enthusiast graphics cards available  from ATI is currently the HD3870. One notch below this card on the performance belt, is the HD3850. The HD3850X2 is a dual-GPU card, so, it was two HD3850 GPUs crammed onto one single board. There you go. That's the HD3850X2 explained!

But there's more to than that. The EAH3850X2 model is particularly unique because previously, generally all dual-GPU video cards were the absolute top-end cards that featured two of the fastest GPUs together, working in tandem. The HD3850X2 however has two GPUs that are slower than the top-end HD3870 crunching numbers underneath the same cooler that is used for the top-end ATI Asus card, the EAH3870X2, which we reviewed back in February.

But there is a method to this madness. The HD3870X2 fills a bit of a hole in the current ATI line-up. The name of the hole that this card fills is called "second fastest." Where NVIDIA has a very complete gaming card line-up, going from the 9600 GT, to the 8800 GT, to the 8800 GTS 512, to the 9800 GTX, to the 9800 GTX2, ATI has less options available, but now hits all the key points in what can be considered a complete line-up. The major current ATI gaming cards currently are the HD 3650, the HD 3850, the HD 3870 -- and now the HD3850X2 -- and finally the top-of-the-line HD3870X2. With the price for the HD3870X2 ranging between $300 and $350 USD, the HD3870X2 should compete well against the 9800 GTX, which sells for around the same price.

Asus announced the EAH3850X2 in early April, and it is just trickling into stores now. It does not seem like many other partners have beckoned to answer the call of the HD3850X2. This will probably be the fastest new card released in the ATI 3000's series before the launch of the RV770, rumored to be arriving in July.

Let's see if Asus has a nice freak of gaming nature on their hands here, or merely an interesting novelty.