Something big comes this way. So what is it? The Palit Revolution 700 Deluxe. Palit has been a manufacturer that has come up with creative solutions to resolve the problems associated with a reference based video card. The Sonic models are Palit built and designed cards that offer excellent cooling solutions as well as better power management to create a product that outperforms the base models on all accounts. The Revolution 700 is a special card when you take the time to look at it. Specification wise, it does not differ much from the reference cards, 750MHz core clock speed but they do give a bump on the GDDR5 memory to 3800MHz. So what makes the Revolution 700 so special? - Overclocker Club

Palit Revolution 700 Deluxe Heatpipe Cooling Review

It can't be just a bump in the memory speed. No Johnny, it's not just that. What's special is the cooling system used on the Revolution 700 Deluxe. It's big, no it's massive. Taking up three expansion slots, the Revolution 700 needs to offer up some exceptional cooling as well as the ability to use that cooling capacity to increase the clock speeds for that something extra. By now you are pretty familiar with the Palit designed packaging. The front panel prominently features the Frobot with a menacing scowl. Deluxe tab on the bottom right side of the box lets you know some of the features of the graphics card.

The rear box panel illustrates some of the technical specifications in multiple languages and lists the required system specifications, one that catches the eye is the 650W power supply requirement. The side panel usually has a picture of the Frobot and this package is no different. And in the past Palit has shipped its products in a cardboard box inside of the main package with blocking to hold the box containing the video card in one spot. Not really the best way to go due to the weight and cost of the high-end cards on the market today, the Revolution 700 included. This time it's fitted in a foam enclosure to eliminate any damage.

At first glance, the Revolution 700 looks huge. And if you take a moment and step back and look again, it still is. This beast of a graphics card is the standard length but instead of taking up two expansion slots, it takes up three. Why is it so large? Well just, there are the two R770 GPU's on board plus there is the non standard cooling solution that utilizes two separate heatsinks that use two heatpipes per sink. Additionally, there are two cooling heatsinks that cover the memory and power regulation circuits, one on each side of the PCB. If nothing, the Revolution 700 is a unique video card and comes with four different interfaces.

Overclocking the Palit Revolution 700 Deluxe was a pretty simple process that yielded some tangible results. When overclocking the Revolution 700 we found the limits pretty quickly on the GPU cores. This we reached at 813MHz. By manipulating the GPU core clocks to suite each benchmark we could go as high as 826MHz on the cores. But the speed it passed all of our benchmarks at was 813MHz. The Qimonda memory had a bit more left in it even though it is slightly overclocked as delivered from Palit. This we were surprised to see scaling well past 4400MHz with a top speed of 4584MHz, which is a great increase.

The Palit Revolution 700 is a departure from the realm of normalcy. By normal we mean the same old solutions for cooling and the same dual link DVI outputs. This card has neither the same old cooling solution nor the standard display connections that have become the norm. Palit has taken the Radeon HD 4870 X2 and addressed one of the biggest concerns that enthusiasts have had with the R770 based video cards. The down side is the way the Revolution 700 is vented, some of this heat makes it way back into the chassis. With adequate airflow through the case, this can be minimized due to the decent cooling solution.

By taking the road less traveled Palit has taken the Radeon HD 4870 X2 to a new level both in size and cooling capability. Along that road there is a performance increase just waiting to be had. If you are in the market for a card that rules the big resolutions, then the Palit Revolution 700 Deluxe is the way to go.