Overclocker Cafe - HIS Radeon HD 5870 TurboX, HIS Radeon HD 5850 Turbo, HIS Radeon HD 5830 Turbo, HIS Radeon HD 5770 Turbo Review

HIS Turbo Radeon Line Up

Manufacturer: Hightech Information System
Supplied by: Hightech Information System

by Dean Barker (7/24/2010)

Introduction

Over the past few months I've been admiring Ford's new SHO Taurus and listening to the commercials pronouncing it 'show'. Basically a standard sedan that got raked through the performance aisle taking things to an entirely new level. HIS is no stranger to this principle. As a matter of fact, it could be argued they were one of the first aftermarket component companies to make factory tuned, super high output video cards. In HIS's case, the 'SHO' is not only Super High Output but the real 'Show' is the eye candy you can only get from ATi's HD 5xxx series.

Always ready to step up to the plate, HIS has sent over their Turbo line up of already shockingly fast ATI Radeon HD 5800 cards as well as a HD 5770 also in Turbo trim. What is 'Turbo Trim'? Turbo is HIS's designation for a factory pre-overclocked card balanced for a boost in gaming performance and cooling efficiency. HIS's motto has been "Faster, Cooler, Quieter" for years and so far they have not disappointed. To have a look at what's what today, we are going to check out four cards. The first three being the HIS HD 5870 TurboX, HIS HD 5850 Turbo and the HIS HD 5830 Turbo; all being the Limited Edition Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 version. Meaning that aside from including a top shelf full version game (Modern Warfare 2) that would run you 50 clams at any retailer, you have a card specially marked as a limited edition product. We also have the HIS Turbo HD 5770 IceQ5 card in the shop. Aside from the Turbo factory overclock, this card comes with HIS's fifth generation high performance cooler and includes the full version of Dirt2.

There are three big features present on all four of our test cards today that I'd like to make note of. The first of these is ATi's Eyefinity Technology. Eyefinity is the expanding of your viewing area over one, two or three displays to provide a wrap around experience. This is real immersion in a game; I can picture three monitors in a half hexagon setup that would give game play an entirely new meaning. Taking this technology on to productivity or entertainment applications offers every bit the same feeling of complete control and power.

The second big technology development with the HD 5xxx series is ATi's Stream Technology. Stream Technology enables the ATi GPU to work in conjunction with the CPU. This tandem balance of computing power is able to accelerate applications other than just graphics. The result is a more balanced machine that raises the bar in efficiency and computing power.

The final big advance offered by the HD 5xxx is the card offering full DirectX 11 support for use with Windows 7. As the year has progressed we've seen some great DX11 titles released and with the blending in of ATi's Eyefinity, some awe inspiring game play awaits.

Before we jump into the individual cards let's look at their specifications in table form so we can better compare their similarities and differences.

	HIS HD 5870 Turbo	HD 5870	HIS HD 5850 Turbo	HD 5850	HIS HD 5830 Turbo	HD 5830 Turbo	HIS HD 5770 Turbo	HD 5770
Interface	PCI-E 2.1	PCI-E 2.1	PCI-E 2.1	PCI-E 2.1	PCI-E 2.1	PCI-E 2.1	PCI-E 2.1	PCI-E 2.1
Engine Clock	900MHz	850MHz	765MHz	725MHz	840MHz	800MHz	875MHz	850MHz
Memory Clock	4.9GHz	4.8GHz	4.5GHz	4.0GHz	4.4GHz	4.0GHz	5.0GHz	4.8GHz
Pixel Pipelines	1600	1600	1440	1440	1120	1120	800	800
Vertex Engines	1600	1600	1440	1440	1120	1120	800	800
Memory Size/Type	1GB GDDR5	1GB GDDR5	1GB GDDR5	1GB GDDR5	1GB GDDR5	1GB GDDR5	1GB GDDR5	1GB GDDR5
Memory Interface	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	256 bit	128 bit	128 bit
Max Resolution	2560x1600*3	2560x1600*3	2560x1600*3	2560x1600*3	2560x1600*3	2560x1600*3	2560x1600*3	2560x1600*3
Display Port	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
HDMI	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
DVI	Two Ports	Two Ports	Two Ports	Two Ports	Two Ports	Two Ports	Two Ports	Two Ports
Crossfire Support	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
HD Support	1080p	1080p	1080p	1080p	1080p	1080p	1080p	1080p

For references purposes we can see how the Turbo cards benefit from about a 5% increase on the GPU core clock and a broader spread of increase on the memory speed. The base card of each unit is the same with the exception of the clock speed and cooler.

We'll have a closer look at the HIS IceQ5 cooler shortly as we look at pics of each card. In essence, the IceQ5 Cooler intakes air from a centrally mounted 80mm nine bladed fan blowing air onto an aluminum convection fin grid cooling both the memory and CPU. Air is exhausted out of the front and rear of the card for quicker and more even cooling of the card itself.

Let's take a quick look at each of these four cards and then drop them in our new test bed for a spin with some current gaming titles so we can see what each card brings to the table. Before we get to far, we want to extend our thanks to the good people of HIS for hooking us up to have a first hand look at these tuned bad ass cards. Let's get started with the HIS HD 5870 TurboX.

Pg. 1 - Introduction
Pg. 2 - HIS HD 5870 iCooler V Turbo
Pg. 3 - HIS HD 5850 iCooler V Turbo
Pg. 4 - HIS HD 5830 iCooler V Turbo
Pg. 5 - HIS HD 5770 IceQ5 Turbo
Pg. 6 - Benchmarking Results
Pg. 7 - Benchmarking Results / Conclusion