Triplex Parasouls HD 3870

Computer hardware and software at amazing prices, available online from Scan Computers UK

Hi, I picked up one of these from scan and have a little mini review on it with lots of pics to share :) I'll start of with the box:


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00136.jpg


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00138.jpg


I chose this one because of its price, but it turns out that it doesnt come with a crossfire connector which is probably why its cheaper. However, the PCB on this model is a lot shorter then the normal 3850 and 3870 cards which makes it a worthwhile buy, particularly for smaller cases.


The card itself has a cooler similar to a zalman one, in fact, I'm sure it is a zalman cooler:


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00140.jpg


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00141.jpg


Also there is no memory cooling at all on the card, so I applied some old copper ramsinks I had after cleaning them with TIM, using some Akasa Thermal Adhesive Tape:

http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00142.jpg


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00143.jpg


And regarding the size of this card, heres a comparison of it next to an X1900 xtx:


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00144.jpg


The smaller size makes installation so much easier. I didnt have to push any cables out of the way while installing or removing the card. It just goes in and out easilly whenever needed:


DSC00145.jpg - Image - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting


You can see here that comes nowhere close to my cables!


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00145.jpg


I powered it on to see what it looks like with my case lights, the coolers fins reflect the light VERY nicely!


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00160.jpg


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00163.jpg


Unfortunately though I cant see them very well with the side panel put on because the case fans get in the way :(


http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...v/DSC00166.jpg


And finally some benchmarks against my old X1900 xtx. All were done with my a 475 Mhz fsb, E8400 @ 4275 Mhz, and my ram on a 1:1 divider at 950 Mhz @ 5-5-5-15 timings:

X1900 xtx:

3dmark01 - 44935
3dmark03 - 25290
3dmark05 - 14979
3dmark06 - 7504


HD 3870:


3dmark01 - 55841
3dmark03 - 37996
3dmark05 - 22813
3dmark06 - 11474


Thats a nice upgrade for £125 - whatever I sell my X1900 xtx for :p I've not bothered overclocking yet, and dont think I will need to for quite a while since I only play at 1280x1024, but if I ever do, I'll post more results.


Ciao.

Its quite a mad overclocker!

the GPU only goes up to 805 Mhz but the ram was stable up to 2600 Mhz with a few artifacts!

I dropped it down to 805/2500 and got 12128 in 3D mark 06.

Im sure its perfectly fine to run at 805/2400 24/7 :)

Good for you Bhavv, Ive been wasting alot of brain power recently, thinking which card to buy, 8800gt or hd 3870...is your card 256MB? whats the price? Have you tested it with any games? What PSU do you use?

Its a 512mb

Their X2s look nice too. If this was around when I got mine, I think I'd have opted for this or their X2 instead. Mine has the same Zalman cooler (mine is a Gigabyte one).

I havnt seen a Triplex 3870 X2 yet, they dont have one on their site either.

Hunain the link at the top of the first post will take you to the card, its a 512 mb.

Wherther to go for a 3870 or 8800GT is up to you. I went for the 3870 as it was cheaper and I have a crossfire motherboard so I have an upgrade option of adding a second, but would rather just upgrade to a 4870.

For power supply requirements on the 3850 and 3870, it says 450 watts for a single card, 550 watts for two.

I have a 580 watt tagan Modular PSU which has around 90% efficiency so it would be just perfect to run two of these if I wanted :)

When I bought it it was the best modular PSU around. Seasonic and Enermax at the time had the best PSU's available according to a magazine review on PSU's which Seasonic won, but they werent modular and they were slightly more expensive so I went for the Tagan.

Actually I remembered I had a hiper modular 580 watt PSU first, and it blew in just under two months so I replaced it for the Tagan one.

So if i got an ASUS 450w PSU, and you can check the rest of my system in the sig, with that OC and one 3870, you think its going to be fine? or barely enough? Plus whats the juice on 4870?

You should be fine with a 450 Watt PSU, but your sig says you have a 400 watts.

There is a thread in this section on the ATI 4000 series, check it out :)

Over an hour error free at 801/1202 (its currently up to 90 mins)

http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...vvv/3870OC.jpg

Niceness!

I already updated this screenshot to one that says 63 mins, but photobucket is really slow at changing them!