Review: HIS Radeon HD 5770 IceQ5 1Gb GDDR5

Posted by Will Smith

Wednesday, 11 August 2010 00:16

Article Index
Review: HIS Radeon HD 5770 IceQ5 1Gb GDDR5
Specifications and Features
Photo Gallery
Installation and Test Setup
GPU-Z and Everest
3D Mark Vantage and Heaven DX11
AvP and Stone Giant DX11
Verdict and Conclusion

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Introduction

HIS - Hightech Information System have been producing AMD/ATI Radeon based PC graphic cards since 1987. While there are a lot of competitors in this aggressive and cut-throat market, HIS are considered to be one of only a few ATI certified and authorized 1st Tier AIB partners for launching new graphics card products. With the backing from AMD/ATI, they have become extremely successful over the past few years. In a recent inteview with HIS, their marketing department have confirmed that they are among the top 5 producers of AMD/ATI graphic cards in the US.

Like many graphics card manufacturers, it's not very often they produce cards that's based on AMD/ATI's standard reference designs. Instead, they usually make them better and cooler. And is what HIS have done. Not only have they introduced their own in-house designed GPU coolers for better cooling, but they've also pre-overclocked some of their graphic cards for even better performance.

For those who are still not sure who they are ... here's some information taken from their website.

"HIS - Hightech Information System Limited is an internationally acclaimed graphics cards company. Time and time again, HIS were compared and tested by hundreds of worldly renowned critics. The results are phenomena, HIS have proven to offer far superior, cooler, quieter, and faster graphic cards than any other leading rivals. Up to the fourth quarter of 2008, HIS has won over 1000 awards with ATI graphic solution from major media worldwide. HIS is being recognized by providing performance leading and award-wining products.

HIS was established in 1987 with the mission to produce the highest quality PC products in the industry. Besides strong devotion to excellent products and services, HIS has been conducting business with the aim to "Glorifying God". Honesty and integrity are the two key principals of how HIS are conducted. Ethical business practice has been an everyday commitment to our clients, vendors, and investors.

HIS is proud to be ATI's Authorized 1st Tier AIB Partner, Certified Partner and Launching Partner. Long term and favorable relationship with ATI, enable HIS to work closely with ATI to promote the HIS ATI Graphics Board; and to strive for best value on the marketing and sales of HIS ATI Product Line."

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In this review, we'll be taking a look at the HIS Radeon HD 5770 IceQ5 1Gb GDDR5 graphics card. It features an overclocked GPU running at 875Mhz (default is 850Mhz), and comes with 1Gb (128-bit) GDDR5 ram.

The Radeon HD 5770 GPU is based on 40nm technology and features 800 Stream processing units, 40 texture units and 24x anti-aliasing modes. What's more, this mainstream GPU also natively supports DX11, GDDR5, CrossfireX and Eye-Finity.

For cooling, HIS have included their own in-house designed GPU cooler, which they call IceQ5. This GPU cooler features copper heatpipes with large aluminum fans for effective heat dissipation. It actually draws the air inside your PC case to cool down the card, and blows large amounts of hot air out of your case. This then, will dramatically decrease the GPU temperature together with your PC components. What's quite interesting also, is the fact that the IceQ5 is also UV sensitive, enhancing the gamers' UV light case.

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The Radeon HD 5770 is nothing new ... in fact, my first experience with one of these GPUs was last year, when I looked at Sapphire's HD 5770 (standard reference card). Having said that, I can see HIS's overclocked version with IceQ5 cooling ... might do a little better than your average reference card. For a mainstream gaming card, I'm not expecting eye-popping performance that can beat the Geforce GTX 460. However, I am expecting it to be able to cope with all of our DX11 tests, and at least produce an acceptable score in 3D Mark Vantage.

We'll be testing the HIS Radeon HD 5770 IceQ5 on our test rig, which consists of the following ... Intel Core i5 - 650 (LGA 1156), Gigabyte P55 USB3, 4Gb Crucial Ballistix Tracer, Noctua NH-D14 CPU cooler and a Silverpower 650w power supply. All-in-all, a decently spec'd computer system.

OK, let's not waste any more time and take a closer look at the specifications of the HIS Radeon HD 5770 IceQ5 ...