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Sapphire Radeon HD 6570
by bhayanid
Bit of a change here from my usual movies and music reviews to review the Graphics card that I got a couple of weeks ago. My old NVidia GTS 250 graphics card was a good graphics card although a few years old now and actually I was not buying a new graphics card for the graphics but more because I needed a HDMI port available in the ... computer. This was due to needing to connect the computer to an AV receiver that I ordered. I had two options, one was to update the sound card to a card with an optical output or the other option is the one I chose to update the graphics card to one with a HDMI output. I will review the main features of the new card and also at times compare it to the GTS 250 to get a direct comparison.
Ports
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The Radeon 6570 has three ports. As I mentioned above one is the HDMI and this is the most advanced out of all three. The reason it is the best one to use is that through one cable it provides both the video transmission and the audio. This means for example if you connect your computer up to your TV via a HDMI to HDMI cable that you will only need the one cable to also output the sound through your TV. To do this however you will also need an HDMI slot in your TV. It is also useful in my instance for connecting the computer up to my speakers via the receiver. This all True Dolby 5.1 surround sound which an optical cable cannot provide although they are both digital connections so overall sound quality will only be slightly different.
The second port is the DVI connection and this in fact provides the same video quality as HDMI, but the key difference is that it does not provide audio. So going back to the TV example even if your TV had an HDMI slot, and you used a DVI to HDMI connector then although you would be able to transmit the video signal to the TV, you would not be able to hear any sound. The third port is the one that will be the first to disappear and that is VGA. This provides lower quality display and unless you use DVI and HDMI on a regular basis, then you may not notice the difference, but with VGA it is a lot less sharp. Most work places are transferring through to DVI and it is just a matter of time till VGA become obsolete.
Installation
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This was very easy and although I have a fair bit of experience with opening up computers, I still think it is something anyone can do. Just open up the screws for your casing, literally pull out your old graphics card and replace the new graphics card in its place. It really is that simple. If you are not sure which card is the dedicated graphics card well then my tip is to look at which piece of hardware has the ports coming out of the back of the unit that your monitor was previously connected to. If you are going to attempt to do this yourself don't forget to switch of the power and take out all connections.
Once you put on your computer you will notice there is basic graphics as you need to install the drivers for the graphics card. Now this is where one of the beauties of Windows 7 comes in. The package did come with a CD to install the drivers, but as long as you have a connection to the internet established then Windows will automatically download and install the drivers, which in this case was 17MB and with an average internet connection this won't take more than a minute. From here you reboot your computer and mission accomplished you now have the Radeon 6570 as part of your arsenal.
Fan
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The fan is very important and these days with graphics card there is such a high range, and you even get self-cooling graphics card which do not need a fan. My old GTS 250 card that I replaced was a large card and had a massive section for a fan. Needless to say I did not realise till it was replaced how loud this fan was. With the Radeon 6570 it is very quiet and don't underestimate how important this feature is. You want your PC running smoothly and efficiently and quiet fans are a part of this. The Radeon 6570 has a smaller fan but I am a lot happier with the quieter PC especially with the new power supply I purchased earlier this year.
Graphics
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My previous graphics card is the GTS 250 which had 2gb dedicated graphics compared to this graphics card which also has 2gb but this was purely based on the reason to do with the HDMI port. I was not buying a graphics card for games but have tried a couple of games out on the Radeon 6570 and know enough on graphics cards to give a fair review. With 2GB graphics you cannot expect a lot as this is on the lower end of the scale however it should be capable at playing most of the latest games but with the most demanding games the minimum requirements is where this will fit in with recommend graphics better standard than 2gb. However if you are intended to play a game along the lines of Black Ops 2 then my advice is do not touch this graphics card and get one of the more advanced Asus graphics card. If you are looking at video playback then there are no faults here and it does not struggle handling 720p files or 1080p.
Price
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At the moment you are looking at about £45 on Amazon for this but the price does go up and down by a few pounds so expect to pay between £40-50. It is a fair price and much better than the on-board graphics. I was determined not to spend too much as I was only buying it for the HDMI port and this fell right in to the price category. There were even cheaper cards like the GTS 610 which are under £30 but I wanted slightly better graphics that at least come close to my previous graphics card so I have no complaints in terms of value for money.
Overall
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Overall this is a great budget graphics card and in direct comparison with its NVidia GT 430 there is not much that can separate them so I guess do your research and make a choice between the two. I wanted a card that came close to matching the graphics on the card that was getting replaced as well as having DVI and HDMI ports. This card ticks both of those boxes and combined with the quiet fan, easy installation and great price I have little choice but to give this 5 stars.
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Sapphire Radeon HD 6670
by Coolchris330
This Sapphire HD Radeon 6670 is a mid/high-range card manufactured by Sapphire. It has 2GB Dedicated Graphics Memory and shares some memory with the RAM in the event that it runs out.
==General Techy Information==
This card is a mid/high range card intended for some gaming and multimedia purposes - for a workstation ... it'd probably be overkill. It is the bridge between mid-range and high-end on the AMD graphics card series', and is particularly cheap - usually found for less than £60.
The graphics card has DirectX 11 support, allowing for advanced features such as tessellation and image-based reflections, however, it would probably require a higher-end card to use all of these features to their full potentials. The card has 480 unified shader cores, and has a 'Core Clock' speed of 800MHz. The graphics memory also has a speed of 800MHz (the clocks don't mean an awful lot to regular users, but those interested in overclocking may find it useful). The bus-width of the card is 128-bit, allowing for a fairly quick data transfer speed from and to the graphics card, but not as fast as cards with a larger bus.
The card is also based on a 40nm architecture (smaller is better), has 716 million transistors and supports OpenCL and DirectCompute 5.0. This card has no support for Nvidia exclusive features like CUDA or PhysX.
==Ease of Installation==
The 6670, and in fact graphics cards in general, are extremely easy to install. This graphics card requires one PCI-E slot running at x16 (most recent desktop motherboards have one of these slots, it's a long slot (and usually blue), with a pullable 'release tab'. Google will provide some lovely images and explanation on the matter if you're at all unsure.
This graphics card simply slots in, and since the card operates at under 65w, it can be powered entirely by the motherboard, so no additional power connectors required. Simply screw it into your case with the provided screws and install the drivers off of the internet (or the included drivers on CD if you don't have access to the internet, but the CD drivers are usually out of date), and hey presto, you're done.
The instructions included are more than adequate, and it's likely that your motherboard will also come with a guide on how to install a PCI-E device.
==Performance==
The performance is an extremely important part of a graphics card, especially for gamers and those that use many graphically intensive applications, and even home users who just want a smooth experience on Windows watching movies and the like. You'll be glad to hear that the performance in lovely here.
===Day-to-day Usage===
The card can easily decode 1080p video under practically every format when run in Media Player Classic (which uses GPU acceleration for the video rendering, making it a good judge of card) and rendered the web beautifully quickly when browsing with Firefox (again, it's GPU rendered, so a good benchmark). I saw no stutters nor slowdowns during either of these activities, not even with YouTube videos pushed up to the highest resolutions, making it perfect for home use.
===Gaming Usage===
Gaming is probably an important part for someone who is looking into buying a card like this, especially since there are far more cheaper alternatives available for home use, a purpose which doesn't need a particularly speedy graphics card anyway (if you're looking into basic home use, I'd recommend a 6450 or 6570 at time of writing).
So, how does the 6670 perform in-game. Below are a few of my benchmarks. The graphics card is in these tests is coupled with the i3 2120 and 4GB of dual channel RAM on an H61 LGA1155 motherboard. All tests span one minute.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 - 1280x768 resolution, max settings. No AA, No AO (60fps+ recommended)
---Test 1---
Minimum framerate: 43
Maximum framerate: 93
Average framerate 72.217
---Test 2---
Minimum framerate: 54
Maximum framerate: 93
Average framerate: 75.2
---Summary---
Modern Warfare 3 is a big one amongst gamers, but it is amongst the easiest AAA games around at the current moment in time, using the dated Quake engine, and allowing for extremely high framerates.
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Battlefield 3 - 1280x768 resolution, max settings, No AA, No AO (30fps+ recommended)
---Test 1---
Minimum framerate: 26
Maximum framerate: 50
Average framerate: 36.4
---Test 2---
Minimum framerate: 21
Maximum framerate: 41
Average framerate: 29.583
---Summary---
Battlefield 3 is one of the most graphically intense games going, and is used as a benchmark for far higher end cards than this. For the price of the card, compared to the price of the recommended card to run this game (a 6950, clocking in at just over £200, yikes), the performance is actually staggeringly good - especially considering the fact that it's Ultra settings.
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Counter Strike: Source - 1280x768, max settings, No AA (60fps+ recommended)
---Test 1---
Minimum framerate: 193
Maximum framerate: 298 (engine limit is 300 here)
Average framerate: 260.550
---Test 2---
Minimum framerate: 141
Maximum framerate: 286
Average framerate: 224.052
---Summary---
Counter Strike: Source is one of the most loved games in the gaming community, and by far one of the most played. If you're interested in Counter Strike, there's no way that you're going to be let down by this card. The framerates never drop below 100, and regularly hit the engine limit. A testament to Valve's game development skills and the power of the card.
===Conclusion===
The HD Radeon 6670 is pretty much the comfortable gaming experience for the majority of people. It topples the performance of gaming consoles, and with the right components, could even be made into a PC cheaper. This is the budget gamers choice.
==Temperatures==
You don't like burning your fingers. Or your case and motherboard for that matter. However, with the Sapphire 6670, this is unlikely to be an issue. The fan on it is pretty large, and with only 65w input, it doesn't have a whole lot of capability to produce masses of heat. Regardless, it pretty much balances out at 50c, which is far below the maximum operating temperature of graphics cards as a collective, which usually sit around the 100c mark.
The Sapphire 6670 is a cool solution to your gaming needs, and may even be one of the coolest running brands of graphics card.
==Power Consumption==
This card doesn't require any additional PCI-E connectors from the power supply, only the base power from the motherboard, meaning that it cannot use more than 65w. This is good for computer efficiency, because it helps you keep your electricity bill down. It's unlikely that the graphics card will ever actually pull 65w, mind you. I don't have exact readings, but I reckon that it probably hangs around the low tens idle and the mid fifties under load.
The only downside to having only PCI-E slot power is there is not an awful lot of additional power to put into overclocking, which may leave some people disappointed. There should be enough headroom for some overclocking though, I should think.
==Value for Money==
This card was cheap. I got it for £50, and it has proved itself to be the exact gaming beast that I wanted in my machine. While waiting for it to come, I was wondering if I had made the right decision, but now that it's here and I'm using it, I realise that this was all I needed, and it's a fabulous card for the price. So why pay more?
I wholeheartedly recommend this card to anyone on a tight computer budget.
==Conclusion==
This is pretty much the peak of the mid-range card. You don't get more performance for lower-profile cards, and you especially don't get more performance at the price that the 6670 is offered at. This is a phenomenal deal, and is exactly where I would place the budget gaming deal.
This is a card for everything. It is well worth the purchase.
I award the Sapphire HD Radeon 6670 a 5/5.
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