HEXUS.bang4buck and overclocking
The HEXUS.bang4buck test takes the benchmark scores from previous tests, performs some mathematical magic and gives us a nice at-a-glance comparison of the relative value of the performance of the cards on test.
This of course does not take into account extra features - neither video decoding nor DirectX 10 tests are not part of our benchmarking suite as of yet and so these factors have to be considered separately.
| Graphics cards | HIS HD 2600XT IceQ Turbo 256MB GDDR3 | HIS HD 2600XT Zalman Fan 256MB GDDR3 | Foxconn 8600 GT-256 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Actual aggregate marks at 1280x1024 4xAA 8xAF | 121.21 | 110.47 | 163.94 |
| Aggregate marks, normalised, at 1280x1024 | 91.81 | 75.71 | 152.294 |
| Price | £76.26 | £73.03 | £80 (approx) |
| HEXUS.bang4buck score | 1.204 | 1.037 | 1.904 |
| Acceptable framerate (Av. 60FPS) at 1280x1024 4xAA 8xAF | No | No | No (FC and SC) |
The choice of resolution, 1280x1024 with 4x AA and 8x AF, gives a worst-case scenario for the HD 2600 XT.
Had we gone with 1600x1200, 0x AA, 8x AF, then the HIS Radeon HD 2600 XT IceQ Turbo would have come in much closer to the Foxconn 8600 GT-256.
Given its performance deficit compared to the IceQ Turbo, the HIS Radeon HD 2600 XT Zalman Fan comes out rather less promising. The IceQ Turbo costs a mere £3 more while delivering higher frame rates.
Overclocking
Our overclocking testing was hindered by some instability in AMD's GPU Clock Tool, which would intermittently crash while applying clock-speed changes.
The HD 2600 XT IceQ Turbo was able to be pushed all the way to 931.5MHz on the core and 2178MHz for the memory. This puts the memory almost on a par with that of GDDR4-equipped cards.
Despite its less-effective cooling, the HD 2600 XT Zalman Fan was also able to break the 900MHz barrier for the GPU core, reaching 904.5MHz. However, memory speeds did suffer, peaking at 1602MHz - well below even the stock speed of the IceQ Turbo.
In contrast with our bang4buck results, the resolution we chose for our mid-range GPU overclocking tests - 1600x1200, 0x AA, 8x AF with HDR lighting - plays to the HD 2600 XT's strengths.
The HD 2600 XT IceQ Turbo is already able to beat the 8600 GT and overclocking helps widen this margin, giving the card another 5fps.
The HD 2600 XT Zalman Fan is clearly constrained by a lack of memory bandwidth. Even with a 100MHz increase in the GPU core clockspeed, it is unable to match the performance of the IceQ Turbo at stock speed.
