iXBT Labs - Sapphire RADEON HD 4850/4870 Vapor-X

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Performance in games

Testbed:

Intel Core2 Extreme QX9650 (3000 MHz) CPU
Zotac 790i Ultra motherboard on NVIDIA nForce 790i Ultra
2GB DDR3 SDRAM Corsair 2000MHz
WD Caviar SE WD1600JD 160GB SATA hard drive
Tagan TG900-BZ 900W PSU
Windows Vista 32-bit SP1, DirectX 10.1
Dell 3007WFP 30-inch monitor
ATI CATALYST 9.4; NVIDIA 185.68 drivers
VSync disabled

Benchmarks:

Far Cry 2 (Ubisoft) -- DirectX 10.0, shaders 4.0 (HDR), built-in benchmarking utility (the Middle level), maximum settings.
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Clear Sky 1.507 (GSC Game World/THQ) -- DirectX 10.0, maximum quality settings (dynamic lighting enabled); demo, copy files to the savegames folder, run the game, load level 'ixbt4', and type "demo_play ixbt4" in the console. This game does not support AA.
3DMark Vantage 1.02 (FutureMark) -- DirectX 10.0, shaders 4.0, multitexturing, 'Extreme' settings.
CRYSIS 1.2 (Crytek/EA), DirectX 10.0, shaders 4.0, 'Very High' settings, 'Rescue' level; batch file, e-mail us to obtain the timedemo.
CRYSIS Warhead (Crytek/EA), DirectX 10.0, shaders 4.0, 'Very High' settings, 'Cargo' level; batch file, e-mail us to obtain the timedemo.
Company Of Heroes Opposing Fronts (Relic Entertainment/THQ) -- DirectX 10.0, shaders 4.0, maximum settings; batch file, run the game, invoke graphics settings and click the test button.
World In Conflict 1.007 (Massive Entertainment/Sierra) -- DirectX 10.0, shaders 4.0, 'Very High' settings with adjusted AA and AF; run the game, invoke graphics settings and click the test button.
Devil May Cry 4 (CAPCOM) -- DirectX 10.0, 'Super High' settings with adjusted AA and AF; Scene 1.
Lost Planet Extreme Condition Colonies Edition (CAPCOM) -- DirectX 10.0, 'Super High' settings (with adjusted AA and AF); Scene 1.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Clear Sky

Far Cry 2

World In Conflict

Crysis, Rescue

Crysis Warhead, Cargo

Company Of Heroes Opposing Fronts

3DMark Vantage Graphics MARKS

Devil May Cry 4, Scene 1

Lost Planet Extreme Condition Colonies Edition, Scene 1

Conclusions

The comparison tables above lack results of the 4850, because the card has usual frequencies and memory volume, so its performance does not differ from that of the reference card.

Sapphire RADEON HD 4850 Vapor-X 512MB has a very interesting cooling system. It does not differ from the other standard 4850 cards in its speed. However, it's an original and noteworthy product owning to its efficient cooling.

Sapphire RADEON HD 4870 Vapor-X 2048MB is even a more captivating product. Its cooling system deserves the same words, it demonstrated excellent efficiency and noiseless operation. And we should also mention 2GB of video memory installed on this card. Our tests show that very few games benefit from so much memory (so there is even no point in publishing test results of this card on the diagrams -- comparison tables are quite enough).

A single gigabyte of video memory is presently sufficient even for the most powerful graphics cards. Nevertheless, a couple of tests forewarn about days, when two gigabytes of video memory are the standard volume for fast graphics cards.

We express our gratitude to Sapphire for the provided graphics cards.
The PSU has been provided by TAGAN, the monitor has been provided by NVIDIA.

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