Fast and Cheap
Written: Jun 15 '08
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Cheap, Fast, lots of features.
Cons: Very soon to be replaced by the HD4850 although at a much higher price.
The Bottom Line: Recommended if you only plan on light/medium gaming. Otherwise wait for the HD4850
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| mdbrown's Full Review: HIS HD 3850 HDMI Dual DL-DVI, (256), (256 MB) PCI ... |
The video card market changes so rapidly that today's bargain is obsolete and in need of replacement tomorrow. Such is the case here. I purchased the HIS HD3850 3 months ago at the then bargain price of $135. It was a tremendous price/performance purchase then. Now, for that same price I can purchase a 512Mb HD3870. With that being said, this has proven to be a very good card within it's class. It has no special features as it is an exact replica of the ATI reference card. OTOH, I have pushed the core from the stock 670Mhz all the way to 855Mhz with no problem. Memory was not quite as good, going from the stock 828Mhz (1.656Ghz) to 915Mhz (1.83Ghz). Performance is still good although not exceptional, especially if you prefer DX10 titles. While there is no bundle (which is true of pretty much all cards nowadays save the top of the line) it does come with everything necessary. Driver CD, 4-pin molex to 6-pin PCIe adapter, DVI-d to VGA adapter, and DVI-d to HDMI adapters. I will admit I have not used the video features of this card at all although everything I have read supports excellent performance.
For my current, modest needs this card is more than enough. My system is a homebuilt Athlon 64 x2 4000+ with 2Gb of Patriot 800Mhz DDR2 ram, WD 160Gb SATA150 HD, Rosewill 600Watt active pfc p/s and LG 16x DVD+/-RW optical drive. My gaming consists of Battlefield 1942, Serious Sam 2, Doom 3, and Quake 4. My screen is a 19" LCD, 1280x1024. I have been able to play all of my games at max resolution, full eye-candy with no less than 60 fps. I would recommend this card only if you are building a general purpose machine with light to medium gaming use. Otherwise, wait for the HD4850, while it will debut at twice the price it will be considerably more powerful.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 135
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Epinions.com ID:
mdbrown
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Reviews written: 61
Trusted by: 2 members
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