PowerColor Radeon HD 3870 X2 review - Page 1 - Introduction

Going first base with the Eccentric Radeon Radeon HD 3870 X2
Series: Radeon HD 3970 X2 1 GB
More info: PowerColor
MSRP: 449 USD / 399 EUR
Seek best price on Guru3D.com pricewatch, click here.

Roughly two weeks ago AMD launched their ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 cards, and with great success. The new Dual GPU based graphics card finally reached the high-end domain that has been protected and guarded by NVIDIA for a long time now. In our earlier review we tested the product from HiS, today we move onwards and have a closer peek at what PowerColor / TUL has to offer us.

So the beast we'll review today is the Radeon HD 3870 X2. A snazzy VGA-card as this is a multi-GPU solution on one PCB (one board). Yep you heard it right, two graphics processors on one board, bridged, making it a "single" card, a card that because it's bridged will work on any mainboard with a fast enough PCIe slot (x8 or x16 is fine); so you do not need a specific Crossfire compatible mainboard.

This card offers you roughly twofold the performance of Radeon HD 3870, has twice the memory (2x512MB). The radeon HD 3870 X2 product is piercing the high-end segment, aimed at you guys at a fair price. The interesting thing is that the core clock speed of the X2 cards are faster than the standard 3870 cards. The memory however is a notch slower. What kind of impact will that have on performance among the two ?

On the next pages we'll look into the GPU, the X2, the technology, noise levels, power consumption, performance .. well everything you need to know, to be honest. Without further ado, let me introduce you to the PowerColor Radeon HD 3870 X2. Over the next pages you'll learn everything you need to know so that you may make a well informed decision whether or not to purchase this product.

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