X²-The Threat:::...

Actual Screenshot - Clickable

A first person space experience designed for todays game players with sound and graphics to match.
Discover new worlds and races, become a trader, bounty hunter, pirate, miner or a cunning combination of them all.
The uneasy peace that befalls the Universe is about to be broken...

Can you meet the Threat head on?

X² - The Threat is a glorious showcase for what a graphics card can do when fed the right diet of data. This highly detailed space sim comes with a benchmark feature built right in and although the demo features sound this gives a more realistic gauge of overall performance provided all the test candidates are run on the exact same platform configuration.

The only variation made to the default settings was to enable shadows. What's the point of all that impressive lighting if the shadows are missing eh?

Settings Used For Testing

The results once more indicate that there's no trickery going on in order to allow a passive cooling solution to work.

Overclocking:::...

Let's be honest, if you want to overclock your graphics card you don't start by buying one that's passively cooled, a fact that seems to be reinforced by the rather odd results I got.

After a bit of tinkering I finally got things stable at 398/358 (core/memory), or at least I thought I had until I started to get artifacts on the last of around 8 runs of 3DMark. It seems even with efficient case cooling the passive cooler does get heat-logged after extensive work. Things like your room and case temperature become doubly critical with such a setup so in many ways my results are as good as meaningless other than as a very rough and ready indication.

Running at the stock settings of

Before Overclock

A drop of 400 3DMarks is hardly what you expect from an overclocked GPU so it's immediately apparent that the heat is a major factor here. With no documented evidence of any kind of thermal throttling from ATi's R3xx GPU it can only be assumed that this is either a BIOS setting or simply a compatibility issue.

I ran the test initially with Sapphire's RedLine utility, then to rule that out as being at fault I repeated it using Power Strip, both with identical results.

After Overclock

With the card now toasty hot, returning the clocks to their original settings brought about a full, and frankly quite unusual 600 point drop. I repeated this about 6 or 8 times so it was no accident. My advice....don't overclock!

Clocks Reset

Conclusion

The 3DVelocity 'Dual Conclusions Concept' Explained: After discussing this concept with users as well as companies and vendors we work with, 3DVelocity have decided that where necessary we shall aim to introduce our 'Dual Conclusions Concept' to sum up our thoughts and impressions on the hardware we review. As the needs of the more experienced users and enthusiasts have increased, it has become more difficult to factor in all the aspects that such a user would find important, while also being fair to products that may lack these high end "bonus" capabilities but which still represent a very good buy for the more traditional and more prevalent mainstream user. The two catergories we've used are:

The Mainstream User ~ The mainstream user is likely to put price, stock performance, value for money, reliability and/or warranty terms ahead of the need for hardware that operates beyond its design specifications. The mainstream user may be a PC novice or may be an experienced user, however their needs are clearly very different to those of the enthusiast, in that they want to buy products that operate efficiently and reliably within their advertised parameters.

The Enthusiast ~ The enthusiast cares about all the things that the mainstream user cares about but is more likely to accept a weakness in one or more of these things in exchange for some measure of performance or functionality beyond its design brief. For example, a high priced motherboard may be tolerated in exchange for unusually high levels of overclocking ability or alternatively an unusually large heat sink with a very poor fixing mechanism may be considered acceptable if it offers significantly superior cooling in return.

The Mainstream User ~

Having a lot of friends who are new to the PC it strikes me we should be teaching new users about the importance of efficient cooling before we invite them to start reducing noise, and having witnessed this card in action I should imagine it teeters on the verge of instability when run in a case that isn't efficiently ventilated.

Passive cooling is viable on modern graphics cards thanks to technology such as heat pipes, but there's more to it than fitting and forgetting and perhaps we need to be reminded occasionally that if fans weren't now an essential part of cooling the modern computer then they simply wouldn't be fitted by manufacturers looking to save every penny they can. If we're being honest, most ATi graphics card fans aren't especially loud to begin with anyway so maybe this is a half step too far?

I can't complain about the card, it's well put together using good quality components. I can't complain about the GPU, the 9800 Pro took an already cutting edge piece of silicon and improved on it. And I can't complain about the company, Sapphire are a big, well respected company who are behind the production of very nearly every retail Radeon currently on store shelves. No, my only gripe is with the heat levels generated and whether it's really feasible to be even trying to passively cool such a product without a little more emphasis on case ventilation and ambient case temperatures. If you accept the limitations and learn about efficient case ventilation though there's no better option for fanless gaming that I know of.

The Enthusiast ~

It may seem odd that I've scored higher for the enthusiast but to me it takes somebody with a little deeper understanding to make the most of this product and to have a clearer understanding what its benefits and limitations are. I'm sure I don't need to explain why overclocking is less than a prime concern on a passively cooled graphics card and that the prime reasons for buying such a card are to do with noise control or power reductions. Plus you get the option to whip the card out and use it to iron your creased shirt after a hard night's LAN gaming!

All in all a great card considering its brief and probably about as good as it gets without resorting to the antichrist of all silent computers...the fan.

If you're desperate for silent computing I'd take a serious look at water cooling first, but if that's not for you then this is probably the next best solution.