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Asus Radeon AEX800XT Review |
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Written by Mavke
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Saturday, 09 October 2004 |
And a new review has also been publishid on the Asus Radeon AX800XT by DriverHeaven. When you think of Asus, the word "quality" immediately comes to mind, and this is just reaffirmed with today's newest review piece, their new PCI express top of the range graphics card the Asus Radeon AEX800XT. There isn't much we haven't covered before with regards to the X800XT series of cards.
 Asus Radeon AEX800XT Review
Testing this card was a pleasure, after my initial horror with Asus Smart Doctor giving the dreaded BSOD thankfully the subsequent BIOS upgrade the Asus engineers sent to fix this, everything was smooth sailing. No matter the resolution or 3D game engine this card will give you more than playable frame rates, yes even with Doom 3. The added bonus of Dual DVI will appeal to the rich gamers with two high end TFT's, the image quality from this card is without a doubt the highest ive seen. When I tested with two Dell 2001fp screens the overall quality was beautiful, whether its gaming, surfing the net or high end CAD or Photoshop work.
Asus really deserve major credit for including the DVO - TMDS convertor chip with their card and along with their own Asus branded software package, fan/temperature control and configuration software this really is the X800XT card to own if you have moved to the PCI Express platform.
So after all this praise is there a downside? As you would expect this card is expensive, at time of publication the AEX800XT is the most expensive X800XT board available and this card retails for £420, over £40 more than the equally high end HIS X800XTAsus you would need to be handy with wiring as the Asus board also has a unique pin header setup when compared to the reference. I tested the Artic Cooler Rev 4 on a reference X800XT and while I was impressed, the temperatures I recorded were only 2-4c less than the Asus cooler. The Asus generally peaked around 50c for me under extended full load conditions with the ram temperatures in the mid 40s. The Artic Cooler is also no quieter than the Asus cooler if you set it up to run at lower fan speeds when idling, and due to the positioning of the northbridge on some 925x boards you might find the artic cooler gives you some issues.
I cannot recommend this card highly enough, if you have the capital to purchase then the Asus Radeon AEX800XT gives the best image quality in both 2D and 3D 8 have seen thanks to high quality dual DVI output, couple this with phenomenal frame rates in any game you throw at it, a totally controllable fan cooling system, core and ram temperature monitoring, a heavy duty copper cooler built on a beautiful orange PCB then you surely are getting what you pay for. Pure class from Asus and the best video card I have used this year.
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 09 October 2004 )
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EVGA 9600GT (SC) PCIe 512MB - Rev 01
