Sapphire HD 4850 X2 Review - PAGE 2

Impressions

When making any sort judgments on the HD 4850 X2, the most of obvious vantage point to make comparisons from is on the heels of the single-PCB, dual-GPU Asus EAH3850X2. When comparing these two cards, in many ways, the Sapphire HD 4850 X2 seems like the next, natural evolutionary step in this designation's design. Superficially the EAH3850X2 and the HD 4850 X2 appear quite similar, but underneath that black cooler cover there are a lot of differences in the two designs. 

Back left, the Asus EAH3850X2, back right, the Palit HD 4870 X2, front, VisionTek HD3870X2 OC

The coolers of the EAH3850X2 and HD4850X2 both share the same positions of the dual fans keeping them cool, but that is about the extent of the similarities. The EAH3850X2 utilized copper heat pipes to move heat, whereas the HD4850X2 loses the pipes in exchange for a larger construction of aluminum. The HD3850X2 does not having any exhaust slits in the card's bracket, so the cooler is designed to push hot air off in all directions from the GPU. 

Supplementary cooling is supplied by a square heatsink that cools the chip handling the CrossFire communication, located in between the two fans, and a pair of heatsinks cooling memory chips on both the back and front of the card. Overall, in testing, this cooler seemed very capable of handling the thermal loads of the HD 4850 X2. Stock HD 4850's have reached greater temperatures in our benchmarking than the HD 4850 X2's cooler.

As for the amount of noise generated by the fans, in normal operation the HD 4850 X2 produced an above average level of sound, in strenuous games such as Far Cry 2. Manually setting the HD 4850 X2 fan to full-throttle made the HD 4850 X2 loud enough that the sound would dissuade a potential overclocker of running the fan full-bore 24/7.  In less intensive games, such as World In Conflict and X3, the sound level was acceptable.

As far as display outputs go, the HD 4850 X2 features four DVI ports and one S-Video connector, giving you the capability to attach up to four displays if you so feel the need. HDMI output is supported through the use of a bundled HDMI-DVI adapter.

Specifications

As you are probably aware, the ATI HD 4850 is the second fastest single-GPU offering from ATI at the moment, behind only the HD 4870. Not containing any substantial surprises, quite simply the HD4850X2 is the power of the HD 4850 doubled. The clock speeds of the HD 4850 and HD 4850 X2 are the same -- effectively there should be hardly any discernable performance gaps between the HD4850X2 and two separate and standard stock-clocked HD4850 cards working in tandem through CrossFire. 

Again, as you are probably aware from prior reviews, a single HD 4850 card is a capable performer that was won many positive reviews and accolades throughout the continuing lifespan of the product, both here on Neoseeker, and other hardware review sites. The HD 4850 is powerful enough to handle all but the most rigorous games (Crysis, GTA 4, on maximum detail settings and with AA) without having to break a sweet. Naturely the HD 4850 seems like a good option to go for with a dual GPU card, and we'll have to see if this holds up in the benches. 

As with all dual-GPU video cards, this chart may be somewhat misleading to the undiscerning eye. The figures denoted with a * are the specs of a single HD 4850 GPU doubled -- which is to say, CrossFire communication must be taken in consideration would comparing the relative strengths of each video card. For example, the HD4850X2 has total of 1600 stream processors, but this is because there are 800 per both GPUs -- not 1600 stream processors on each GPU.

 As par for the course with HD 4000 series, the Sapphire HD 4850 X2 has a host of features to improve time spent on your computer, including support for DirectX 10.1, Shader Model 4.1, 7.1 surround sound audio support over HDMI, and a high definition video decoding engine to handle HD video and Blu-Ray movies. Additionally, the HD 4850 X2 is capable of CrossFireX -- if you just can't get enough GPUs, you are more than welcome to step up to 4!

Now that we are acquainted with the HD 4850 X2, let's take a look at the bundle, box and overclocking of this product from Sapphire.