Temps, power-draw, and noise
Noise
Radeon HD 6870's reference heatsink isn't all that great at keeping the 151W GPU cool. The figures would be good if it was supremely quiet under load. However, it spins up to a level which is noticeable, albeit not deafening.
Where the Radeon HD 6870 will really hit home is when partners launch custom-designed models with the better coolers found on the latest Radeon HD 5850s - a GPU with which the HD 6870 shares thermal commonality.
ASUS does provide a means to change the fan speed via the SmartDoctor application; we left it at the default 33 per cent during regular testing.
