On the following page, we’ll review our testing methodology, which is a highly-recommended read if you haven’t read it before, or if you are new to the site.The Radeon HD 3870 was a performance-segment graphics card by ATI, launched on November 19th, 2007. Their card offers a 3-phase power solution and slightly higher-quality capacitors, so we’ll see if that makes a difference in our overclocking tests. Palit did a solid job with the presentation of the card, and the included accessories are far from lacking.
512 mb amd radeon hd 3870 install#
In way of included accessories we found an install guide, Crossfire connector, the DVI and VGA adapters, driver CD-Rom, TV-Out cable and also a dual-Molex power connector used to create an extra PCI-E 6-pin, in case your PSU only includes one. I won’t get into how I found out, however. It denotes a hot surface, and I for one, can verify that this warning is well-warranted. The card supports HDCP, so using the HDMI adapter should deliver excellent Blu-ray performance and quality.īelow you can see the Crossfire connector and also a warning label. Palit’s offering includes two DVI ports and a TV-Out, although HDMI and VGA are both possible with included adapters. AMD and NVIDIA have been known to stick to the what will get the card by, but Palit wants to make sure their cards last a while (after all, RMA’s cost more money in the long-run) and also become the best overclockers. Another way they improve upon the launch design is with higher-quality capacitors. Due to time, I was unable to haul the cooler off to check that out, but Palit assures me that it’s there.
One feature that Palit has implemented into many of their recent GPUs is a three-phase power solution, while the reference design only calls for two. They don’t have any desire to take a reference card and simply slap their sticker on it, but rather improve upon the initial design in various ways to improve the performance, overclocking-ability and durability. What sets Palit from the rest? Talking to the folks there, it’s quickly evident that they have a real passion for quality.
Both cards feature 800 stream processors and 512MB of memory, along with the 256-bit memory bus. The memory frequency is oddly lower, but the HD 4870 features the already-faster GDDR5, improving upon bandwidth, latencies and voltage requirements. The HD 4870 offers some considerable upgrades over the HD 4850, such as the core clock, which has been bumped up to 750MHz, compared to the HD 4850’s 625MHz. Of course, I used that statement earlier this year with regards to, what, five different GPUs? It really is becoming increasingly difficult to predict how things will go, but it’s certainly been exciting. If you are running a 1920×1200 display and are not entirely peeved that you can’t turn AA up all the way, then this single GPU is going to keep you happy for a while. The HD 4870, as we will see, is a seriously powerful card, and one year down the road, adding a second one in really shouldn’t detract from your game play experience in any notable way, even at 2560×1600. That complicates the decision a little for some, but what I’d recommend is picking up a single card for now, then wait for the cards to go down in price before picking up another. The problem, though, is that the HD 4870 X2 costs less than two separate HD 4870’s at this point in time. One thing we did know, is that the HD 4870 X2 and two HD 4870 cards in Crossfire offer almost identical performance. Ironically, we received one a few days after that article, so I jumped right to testing to see just how great of a choice it is in the GPU scheme of things, both with regards to performance and price.
We didn’t do it on purpose, but it is generally difficult to benchmark a card that isn’t in the lab. What that review lacked, though, were some single-GPU results of the same card. It was the first time in a while we saw things play out this way, so it’s been interesting to watch. To say we were impressed would really be an understatement, because AMD pulled out a weapon that made NVIDIA’s newly-launched GTX 280 look silly by comparison. Earlier this month, we posted a look at AMD’s latest high-end dual-GPU offering, the HD 4870 X2.
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