Hardware Asus Radeon HD 4890 Voltage Tweak Review

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2009/06/09/asus-radeon-hd-4890-voltage-tweak-review/1

Asus brings something unique to the crowded graphics market with it's take on AMD's Radeon HD 4890. Using the included software you're able to manually alter the card's core voltage, allowing for some serious overclocking. Volt modded overclocks made easy? We find out.

 

MEH. A good overclocker with stock cooling just seems like a bit of a waste. Sure one can swap the cooler himself and sure it helps keep the cost down, but that's just my 2 cents.

It's always nice to see some new features, though.

 

I got halfway through the Fallout 3 graphs and gave up. Couldn't there have just been one text line that says "performs same as Reference card"?

Fun idea though, hopefully this will pave the way for similar things in the future.

 

It's at the bottom of each results page, and is mentioned a couple of times on the first page - it's a stock card, what do you expect! We wanted to include it in all the results graphs though, as a someone who perhaps didn't know too much about the card could see it's comparison with the competition (I.E.-its the same as any other HD 4890 out of the box)

Still, it's an awesome overclocker, better even than the Sapphire Atomic. Pair with a decent 3rd party cooler and you're in business (although, warranty VOID!)

 

The boost from upping GPU Vcore is quite impressive. But it badly needs a better cooler. Still for those for whom it isn't an issue (like anyone putting a waterblock on it) then that's a nice boost over stock performance!

 

Whilst I agree with your point it would have been nice to see the results for the overclocked settings in the entire review (rather than in a seperate page). Whilst I know this would have been more work it would have shown just how good this card is against all of its competition across all resolutions.

That said I do appreciate the hard work that goes into these reviews : )

Just a quick note, Unless it has changed in the past couple of days, this card is available for £165 from overclockers. Great value for a great card.

 

It just entirely defeats the purpose of being able to overclock to these speeds with voltage increases if you then just slap the stock cooler on it.

Adding a 3rd party cooler helps but it again beats the idea of having a card that you overclock WITHOUT losing the possibility to RMA it if anything goes wrong.

 

I always wonder, why so many sites insist on separating performance in stock and overclocked form to different segments of the article. Especially, considering the only thing that separates this card from the sea of reference, is the voltage tweak. Wouldn't it be then wrong to assume, that this card is directed straight at the overclocker's crowd, who want to see how it performs when overclocked, not when in stock.

Therefore, my suggestion is that before any charts, tell about overclocking, and put the results in the same chart as the rest of the cards, so easier to compare just what that overclock give you in comparison to the competition, not just one chart with overclocked and stock settings.

My two cents. Otherwise, good review as usual.

 

*i meant here "wouldn't it be then right to assume ...", in the first paragraph.*

 

Interesting card and nice review. I'm with most everyone else here, though, that the stock cooler just kills the deal for me. I don't mind a noisy cooler at full load, usually, but the stock 4870/4890 cooler is too much even for me.

Also, quick check on the article. In the last paragraph of the "Thermal Performance" page, you say,

I'm guessing that should be 4C "warmer"?

 

2nd to last Crysis graph is missing the 4870X2 data, and the last Fallout 3 graph has black text.

How hard will a "cheeky" BIOS flash be.

EDIT: Temp graphs are messed up, 4870X2 idle info isn't there, and 4870 1GB idle is very high, and 4870 1TB load isn't there.

 

Any chance of adding the 4890 in crossfire and crossfire overclocked?

Would like to compare it to the 4870x2.

 

HEHE, a 1TB graphics card^^

It seems strange to me that they didn't pair this with a decent 3rf party cooler, they could charge a similar price to the Atomic and do pretty well with the overclockers.

 

Honestly, if only Asus shipped this ability with all of it's cards, they would easily become enthusiast favourites. I am tempted to overclock my 4870X2, since it is watercooled, but I plan on volt modding it it not too long (roughly around the time I wouldn't be sick if I fried it!), so don't see the point.

If they released a 4870X2 with this capability, I would flash my X2 in a heartbeat.

 

sapphire (and their vapor x coolers) should have a look at releasing this kinda warranty and enabling volt mods. thank you asus for doing this. maybe amd will put something like that volt mod program in overdrive.

 

I get knocking the fan for the noise, comparing gaming performance, what I don't get is knocking it for Folding@home performance. What does Folding@home do for my game playing experience? Folding@home is nothing more than a gee whiz feature to process data for someone else while feeling good for leaving your computer cooking all night. It should not be listed as a negative, regardless of whether Nvidia or ATI/AMD designed the card. As you can guess, I think Folding@home comparisons are RUBBISH. If I want to Folding@home I could buy a PS3 and go back to play games on my computer. It's nonsense!

 

ah I hope this becomes a standard with future cards, sure would be nice