Bundle and extras
AOpen doesn't have the cross-market recognition and exposure of, say, someone like MSI, so presentation and extras, both hardware and software, can provide a competitive advantage.
Three heads are better than one, evidently. The packaging is minimal, and not the motherboard-sized boxes that other 5900-series cards often arrive in.
Here's where the lamentations begin. AOpen doesn't seem to keen on pushing out the extras' boat. Instead, it's more rudimentary than deluxe. The word generic is often used to describe lacklustre bundles. It's difficult to become more generic than AOpen's inclusion of a NVIDIA user's guide. The colour fold-out chart provides a brief outline on hardware and driver installation, too brief in fact. The installation CD contains an automated, all-in-one setup for VGA driver (52.16), DirectX 9, 3Deep E-Color, and a VGA LiveUpdate Wizard. InterVideo comes to some sort of bundle rescue with its much-used WinDVD4 and WinRip package.
Of notable concern is the lack of supplied games, be they full titles or even demos. That's poor thinking on AOpen's part. Other FX5900 XT board partners include more substantial software offering, including the excellent Call Of Duty. The hardware portion of the package is little better, with only a single S-Video-to-RCA cable and the ubiquitous DVI dongle.
