Sapphire Radeon HD 6950 2GB FleX review - making Eyefinity simple

Final thoughts and rating

Spending £200-plus on a graphics card will give you a healthy dollop of performance. It doesn't really matter who manufactures the GPU, because the Radeon HD 6950 2GB or GeForce GTX 560 Ti 1GB are both solid performers. In fact, we recommend the duo.

And while both cards provide a smooth gaming experience when using a full-HD monitor, NVIDIA and AMD have been at pains to explain that their respective GPUs can do so much more.

Sapphire has taken a Radeon HD 6950 2GB card and given it a boost by providing two company-specific features: Vapor-X cooling and FleX Eyefinity connectivity. The heatsink has a proven lineage in keeping hot-running GPUs at low-ish temperatures and, while the power-draw is strangely high, the cooler does a good job.

AMD talks a good game for multi-monitor Eyefinity usage but has dropped the ball by not providing out-of-the-box connectivity when running three screens from the twin DVI ports and HDMI connector. Sapphire adds in extra circuitry to the FleX card and enables three DVI-equipped monitors - which are, we believe, the most pervasive flat-panel computer screens in circulation - to be connected with the minimum of fuss.

Radeon HD 6950 2GB has enough oomph to enable three-screen gaming - either through a trio of 1,680x1,050 or 1,920x1,080 monitors - to be run with quality presets. Expensive graphics cards need compelling reasons for purchase; Sapphire provides just that with the £225 Radeon HD 6950 2GB FleX. Recommended.

The Good

Vapor-X cooling works well
FleX technology makes a lot of implicit sense
Small-ish price premium over bog-standard cards

The Bad

Power-draw is, inexplicably, higher than expected

HEXUS Rating

Sapphire Radeon HD 6950 2GB FleX

HEXUS Awards

Sapphire Radeon HD 6950 2GB FleX

HEXUS Where2Buy

The reviewed Sapphire Radeon HD 6950 2GB FleX graphics card is available to purchase from ebuyer.com.

HEXUS Right2Reply

At HEXUS, we invite the companies whose products we test to comment on our articles. If any company representatives for the products reviewed choose to respond, we'll publish their commentary here verbatim.

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Eh, I can't see any really going for this. I got my HD6950 for 189 quid. And I can run three monitors off that if I wanted to. It has enough bloody connections.

Besides if someone has 3 monitors chances are they would probably have a very high end card already.

It's not about the connectors, you still need an adaptor. I'm still not convinced it's worth it, 10% over a normal card but you can buy an active dvi > dp adaptor for about £25 at scan or ebuyer.

For a 6950 you'd need an active mini-dp -> DVI adapter. And this way you don't end up with at least one useless port on your graphics card. Plus some people plain don't like dongles. And don't forget this is a vapour-x card, so some of the increase is for that as well as the ability to use 3 monitors without active dongles (don't forget that with 2 mini-dp ports it can run 5 monitors simultaneously, whereas other 6950s can only run 4).

I don't think anyone's suggesting this is a must buy product over a standard 6950, but it has a lot of features that make it an interesting proposition…

EDIT: also, was that a 2GB card @ £189 or a 1GB card? Doesn't make a big difference at 1 screen res but if you're powering 3 screens…. ;)

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For a 6950 you'd need an active mini-dp -> DVI adapter. And this way you don't end up with at least one useless port on your graphics card. Plus some people plain don't like dongles. And don't forget this is a vapour-x card, so some of the increase is for that as well as the ability to use 3 monitors without active dongles (don't forget that with 2 mini-dp ports it can run 5 monitors simultaneously, whereas other 6950s can only run 4).

I don't think anyone's suggesting this is a must buy product over a standard 6950, but it has a lot of features that make it an interesting proposition…

My point is that if you have 2+ screens you probably have other specialist hardware that will allow you to run an insane amount of monitors at once. This card changes nothing, it's purely a gimmick

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EDIT: also, was that a 2GB card @ £189 or a 1GB card? Doesn't make a big difference at 1 screen res but if you're powering 3 screens…. ;)

2GB, unlocked to a HD6970 now aswell.

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My point is that if you have 2+ screens you probably have other specialist hardware that will allow you to run an insane amount of monitors at once.

Potentially, but if you don't have > 2 monitors already this card provides a consumer-friendly entry into multi-monitor gaming / productivity, without having to worry about whether you need specialist monitors, dongles etc. You can buy this and any 3 DVI screens of your choice, and you're good to go - potentially for < £500, which doesn't strike me as a prohibitive cost for the screen real estate you're getting ;)