Reviews - Supercharging the Radeon HD 4870 - PowerColor does it properly

[HEXUS]

PowerColor has taken the already very good Radeon HD 4870 and boosted performance. We tell you if it's any good.

Read more.

[joe pineapples]

Liking the look of those temps. That would save a lot of messing, and extra expense changing the stock cooler.

I wonder if scan will be getting these in.

[Brewster0101]

Wonder why they didn't design the cooler to exhaust warm air out the back plate!!

[Biscuit]

£210 - bit pricey but im assuming its because of the cost of the VRAM.

[Tarinder]

Yup,

512MB of GDDR5 ain't gonna be cheap.

[kalniel]

Wonder why they didn't design the cooler to exhaust warm air out the back plate!!

It looks like they've got a multi-purpose cooler and just bolted it on - upsidedown in this case!

[Biscuit]

pretty much the same as

[stevie lee]

so PowerColour are claiming a 10c drop in temps.. HEXUS got 27c with what appears to be an upside down cooler.. would it be possible to put the cooler on the right way round and see if that affects the temps?

[kalniel]

so PowerColour are claiming a 10c drop in temps.. HEXUS got 27c with what appears to be an upside down cooler.. would it be possible to put the cooler on the right way round and see if that affects the temps?

It won't - the cooler is rotationally symmetrical.

[stevie lee]

but with a ~20c difference between claimed and actual temp, it could be worth a quick test just to see.. might not be symmetrical after all, the internal gubbins could be different.

[Crazytom]

I still prefered the graphs as they were previously with percentages on as well. This gives a fairly quick and easy comparison between different graph bars, and i find is more useful than the raw numbers in many cases. I do however like the colouring - redish colours for ati and greenish colours for nvidia. This gives a bit more distinguishment between the brands, and again is useful for quick comparisons.

[McstylisT]

That's a good improvement over the current temps that were stated when the 4870 series were released. I would be comfortable with them like that.

I am looking to acquire a 4870 in the very near future to replace my 3870. Just not sure which one , but this thread helps.

McT

[Xtanto]

pre order for £190 inc vat well that is much better Bang for buck than £210

[0iD]

I'm up for one of these when they're in stock. Have asked Scan for an ETA.

[MadduckUK]

mixing drivers.. tut tut

[Touche36]

pre order for £190 inc vat well that is much better Bang for buck than £210

That's a different card - still a 1GB 4870 but without the special cooler. The correct part # is AX4870 1GBD5-PPH