Review: PowerColor Radeon HD 7870 Myst

Final thoughts and rating

PowerColor is one of a handful of AMD partners to produce a special-edition Radeon HD 7870 card, dubbed Myst. The model-numbering is a misnomer as the card uses a cut-down Tahiti GPU that is ordinarily found on Radeon HD 7900 GPUs.

Careful market segmentation means that other snips have to be made in order to hit a projected £180 price point. The upshot of various silicon finagling is performance that's around 10 per cent healthier than an honest-to-goodness Radeon HD 7870, powered by the well-balanced Pitcairn XT architecture. Using a meatier GPU, however, translates to the Myst's power consumption being markedly higher.

Solid in terms of pure performance but a little lacking in other areas, notably power-draw and noise, the PowerColor HD 7870 Myst straddles a thin sliver of middle ground that limits its appeal to those who want to spend less than £200 on their next graphics card and don't mind sacrificing all-round excellence for pure gaming speed.

The Good

Best gaming performance for under £200
Overclocks well

The Bad

High power consumption
Noisier than we'd like under load

HEXUS Rating

PowerColor Radeon HD 7870 Myst

HEXUS Awards

PowerColor Radeon HD 7870 Myst

HEXUS Where2Buy

The PowerColor Radeon HD 7870 Myst graphics card is available to purchase from Ebuyer.

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