The card
The lower power requirements of true mid-range cards mean that Sapphire can do away with a card-enveloping cooler.
This version is equipped with a 1,024MB framebuffer and will etail for £90, including VAT. The 512MB card will sell for £70 and will also lose a few connectivity options, and we'll discuss these below.
The card is very quiet in 2D and reasonably quiet when gaming. It should also fit into most chassis, as it measures 169mm x 110mm x 33mm (WxDxH) and weighs 279g.
There's no external power connector here, which'll be a boon for smaller HTPC setups. CrossFire fingers enable you to attach further cards for multi-GPU usage.
GDDR5 memory has now become mainstream, to the extent where £50 graphics cards now feature it. Sapphire's card is clocked in at a reference-matching 4,000MHz (effective) memory speed, along with the engine and shaders operating at 775MHz.
The 1,024MB card is equipped with DisplayPort, HDMI and dual-link DVI. The cheaper 512MB card will support DVI, HDMI, and VGA, however.
Sapphire bundles in a DVI-to-VGA dongle and an HDMI-to-DVI adapter, the latter enabling two DVI-totin' monitors to be used concurrently. This particular version of the card supports a three-monitor Eyefinity setup, too.
The package is backed up by Sapphire's standard two-year warranty. Claims in the first year are handled by the supplier from whom the card was purchased from. Claims after this period are handled by a U.K.-based service centre.
