An atom is the smallest particle known to man and if that atom is split, it can cause devastation in such great proportion its effects will last for years. We have been living in the atomic age for over sixty years and man still has much more to learn in order utilize it to its fullest potential. The Sapphire Atomic HD 3870 edition is a product that uses the word atomic, but is it to profess that the Sapphire card is fast and should blow the other video cards in its class out of the water? The Sapphire Atomic HD 3870 edition is an overclocked version based upon the recently introduced ATI RV670 chipset, which is the basis of the Radeon HD 3800 series of graphics solutions.- Overclockers Club

Sapphire Atomic HD 3870 Vapor-X OverClock Review

The Sapphire Atomic HD 3870 graphics card also has something small which would be its heatsink. The heatsink is a single slot cooling solution which utilizes a Vapor-X chamber to enhance its cooling properties. The Sapphire Atomic HD 3870 comes packaged for awe. It is encased in a silver briefcase with the Atomic logo on its face. When the case is opened, you get the feeling that something interesting will be contained within its confines. The case is very well insulated and also has a plastic cell covering the Sapphire Atomic HD 3870 which is surrounded by a mountain of pink styrofoam.

So what does atomic really stand for? We will let you decide on that but here are our thoughts. The extra clock speeds do make a difference in most of our benchmarks, there was a solid four to five frame difference, while in 3DMark06 there was roughly a difference of 700 points. As per the cooler, it takes up less space than the normal two slot cooling solutions that come with most manufacturer's Radeon HD 3870's, but what most impressed us was that where we might think bigger is better, in this case smaller was better by a decent amount. The small Vapor-X cooling just made it all worthwhile.

Sapphire has relayed that the price of the card will only be ten to fifteen dollars above what you can buy a standard Radeon HD 3870 for, this we consider a deal. Why? Even though there is not much of a performance increase, the bundle itself is probably worth twice as much, which makes for a pretty nifty price point. So what would we consider atomic about the Sapphire Atomic HD 3870 edition? Well, as for it packing an atomic punch in performance, no. With the heatsink being a single slot cooling solution, it does it have the efficiency to cool better than the larger two slot solution? Yes, by all means.

What would we consider the best value out of the whole package would have to be the bundle of software, HDMI cable and cold cathodes. Many may be wondering why this card was tested on an AMD system rather than an Intel. Well, there are still many loyal AMD users out there and many would like to see how a card performs on the new Spider platform.