Asus EAH3870 X2 1GB

Overclocking

To overclock our Asus EAH3870 X2 1GB graphics card, we used the latest build of RivaTuner (version 2.09) to increase the clock speeds and Crysis under DirectX 10 mode to ensure the card was stable at the frequencies we reached.

We moved the clock speeds up slowly in 5MHz increments until the system crashed. Once we reached this point, we backed off to the previous setting to test for stability by looping Crysis continually for two hours. If that clock speed was unstable, we then dropped back further and repeated the process until we had hit clock speeds that survived our stress test without crashing or signs of visual artifacts appearing.

Before we get onto the clock speeds we achieved though, it’s worth reminding you of the Asus EAH3870 X2’s standard clock speeds: the card runs at an 825MHz core speed, while the memory clock sits at 1,800MHz (effective). These are the same as the ATI reference clock frequencies.

After a few hours of playing around, we managed to get the card running stable at some decent frequencies – 909MHz on the core and a 2,046MHz (effective) memory clock. These represent increases of 10 percent for the core and 13 percent on the memory.

When you consider that there is not one but two GPUs sitting under the heatsink, it makes these increases look more impressive than they might be at first glance. And what makes it more impressive is that our little overclocking endeavour proved to be enough to close the gap between the Radeon HD 3870 X2 and Nvidia’s GeForce 9800 GX2 at 1,920 x 1,200 in DirectX 10 mode – there were just fractions of a frame per second in it.

Final Thoughts...

I have to say that I’m impressed with the Asus EAH3870 X2 graphics card – it’s quite a step away from the reference design and innovation like this should be encouraged. The inclusion of four DVI ports will be a welcome addition for anyone looking to run more than a couple of monitors on their workstation and what makes it even better is the fact that, unlike Nvidia’s SLI, ATI CrossFireX technology scales across multiple displays.

There is no need to disable CrossFireX in order to enable multi-display mode – and believe me when I say that is a big thing for anyone like me who is a gamer but also runs multiple displays. It’s for that reason alone that I have never used a GeForce 9800 GX2 or GeForce 7950 GX2 in any system that isn’t used for testing purposes – it defeats the object of having a single graphics card for me because it has all the compromises of SLI. And if I want SLI, I'll grab two graphics cards, thanks.

It’s not all rosy though because there are some things that aren’t as likeable about the Asus EAH3870 X2 1GB. The biggest one is of course performance. In short, the Radeon HD 3870 X2 is not as competitive as it needs to be and, if you took some games in isolation, you could make the card look like exceedingly poor value for money compared to the GeForce 8800 GTS 512 and GeForce 9800 GTX, which are both retailing for under £200. The 3870 X2, on the other hand, sits at about £240 (inc. VAT) at best, and heads up towards the £280 mark at worst.

Another peeve of mine is with the fansink. Now, I accept that it’s a compromise that had to be made in order to accommodate the four dual-link DVI ports on the PCI bracket, but that doesn’t mean it’s a good thing. While the two fans don’t really increase the amount of noise pollution by a significant amount, it does mean there are now two points of failure on the card – you could say you’re twice as likely to need to change the card’s heatsink later down the line when one of the fans inevitably fails. There’s also the fact that heat created by the GPUs is no longer exhausted out of the back of the card, which means that you end up heating up the inside of your chassis – I doubt that’s going to be a major concern for most though.

On the whole then, I think that the Asus EAH3870 X2 is a good choice compared to what’s on offer from other partners on both red and green fronts. It will undoubtedly please the multi-monitor crowd and that’s where I see this card making the most headway. A word of warning though: Asus has two EAH3870 X2 cards—one with four DVI ports (this one), and one that follows the reference design pretty closely—so if you’re unsure, please do check with the retailer before purchasing.

• Features
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• 10/10

• Performance
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• 8/10

• Value
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• 7/10

• Overall
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• 8/10

What do these scores mean?