PowerColor X1600 Pro Video Card Review

Okay, time for another round of in-your-face video card action.  There are several video cards on the market right now that will show you a good time.  Some do it for a little more, some do it for a little less.  But just like a trip to Vegas, what really matters is the quality of the experience.  And also like Vegas, you get what you paid for.  The difference between choosing video cards and choosing a good time in Vegas?  The genital warts…

Today I’m sinking my tooth (I’m from the South, that’s all I have left) into the ATI Radeon X1600.  The Radeon X1600 series is designed to deliver outstanding digital entertainment and 3D graphics through its unique ultra-threaded architecture and Avivo video and display technology. The X1600 is CrossFire Ready to deliver the ultimate gaming performance.  The one I’m playing with today is sporting 512MB of pure video power, and can be purchased for around $100 on the online marketplace.  It’s a pretty damned sweet video card.

ATI’s new Radeon X1600 series transforms your PC with astonishing graphics performance and visual quality, creating a lifelike High Definition (HD) viewing experience with 3D games, DVD movies, and digital photography and video. Radeon X1600 is an ideal product for the working demands and entertainment pleasures of tomorrow.

ATI’s Avivo- Video & Display Perfection
Connect your Radeon X1600 with your home entertainment devices for high definition convergence, enhanced with ATI’s revolutionary new Avivo video and display technology platform. Avivo technology creates vibrant colors, ultra sharp images, true-to-life image reproduction, and the smoothest HD video playback ever offered by ATI.
Avivo redefines the ultimate visual experience for today’s PCs, and sets the stage for tomorrow’s exciting possibilities. Check your board for specific support of Avivo features.

• Sharp video and photos
  Avivo enhances your digital video and photos, creating sharp images, crisp text, and vivid color. Boost the video quality captured by your Media PC and Personal Video Recorder with advanced 3D comb filtering and automatic gain control. Improve analog video signal quality and reduce annoying artifacts. Maintain clean images even at high display resolutions with Avivo’s video scaling technology.
• True-to-Life Image Reproduction
  Get high image fidelity with CRT and LCD displays, TVs, rear projection and plasma TVs, as well as projectors. Avivo introduces new life to colors across the entire spectrum with an advanced 10-bit-per-color display engine. Gain better digital signal reception, and maintain cleaner video with hardware noise reduction. Enjoy high-quality analog video capture enabled by robust 12-bit analog-to-digital converters. With Avivo, any video display paints a radiant canvas that will delight your eyes.
• Smooth Video Playback
  Free your CPU to devote more processing power to other applications with Avivo’s hardware accelerated processing of new HD video formats, including H.264. Transform your movies and improve every image sent to your display with hardware post processing for superb stutter-free viewing. Avivo gives your video playback the smooth, fluid motion you want from your HD content.
• Universal Display Connectivity
  Certain ATI graphics cards with Avivo technology can dissolve connectivity barriers between PCs and consumer electronic devices. Outputs for virtually any TV via analog or digital interface, such as s-video and DVI , are complemented by inputs for cable, broadcast TV and other video sources. Advanced dual-link DVI interfaces support the largest high-resolution LCD displays.

State-of-the-Art 3D Performance Technology
Experience state-of-the-art graphics technology and enjoy unparalleled gaming with the most advanced 3D performance technology including a new ultra-threaded 3D architecture, a 256-bit ring-bus memory controller, support for up to 512 MB RAM and Shader Model 3.0 done right. All delivered using the most advance 90 nanometer GPU process.

• Radeon X1600 Series excels with Shader Model 3.0, HDR and adaptive anti-aliasing
  Radeon X1600’s 90-nanometer process technology and ultra-threaded architecture combine power and efficiency to optimized support for Shader Model 3.0 and deliver new high dynamic range visual effects, enhanced realism with adaptive anti-aliasing and lightening fast performance in OpenGL and DirectX® 9 games.

CrossFire: Multiply and Conquer with Multi-GPU Performance
Designed from the ground up with GPU sharing in mind, the Radeon X1600 series allows you to get incredible gaming performance by adding a second Radeon™ X1600 graphics card for ultra fast performance that works with all games, all the time.
To achieve optimal enthusiast-class performance from your Radeon X1600 CrossFire platform, combine two Radeon X1600 graphics cards with a motherboard based on ATI’s CrossFire Xpress™ 3200 chipset.

• Supertiling for optimized gaming performance
  CrossFire’s “supertiling” GPU-sharing speeds rendering by evenly dividing the graphics processing, intelligently alternating the rendering workload to each Radeon GPU for efficient load balancing, and optimized performance.
• CrossFire boosts image quality
  CrossFire boosts image quality along with rendering speed, eliminating the need to crank down screen resolutions to get the high image quality you want.
  CrossFire ignites with the higher anti-aliasing, anisotropic filtering, shading, and texture settings you desire. Adjust your display configurations, experiment with your advanced 3D settings, and check the effect with a real-time 3D-rendered preview within ATI’s ATI Catalyst™ Control Center to rule your CrossFire system.
• Upgradeable components and web support
  CrossFire supports a wide range of ATI-based graphics cards and motherboards, and offers compatibility with a broad array of third party components for a flexible and robust solution.
• Upgradeable components allow you to gradually improve your system performance with the reliability and support that only ATI delivers.
• Free monthly on-line Catalyst software updates, ATI’s one-click comprehensive help system, and web-based online customer support are available 24 hours per day.
  Catalyst Software: Customizable Performance, Control and Support
  Control your Radeon X1600 with ATI’s Catalyst Control Center, the award-winning feature-rich 3D software application. Catalyst automatically configures optimal settings for your system, and is packed with features that go far beyond traditional driver configuration software.
• Experiment with display settings hassle-free
  Adjust your display configurations, experiment with your advanced 3D settings, and check the effect with a real-time 3D-rendered preview.
• Support and updates for optimal performance and protection