swimtech

OmegaRED would have to get a bud to meet him in New York or Vermont to get that US price though. It's still 510.00 this evening at NewEgg Canada - bummer...

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It's not so much getting your way that matters or not - what matters is how you go about getting it.

THRASHER2

I love this card (I hope to get one in a few weeks)

One Question...
why was the test done on a Dual Core CPU and not on a Quad Core CPU?

OmegaRED

Dual core cpu's are the fastest for gaming for the overwhelming majority of games. You'll notice a lot of reviewers use either the e8400 overclocked past 4ghz or the Q9770 because at those speeds there is minimal bottlenecking. That wasn't the case for this review but at high resolutions there's no difference between 3ghz and 4ghz anyway; the gpu will be the limitation.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/cpu-sc...e-processors/1

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THRASHER2

Thanks

Zardon

Append 11th November 2008: Sapphire issued us with a new bios which lowers fan speed in 2d/idle mode. This bios flash reduces the noise significantly and when not gaming it is almost silent.

1/2_Baked_Alaskan

Excellent Review, I'm Curious at what kind of Advantage might be Gained going Tri-Fire as I already have a 4850 which is already Impressed me over the Asus EN9600GT it replaced. It Probably doesn't make sense to get Two(2) of these, but one would certainly be feasable, especially if it would scale better, allowing higher AA.

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My Rig:
Asus P5K-E Pro, Core Duo E6850, True120,
4 Gigs OCZ PC8500 Platinum,
Gigabyte HD4850 512, Xygamatek VD924 w/Ramsink/PWM Mod
250 Gig Seagate 7200.11 SATA
Asus 20 X DVD-RW SATA,
Ultra XBlaster Midtower, Black
Windows Vista 64 Bit Ultimate SP1
Sceptre X24WG 24", Logitech G15, G9, Z5500 Spkrs, DLink DGL4100 Router

1/2_Baked_Alaskan

Probably Doesn't make any Difference, I have Several TT120's in my Case, Plus a Thermalright Ultra 120 w dual 120mm Fans, so my Box kind of sounds like Freakin 747 Engine winding up, and if my Xygmatek BattleAxe GPU Cooler makes any noise, I'd be hardpressed to notice. If a Decent Aftermarket Cooler Comes out for the 4850 X2, I'll be all over it like Yesterdays news.

If ATI Gets better Scaling in their Crossfire Setups, this would be a Great Card to mate up with a Single Core 4850 512.

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My Rig:
Asus P5K-E Pro, Core Duo E6850, True120,
4 Gigs OCZ PC8500 Platinum,
Gigabyte HD4850 512, Xygamatek VD924 w/Ramsink/PWM Mod
250 Gig Seagate 7200.11 SATA
Asus 20 X DVD-RW SATA,
Ultra XBlaster Midtower, Black
Windows Vista 64 Bit Ultimate SP1
Sceptre X24WG 24", Logitech G15, G9, Z5500 Spkrs, DLink DGL4100 Router

douglatins

I was very very really sad not seeing the 4870X2 in here, major failure

Zardon

While I appreciate the fact it would be interesting to see the results of the 4870 X2 in this particular review, this specific writeup was geared for people with a particular budget in mind. We have covered the 4870 X2 in quite a few reviews before and it is considerably more expensive than the 4850 X2.

All I can do is suggest you read our other reviews of 4870 X2 boards if you are interested in seeing how it performs (there are a few more reviews coming of it in various guises as well).

http://www.hardwareheaven.com/reviews.php?reviewid=622
http://www.hardwareheaven.com/reviews.php?reviewid=607
http://www.hardwareheaven.com/reviews.php?reviewid=609

OmegaRED

X24870 wasn't needed at all, it was 5-10% ahead of the X2 4850 in all the benches I saw.

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Fletchertron

Radeon 4850 X2 Fan Noise Problem Solved

I purchased the Radeon 4850 X2 2GB card 3 days ago (upgrade from nVidia 8800 GTS OC) and nearly sent it back due to the ridiculous noise it makes.

Having scoured the internet for a solution (editing profiles, downloading new bios updates etc) I came to the conclusion that I was going to have to put up with it.

It is true you can set the fan speed to 20% via the Catalyst Control Centre, however this is actually louder than automatic, which seems to run at 12%.

At 3am last night however, I found a way which gives you the best of both worlds; superb gaming performance which is cooler than before but also non-gaming noise levels that are so low, my hard disk makes more noise J
The main reason for the excessive noise, is ATI/Saphires’ over conservative and inefficient approach to cooling their card. With the method listed below, I am able to get an idle temperature of 42 degrees celcius and a load temperature of 62 degrees celcius without spending a penny. My idle fan speed is 2% and anything above 50 degrees celcius has a % increase in fan speed relative to the temperature of the card (as it should be).

To achieve this, just follow these steps:
1. Download and install ‘Radeon Bios Editor’ (RBE)
techPowerUp! :: Downloads
2. Download and install ‘ATI WinFlash’
techPowerUp! :: Download Winflash 2.0.1.7
3. Run RBE and click the ‘Acquire/flash’ icon at the bottom
4. Locate your installed ‘ATI WinFlash’ software by clicking browse at the top right (ATIWinFlash.exe)
5. Click ‘Analyze’ at the bottom to refresh the attached graphics card list
6. Select the first adapter in the list and click ‘Acquire Bios’ at the bottom
7. The Bios will be loaded into the RBE program
8. Click ‘Save Bios’ so that you have a backup copy of the adapters default bios settings (safety first)
9. Select the ‘Fan Settings’ tab at the top
10. Select the ‘Use transfer function (recommended)’ button under ‘Fan throttle control settings’ heading
11. Change the following:
‘Tmin (C)’ to 50
‘Duty cycle min (%)’ to 2
‘Hysteresis (%)’ to 10
‘Tmin hysteresis (C)’ to 4
12. Select the ‘Additional features’ tab at the top
13. Select the ‘Fix/already fixed’ button under ‘Fix spin up bug’ heading
14. Click the ‘Acquire/flash’ button at the bottom
15. Click the ‘Flash Bios’ button at the bottom (this will apply the changes listed above)
16. It may ask you to reboot, but say ‘No’ if you have the other GPU adapter to update aswell
17. Repeat points 6 to 15, but selecting the second adapter
18. When you click ‘Flash Bios’ on the second adapter, it may notify you the product number is different, but continue anyway
19. Once updated, say ‘Yes’ to rebooting
20. Once rebooted you should notice a strange sensation of your ears going back to normal

I use a ‘Tmin (C)’ setting of 50 degrees celcius, because this is the level my card temperature sits below when idling. This level may be different for your system, so you may need to experiment.
You will have noticed than when you were inputting the numbers, the graph on the right also changes. With the figures selected above you will get a linear increase in fan speed corresponding to a similar increase in card temperature after 50 degrees celcius (the graph can be manually adjusted to suit your needs).

I hope this guide has been useful but please note any changes made your cards Bios is at your own risk.

Mac Daddy

Thanks for the feedback and welcome to DH Fletchertron.

This is an older review thread but some might find that feedback useful

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"My mom said the only reason men are alive is for lawn care and vehicle maintenance." - Tim Allen