HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X Video Card

Manufacturer: Hightech Information System Limited
Product Name: HIS 6870 IceQ X Turbo X 1GB GDDR5 PCI-E
Model Number: H687QNX1G2M
Price As Tested: $229.99 at Newegg and Amazon

Full Disclosure: The product sample used in this article has been provided by HIS.

HIS first introduced its IceQ coolers in 2003 to its Radeon 9800PRO series of video cards, eight years later HIS return with the IceQ X cooler, which performs better than it looks. In this review the IceQ X cooler is strapped onto a HIS HD6870 Turbo X video card which comes factory overclocked at 975MHz GPU and 1150MHz Memory. Pushing clocks this far on a factory overclocked video card takes some guts, but HIS know that they have nothing to worry about, their IceQ cooler is up to the job.

While the IceQ cooler is more than capable of taming the HD6870 GPU, HIS were not very aggressive with the default fan profile and this resulted in a couple of unexpected shutdowns during our test procedures. Thankfully MSI Afterburner was at hand to allow me to alter the fan profile making sure that the temperatures always stayed in check, a topic I discuss further in the temperatures section of this review. Benchmark Reviews aims to provide you with an unbiased review of the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X and report back our findings, keeping you informed on the latest technologies available on the market today.

For this review we have a wide range of video card comparisons in our usual mixture of DX10 / DX11 synthetic benchmarks and current games to get a good idea where it fits in performance and price wise. We also intend to overclock the GPU to its limits and see if the IceQ X cooler really has what it takes to cool the GPU and other components effectively, so without further delay let's move on and get stuck in.

Closer Look: HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X

In this section we will have a good tour of the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card and discuss its main features.

The HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X is packed in a relatively small package, about the size and shape of a shoe box. In the box you get a fairly standard bundle that includes an installation package (driver disk and manual), two molex to 6-pin power cable converters, a DVI to VGA adapter and a CrossFireX bridge.

The HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card is fairly big, measuring 14.2 cm tall x 26 cm long and is also a dual slot design. Bang smack in the middle is a 92mm fan that effectively cools the overclocked HD6870 GPU while still remaining fairly quiet. The big, in your face, aqua colored shroud that covers the IceQ X cooler is a little bit loud for my liking, its design is more of a metaphor but it is quite functional at the same time. When installed in your system you only see the side view which actually looks quite nice, as you will see below.

It is likely going to be the case that if you buy this video card then you will most certainly have a side window in your PC case of choice. Until recently most video cards aesthetic features were on the front only, this is no longer the case here as this side view demonstrates. The semi transparent aqua shroud is quite pleasing on the eye when viewed from the side and here the visual metaphor really works.

The HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card requires two 6-pin PCI-E power connectors from your PSU, while HIS supply two molex to 6-pin converters it is strongly recommended that you use a PSU that actually has two 6-pin connectors present to power this card. HIS also recommends using a 500W or greater PSU.

For output we have two mini display port connectors, a HDMI port and two DVI-I connectors (top is single link and bottom is dual link). Bundled with the card you get a DVI to D-SUB adapter, so as far as connectors go HIS have really covered all the bases here. The top half of the PCI bracket has a small vent cut out, but the design of the cooler exhausts the hot air inside the case rather than out here.

The IceQ X cooler is somewhat smaller than I had first suspected. A pair of 8mm and a pair of 6mm heatpipes take the heat from the GPU and into the aluminum fin array where it is met with cool air from the 92mm fan seen earlier. The shroud makes sure that the cool air is evenly distributed and not wasted. It's nice to see that HIS have not over done it with the thermal interface leaving not much room for improvement.

With the IceQ cooler removed a further two heatsinks are visible, in the middle of the card is a large memory heatsink and off to the left is a smaller VRM heatsink. These two are in great locations to get some second hand air directly through the aluminum fins of the main heatsink, cooling the memory is not as essential as it used to be but the benefit of such cooling is always welcome. The HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X has only one CrossFireX connector limiting it to a 2-way CrossFireX configuration.

HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X Details

In this section we shall take an in-depth look at the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card and see what makes it tick.

With the cooler assembly and other heatsinks fully removed we can get a better look at the board, The overall layout of all the components is a little different with the 6000 series, the standard layout has moved the power phase/VRM section to the left hand side of the GPU, into an area that is normally left somewhat unoccupied. All in all the PCB looks good with no real waste of space and the soldering quality is of a very high standard as you will see in the close-up shots further down the page.

The back of the PCB is utilised mainly for resistors and the soldering quality is excellent for such tiny components, man loses the war to the machine when it comes to detailed work like this. These days you don't generally see RAM on the reverse side of a 1GB video card design thanks to the smaller manufacturing process that allows more density in a smaller package. There are a few points of interest that we will look at in more detail in this section.

The HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X uses 1GB of Elpida W1032BABG GDDR5 Memory rated 1250MHz (5GHz effective) at 1.5V.

For voltage control HIS have utilized a CHiL CHL82414-01 Dual output 4+1 phase PWM Controller. Below is a snippet from the product description.

The CHL8212/13/14 are dual-loop digital multi-phase buck controllers and the CHL8203 is a single-loop digital multiphase buck controller designed for GPU voltage regulation. Dynamic voltage control is provided by registers which are programmed through I2C and then selected using a 3-bit parallel bus for fast access.

The CHL8203/12/13/14 include CHiL Efficiency Shaping Technology to deliver exceptional efficiency at minimum cost across the entire load range. CHiL Dynamic Phase Control adds/drops active phases based upon load current and can be configured to enter 1-phase operation and diode emulation mode automatically or by command.

SOURCE: chilsemi.com

The uP6122AF from uPI Semiconductor provides voltage control to the I/O buffer.

Two uP7701U8 (above and below) voltage control chips are present, one on the front and one on the reverse of the PCB. Specifications for these chips are not readily available but there is a good chance that they are an improvement on an older design. They provide voltage control for the GPU.

One can only speculate as to why there are two controllers but they may not be both performing the same task. When we look at the vital statistics of this video card in GPU-Z we see lots of extra info not normally seen on this level of card. For instance, instead of just a regular vCore reading we get readings for 12V line quality, VDDC usage in volts and VDDC current usage in amps.

A uP6101BU8 is somewhat of an older chip seen on much earlier 4000 series AMD Radeon video cards, provides voltage control for the memory.

The Pericom PI3HDMI4 chip controls the HDMI and DVI interfaces. Seen on a lot of Radeon video cards, this is likely to be the main reason why AMD video cards can support more than two monitors whereas NVIDIA cards can only support two max.

HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X Features

HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X Features

• Dynamic Phase Control PWM IC - A significant energy saving technique for reducing power consumtion.
• Solid State Choke (SSC) - Durable Iron that can maximize current capacity, power efficiency and stability.
• Full Solid State Capacitors - Extend the lifespan and storage capabilities.

IceQ X Cooling Technology

• HIS 6870 IceQ X is quieter than the Reference Cooler.

• Driver CD
• Manual
• Installation Guide
• DVI to D-Sub Dongle
• 2 x 6-Pin Power Cable
• CrossfireX Bridge

HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X Specifications

Source: hisdigital.com

VGA Testing Methodology

The Microsoft DirectX-11 graphics API is native to the Microsoft Windows 7 Operating System, and will be the primary O/S for our test platform. DX11 is also available as a Microsoft Update for the Windows Vista O/S, so our test results apply to both versions of the Operating System. The majority of benchmark tests used in this article are comparative to DX11 performance, however some high-demand DX10 tests have also been included.

According to the Steam Hardware Survey published for the month ending April 2011, the most popular gaming resolution is 1920x1080 with 1680x1050 hot on its heels, our benchmark performance tests concentrate on these higher-demand resolutions: 1.76MP 1680x1050 and 2.07MP 1920x1080 (22-24" widescreen LCD monitors), as they are more likely to be used by high-end graphics solutions, such as those tested in this article.

In each benchmark test there is one 'cache run' that is conducted, followed by five recorded test runs. Results are collected at each setting with the highest and lowest results discarded. The remaining three results are averaged, and displayed in the performance charts on the following pages.

A combination of synthetic and video game benchmark tests have been used in this article to illustrate relative performance among graphics solutions. Our benchmark frame rate results are not intended to represent real-world graphics performance, as this experience would change based on supporting hardware and the perception of individuals playing the video game.

Intel P55 Test System

• Motherboard: ECS P55H-AK (Intel P55)
• System Memory: OCZ Blade ST 2000MHz 4GB Kit
• Processor: Intel Core i5 760 @ 3.60GHz
• CPU Cooler: Zalman CNPS10X Flex
• Disk Drive 1: 60GB OCZ Vertex 2 SSD
• Disk Drive 2: 160GB Seagate SATA 7200rpm 32MB cache
• Enclosure: Lancool PC-K63
• PSU: Corsair HX750W Modular
• Monitor: HKC 2219A 22" Widescreen

DirectX-10 Benchmark Applications

• 3DMark Vantage v1.02
  • Extreme Settings: (Extreme Quality, 8x Multisample Anti-Aliasing, 16x Anisotropic Filtering, 1:2 Scale)
• Street Fighter IV Benchmark
  • Extreme Settings: (Very High Quality, 8x AA, 16x AF, Parallel rendering On, Shadows High)

DirectX-11 Benchmark Applications

• Aliens vs Predator
  • Extreme Settings: (Very High Quality, 4x AA, 16x AF, SSAO, Tessellation, Advanced Shadows)
• BattleField: Bad Company 2
  • Extreme Settings: (Highest Quality, HBAO, 8x AA, 16x AF, 180s Fraps Single-Player Intro Scene)
• BattleForge v1.2
  • Extreme Settings: (Very High Quality, 8x Anti-Aliasing, Auto Multi-Thread)
• Lost Planet 2
  • Extreme Settings: (2x AA, Low Shadow Detail, High Texture, High Render, High DirectX 11 Features)
• Tom Clancy's HAWX 2 Benchmark 1.0.4
  • Extreme Settings: (Maximum Quality, 8x AA, 16x AF, DX11 Terrain Tessellation)
• Metro 2033
  • Extreme Settings: (Very-High Quality, AAA, 16x AF, Advanced DoF, Tessellation, 180s Fraps Chase Scene)
• Unigine Heaven Benchmark 2.1
  • Extreme Settings: (High Quality, Normal Tessellation, 16x AF, 4x AA)

Video Card Test Products

• NVIDIA GeForce GTX550-Ti (950 MHz GPU/1900 MHz Shader/1075 MHz vRAM - Forceware 270.61)
• AMD Radeon HD6850 (775 MHz GPU/1000 MHz vRAM - AMD Catalyst Driver 11.5)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX460 (715 MHz GPU/1430 MHz Shader/900 MHz vRAM - Forceware 270.61)
• AMD Radeon HD6870 (900 MHz GPU/1050 MHz vRAM - AMD Catalyst Driver 11.5)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560Ti (822 MHz GPU/1645 MHz Shader/1002 MHz vRAM - Forceware 270.61)
• AMD Radeon HD6950 (800 MHz GPU/1250 MHz vRAM - AMD Catalyst Driver 11.5)
• AMD HIS Radeon HD6850 IceQ X Turbo (820 MHz GPU/1100 MHz vRAM - AMD Catalyst Driver 11.5)
• AMD HIS Radeon HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X (975 MHz GPU/1150 MHz vRAM - AMD Catalyst Driver 11.5)
• AMD HIS Radeon HD6950 IceQ X Turbo X (880 MHz GPU/1300 MHz vRAM - AMD Catalyst Driver 11.5)

DX10: 3DMark Vantage

3DMark Vantage is a PC benchmark suite designed to test the DirectX10 graphics card performance. FutureMark 3DMark Vantage is the latest addition the 3DMark benchmark series built by FutureMark corporation. Although 3DMark Vantage requires NVIDIA PhysX to be installed for program operation, only the CPU/Physics test relies on this technology.

3DMark Vantage offers benchmark tests focusing on GPU, CPU, and Physics performance. Benchmark Reviews uses the two GPU-specific tests for grading video card performance: Jane Nash and New Calico. These tests isolate graphical performance, and remove processor dependence from the benchmark results.

• 3DMark Vantage v1.02
  • Extreme Settings: (Extreme Quality, 8x Multisample Anti-Aliasing, 16x Anisotropic Filtering, 1:2 Scale)

3DMark Vantage GPU Test: Jane Nash

Of the two GPU tests 3DMark Vantage offers, the Jane Nash performance benchmark is slightly less demanding. In a short video scene the special agent escapes a secret lair by water, nearly losing her shirt in the process. Benchmark Reviews tests this DirectX-10 scene at 1680x1050 and 1920x1080 resolutions, and uses Extreme quality settings with 8x anti-aliasing and 16x anisotropic filtering. The 1:2 scale is utilized, and is the highest this test allows. By maximizing the processing levels of this test, the scene creates the highest level of graphical demand possible and sorts the strong from the weak.

Cost Analysis: Jane Nash (1680x1050)

Test Summary: In the charts and the cost analysis you will notice not one but three HIS HD6000 series cards, this is a clue of future articles to come but this review is focusing on the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X. This also goes to dispel an old myth/misconception that someone new to buying video cards may encounter, the HIS HD6870 is the highest clocked video card of the trio but it still fails to match or outperform its bigger brother, the HD6950 (even at reference speeds). The point I am trying to address here is that a higher clock speed on a lower tier video card will not perform better than a lower clock on a higher tier video card. When buying a video card it is always best to do your homework.

3DMark Vantage GPU Test: New Calico

New Calico is the second GPU test in the 3DMark Vantage test suite. Of the two GPU tests, New Calico is the most demanding. In a short video scene featuring a galactic battleground, there is a massive display of busy objects across the screen. Benchmark Reviews tests this DirectX-10 scene at 1680x1050 and 1920x1080 resolutions, and uses Extreme quality settings with 8x anti-aliasing and 16x anisotropic filtering. The 1:2 scale is utilized, and is the highest this test allows. Using the highest graphics processing level available allows our test products to separate themselves and stand out (if possible).

Cost Analysis: New Calico (1680x1050)

Test Summary: The tables have turned in the New Calico Vantage test, here the results show that the FERMI architecture is the more advanced. The performance scaling is as expected, the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X has a nice performance lead over its 6850 counterpart and offers better value when we analyse the cost per FPS results of the two cards. Even with its overclock the HIS HD6870 is unable to meet or match the performance of the HD6950 or the GTX 560Ti, instead performing in line with the GTX 460.

DX10: Street Fighter IV

Capcom's Street Fighter IV is part of the now-famous Street Fighter series that began in 1987. The 2D Street Fighter II was one of the most popular fighting games of the 1990s, and now gets a 3D face-lift to become Street Fighter 4. The Street Fighter 4 benchmark utility was released as a novel way to test your system's ability to run the game. It uses a few dressed-up fight scenes where combatants fight against each other using various martial arts disciplines. Feet, fists and magic fill the screen with a flurry of activity. Due to the rapid pace, varied lighting and the use of music this is one of the more enjoyable benchmarks. Street Fighter IV uses a proprietary Capcom SF4 game engine, which is enhanced over previous versions of the game.

Using the highest quality DirectX-10 settings with 8x AA and 16x AF, a mid to high end card will ace this test, but it will still weed out the slower cards out there.

• Street Fighter IV Benchmark
  • Extreme Settings: (Very High Quality, 8x AA, 16x AF, Parallel rendering On, Shadows High)

Cost Analysis: Street Fighter IV (1680x1050)

Test Summary: The Street Fighter IV test comes across a little biased towards the green team, perhaps the good old 'NVIDIA The way it's meant to be played' logo displayed when you launch the benchmark gives that away. As you will see later in the performance analysis, this analogy is turned on its head when a game that was touted as an NVIDIA game (METRO 2033)actually performs better on AMD hardware when PhysX is disabled. Street Fighter IV is a very fast paced game but the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X is simply overkill.

DX11: Aliens vs Predator

Aliens vs. Predator is a science fiction first-person shooter video game, developed by Rebellion, and published by Sega for Microsoft Windows, Sony PlayStation 3, and Microsoft Xbox 360. Aliens vs. Predator utilizes Rebellion's proprietary Asura game engine, which had previously found its way into Call of Duty: World at War and Rogue Warrior. The self-contained benchmark tool is used for our DirectX-11 tests, which push the Asura game engine to its limit.

In our benchmark tests, Aliens vs. Predator was configured to use the highest quality settings with 4x AA and 16x AF. DirectX-11 features such as Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO) and tessellation have also been included, along with advanced shadows.

• Aliens vs Predator
  • Extreme Settings: (Very High Quality, 4x AA, 16x AF, SSAO, Tessellation, Advanced Shadows)

Cost Analysis: Aliens vs Predator (1680x1050)

Test Summary: In the Alien vs Predator benchmark it is the turn of the AMD hardware to show what it is made of. With its extreme overclock the HIS HD6870 is able to beat a stock GTX 560Ti. If this is your sort of game you would be best to own an AMD card. The HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X handles its own and delivers above average frame rates at both resolutions.

DX11: Battlefield Bad Company 2

The Battlefield franchise has been known to demand a lot from PC graphics hardware. DICE (Digital Illusions CE) has incorporated their Frostbite-1.5 game engine with Destruction-2.0 feature set with Battlefield: Bad Company 2. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 features destructible environments using Frostbit Destruction-2.0, and adds gravitational bullet drop effects for projectiles shot from weapons at a long distance. The Frostbite-1.5 game engine used on Battlefield: Bad Company 2 consists of DirectX-10 primary graphics, with improved performance and softened dynamic shadows added for DirectX-11 users.

At the time Battlefield: Bad Company 2 was published, DICE was also working on the Frostbite-2.0 game engine. This upcoming engine will include native support for DirectX-10.1 and DirectX-11, as well as parallelized processing support for 2-8 parallel threads. This will improve performance for users with an Intel Core-i7 processor. Unfortunately, the Extreme Edition Intel Core i7-980X six-core CPU with twelve threads will not see full utilization.

In our benchmark tests of Battlefield: Bad Company 2, the first three minutes of action in the single-player raft night scene are captured with FRAPS. Relative to the online multiplayer action, these frame rate results are nearly identical to daytime maps with the same video settings. The Frostbite-1.5 game engine in Battlefield: Bad Company 2 appears to equalize our test set of video cards, and despite AMD's sponsorship of the game it still plays well using any brand of graphics card.

• BattleField: Bad Company 2
  • Extreme Settings: (Highest Quality, HBAO, 8x AA, 16x AF, 180s Fraps Single-Player Intro Scene)

Cost Analysis: Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (1680x1050)

Test Summary: As DirectX 11 titles go, Battlefield: Bad Company 2 is not the most demanding. Even the low end GTX 550Ti can deliver above standard frame rates. The good news is that you can rest assured that your video card won't be the cause of your lag in BF: BC2.

DX11: BattleForge

BattleForge is free Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) developed by EA Phenomic with DirectX-11 graphics capability. Combining strategic cooperative battles, the community of MMO games, and trading card gameplay, BattleForge players are free to put their creatures, spells and buildings into combination's they see fit. These units are represented in the form of digital cards from which you build your own unique army. With minimal resources and a custom tech tree to manage, the gameplay is unbelievably accessible and action-packed.

Benchmark Reviews uses the built-in graphics benchmark to measure performance in BattleForge, using Very High quality settings (detail) and 8x anti-aliasing with auto multi-threading enabled. BattleForge is one of the first titles to take advantage of DirectX-11 in Windows 7, and offers a very robust color range throughout the busy battleground landscape. The charted results illustrate how performance measures-up between video cards when Screen Space Ambient Occlusion (SSAO) is enabled.

• BattleForge v1.2
  • Extreme Settings: (Very High Quality, 8x Anti-Aliasing, Auto Multi-Thread)

Cost Analysis: BattleForge (1680x1050)

Test Summary: Battleforge with all the settings cranked up looks very nice indeed, once again the GTX 560Ti result sticks out like a sore thumb. The HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X delivers some respectable frame rates but Cost per FPS is on the high side, the question now is... How much power does one need?

DX11: Lost Planet 2

Lost Planet 2 is the second instalment in the saga of the planet E.D.N. III, ten years after the story of Lost Planet: Extreme Condition. The snow has melted and the lush jungle life of the planet has emerged with angry and luscious flora and fauna. With the new environment comes the addition of DirectX-11 technology to the game.

Lost Planet 2 takes advantage of DX11 features including tessellation and displacement mapping on water, level bosses, and player characters. In addition, soft body compute shaders are used on 'Boss' characters, and wave simulation is performed using DirectCompute. These cutting edge features make for an excellent benchmark for top-of-the-line consumer GPUs.

The Lost Planet 2 benchmark offers two different tests, which serve different purposes. This article uses tests conducted on benchmark B, which is designed to be a deterministic and effective benchmark tool featuring DirectX 11 elements.

• Lost Planet 2 Benchmark 1.0
  • Moderate Settings: (2x AA, Low Shadow Detail, High Texture, High Render, High DirectX 11 Features)

Cost Analysis: Lost Planet 2 (1680x1050)

Test Summary: Lost Planet 2 is a tough cookie to crack, in our tests we had to use relatively moderate settings just to get some acceptable numbers. This game wants high level hardware to play maxed out. The overclocked HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X delivers average framerates at a mid/high cost/performance ratio.

DX11: Tom Clancy's HAWX 2

Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X.2 has been optimized for DX11 enabled GPUs and has a number of enhancements to not only improve performance with DX11 enabled GPUs, but also greatly improve the visual experience while taking to the skies. The game uses a hardware terrain tessellation method that allows a high number of detailed triangles to be rendered entirely on the GPU when near the terrain in question. This allows for a very low memory footprint and relies on the GPU power alone to expand the low resolution data to highly realistic detail.

The Tom Clancy's HAWX2 benchmark uses normal game content in the same conditions a player will find in the game, and allows users to evaluate the enhanced visuals that DirectX-11 tessellation adds into the game. The Tom Clancy's HAWX2 benchmark is built from exactly the same source code that's included with the retail version of the game. HAWX2's tessellation scheme uses a metric based on the length in pixels of the triangle edges. This value is currently set to 6 pixels per triangle edge, which provides an average triangle size of 18 pixels.

The end result is perhaps the best tessellation implementation seen in a game yet, providing a dramatic improvement in image quality over the non-tessellated case, and running at playable frame rates across a wide range of graphics hardware.

• Tom Clancy's HAWX 2 Benchmark 1.0.4
  • Extreme Settings: (Maximum Quality, 8x AA, 16x AF, DX11 Terrain Tessellation)

Cost Analysis: HAWX 2 (1680x1050)

Test Summary: HAWX 2 is a strange game in that you need to look very close to see the difference in quality settings, the main difference is in the terrain but this is easily overlooked as you are busy fighting with the controls just to fly in a straight line. The GTX 560Ti pummels on all of the video cards in this line up, beating them in both FPS performance and price per FPS, but all of the other cards also deliver excellent frame rates. The landscapes are beautifully rendered making the game scenery pleasurable, now I just need to master the controls.

DX11: Metro 2033

Metro 2033 is an action-oriented video game with a combination of survival horror, and first-person shooter elements. The game is based on the novel Metro 2033 by Russian author Dmitry Glukhovsky. It was developed by 4A Games in Ukraine and released in March 2010 for Microsoft Windows. Metro 2033 uses the 4A game engine, developed by 4A Games. The 4A Engine supports DirectX-9, 10, and 11, along with NVIDIA PhysX and GeForce 3D Vision.

The 4A engine is multi-threaded in such that only PhysX had a dedicated thread, and uses a task-model without any pre-conditioning or pre/post-synchronizing, allowing tasks to be done in parallel. The 4A game engine can utilize a deferred shading pipeline, and uses tessellation for greater performance, and also has HDR (complete with blue shift), real-time reflections, color correction, film grain and noise, and the engine also supports multi-core rendering.

Metro 2033 featured superior volumetric fog, double PhysX precision, object blur, sub-surface scattering for skin shaders, parallax mapping on all surfaces and greater geometric detail with a less aggressive LODs. Using PhysX, the engine uses many features such as destructible environments, and cloth and water simulations, and particles that can be fully affected by environmental factors.

NVIDIA has been diligently working to promote Metro 2033, and for good reason: it's one of the most demanding PC video games we've ever tested. When their flagship GeForce GTX 480 struggles to produce 27 FPS with DirectX-11 anti-aliasing turned to to its lowest setting, you know that only the strongest graphics processors will generate playable frame rates. All of our tests enable Advanced Depth of Field and Tessellation effects, but disable advanced PhysX options.

• Metro 2033
  • Moderate Settings: (Very-High Quality, AAA, 16x AF, Advanced DoF, Tessellation, 180s Fraps Chase Scene)

Cost Analysis: Metro 2033 (1680x1050)

Test Summary: Metro 2033 is hard on all video cards, and in our tests only the factory overclocked video cards delivered acceptable frame rates. It is also rather apparent that the AMD GPU's deliver better performance across the board when compared to their theoretical rivals, another win for the overclocked HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X. This game was intended to be played with PhysX enabled and we all know this is something only NVIDIA cards can do well at the moment, hopefully in the future we might see PhysX code that is better optimized for multi-core CPU's.

DX11: Unigine Heaven 2.1

The Unigine Heaven 2.1 benchmark is a free publicly available tool that grants the power to unleash the graphics capabilities in DirectX-11 for Windows 7 or updated Vista Operating Systems. It reveals the enchanting magic of floating islands with a tiny village hidden in the cloudy skies. With the interactive mode, emerging experience of exploring the intricate world is within reach. Through its advanced renderer, Unigine is one of the first to set precedence in showcasing the art assets with tessellation, bringing compelling visual finesse, utilizing the technology to the full extent and exhibiting the possibilities of enriching 3D gaming.

The distinguishing feature in the Unigine Heaven benchmark is a hardware tessellation that is a scalable technology aimed for automatic subdivision of polygons into smaller and finer pieces, so that developers can gain a more detailed look of their games almost free of charge in terms of performance. Thanks to this procedure, the elaboration of the rendered image finally approaches the boundary of veridical visual perception: the virtual reality transcends conjured by your hand.

Although Heaven-2.1 was recently released and used for our DirectX-11 tests, the benchmark results were extremely close to those obtained with Heaven-1.0 testing. Since only DX11-compliant video cards will properly test on the Heaven benchmark, only those products that meet the requirements have been included.

• Unigine Heaven Benchmark 2.1
  • Extreme Settings: (High Quality, Normal Tessellation, 16x AF, 4x AA)

Cost Analysis: Unigine Heaven (1680x1050)

Test Summary: Unigine heaven is also quite hard on video cards, only the best video cards will be able to run it smooth at the highest settings, certain parts of this benchmark put more work on the GPU than others. With the exception of the GTX 460 and GTX 560Ti results we see nearly perfect scaling in the line-up. The higher core count of the HD6950 GPU certainly makes a lot of difference in our tests.

In the following sections we will report our findings on power consumption and overclocking.

HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X Temperatures

Benchmark tests are always nice, so long as you care about comparing one product to another. But when you're an overclocker, gamer, or merely a PC hardware enthusiast who likes to tweak things on occasion, there's no substitute for good information. Benchmark Reviews has a very popular guide written on Overclocking Video Cards, which gives detailed instruction on how to tweak a graphics cards for better performance. Of course, not every video card has overclocking head room. Some products run so hot that they can't suffer any higher temperatures than they already do. This is why we measure the operating temperature of the video card products we test.

To begin my testing, I use GPU-Z to measure the temperature at idle as reported by the GPU. Next I use FurMark's "Torture Test" to generate maximum thermal load and record GPU temperatures at high-power 3D mode. The ambient room temperature remained at a stable 24°C throughout testing. FurMark does two things extremely well: drive the thermal output of any graphics processor higher than applications of video games realistically could, and it does so with consistency every time. Furmark works great for testing the stability of a GPU as the temperature rises to the highest possible output. The temperatures discussed below are absolute maximum values, and not representative of real-world performance.

As previously stated my ambient temperature remained at a stable 24°C throughout the testing procedure, the cooler is quity efficient and a heavy load from FurMark raises the temperature from 36°C (39% fan speed) idle to only 64°C load with an automatic fan speed of 56%. Putting the fan on manual and cranking it up to 100% saw the temperature drop to 57°C and the noise level at max speed is honestly still quite bearable, giving us a nice 7°C improvement in load temperature.

While the temperature tests went without a hitch, it seems the default fan profile on the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card wasn't aggressive enough during a couple of our heavier benchmarks (Vantage: New Calico and Unigine Heaven), this meant that the GPU was heating up faster than the cooler could respond, which resulted in the GPU shutting down to protect itself. My solution to this was to set up a fan profile in MSI Afterburner (v2.2.0 Beta 3) which kept the GPU temperature in check and also allowed for some overclocking. The only other option would have been to down clock the GPU speed.

I didn't take a screen shot of the default profile but the above image shows what I have the current fan profile set to. After some testing with the fan set to constant speeds of 100% / 90% / 80% / 70% and 60%, and the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card finishing the tests without shutting down, I was able to devise my own fan profile. The obvious conclusion I came to was that the fan needed to be spinning faster at a lower temperature in order to stop the temperature of the GPU rising too quickly, which was causing it to shut down. Thankfully afterburner is able to run these settings for me when windows starts but there is always the option of editing the BIOS using the techPowerUp RBE tool (Radeon BIOS Editor) to make it a permanent change.

In the next section we will look at power consumption figures, let's go.

VGA Power Consumption

Life is not as affordable as it used to be, and items such as gasoline, natural gas, and electricity all top the list of resources which have exploded in price over the past few years. Add to this the limit of non-renewable resources compared to current demands, and you can see that the prices are only going to get worse. Planet Earth is needs our help, and needs it badly. With forests becoming barren of vegetation and snow capped poles quickly turning brown, the technology industry has a new attitude towards turning "green". I'll spare you the powerful marketing hype that gets sent from various manufacturers every day, and get right to the point: your computer hasn't been doing much to help save energy... at least up until now.

For power consumption tests, Benchmark Reviews utilizes an 80-Plus Gold rated Corsair HX750w (model: CMPSU-750HX) This power supply unit has been tested to provide over 90% typical efficiency by Ecos Plug Load Solutions. To measure isolated video card power consumption, I used the energenie ENER007 power meter made by Sandal Plc (UK).

A baseline test is taken without a video card installed inside our test computer system, which is allowed to boot into Windows-7 and rest idle at the login screen before power consumption is recorded. Once the baseline reading has been taken, the graphics card is installed and the system is again booted into Windows and left idle at the login screen. Our final loaded power consumption reading is taken with the video card running a stress test using FurMark. Below is a chart with the isolated video card power consumption (not system total) displayed in Watts for each specified test product:

At Idle the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X consumes 44 (163-119) watts at idle and 191 (310-119) watts when running full load using the test method outlined above. As we can see in the GPU-Z screenshot below the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X uses 0.945v when idle, when under load it uses 1.226v.

In the next section we will be discussing our overclocking session with the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card.

HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X Overclocking

Before I start overclocking I like to get a little bit of information, firstly I like to establish operating temperatures and since we know the IceQ X cooler is quite capable we can quickly move forward. Next I like to know what the voltage and clock limits are, so I fired up the MSI's Afterburner utility. I established that vCore was adjustable between 800mV and 1.299V and clock speeds were limited to 1200MHz max on the GPU and 1250MHz (5GHz effective) maximum frequency for the memory. This is more than enough range to move forward with and I know I can squeeze every last drop of performance out of the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X. My preferred weapons are MSI Afterburner (v2.2.0 Beta 3) for fine tuning while using FurMark (v1.9.0) to heat the GPU.

The GPU-Z screenshot above serves as a reminder of the temperatures and speed the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card at its default settings. With my modified fan profile running I gradually bumped the vCore to max and was able to push the clock speeds to 1020MHz GPU and 1220MHz (4.88GHz effective) Memory and still remain stable while in FurMark.

With a 45MHz GPU overclock (120MHz over reference design) and a 70MHz memory overclock (170MHz over reference design) we went back to the bench and ran through the entire test suite. Overall there is an average 4.75% increase in scores (at 1920x1080 resolution). We also re ran temperature tests at the overclocked speeds with a slightly higher ambient temperature of 25°C. The IceQ X cooler on the HIS HD6870 Turbo X (with modified fan profile) once again pulled through and gave some good temperatures. At idle the GPU sat at 42°C (47% fan speed). Pushing the temperature up with FurMark saw the GPU load temperature rise to 72°C (73% fan speed) and cranking the fan on manual to 100% saw the temperature drop to 66°C.

The two problem benchmarks (Vantage: New Calico and Unigine Heaven) required the fan to be running at 100% in order for the test to complete successfully under the overclocked settings, this means a more aggressive fan profile is needed to run this video card with a long term overclock, either that or just keep the fan running at 100%.

That's all of the testing over, in the next section I will deliver my final thoughts and conclusion.

IceQ X Turbo X Final Thoughts

If it wasn't for the issue with the card shutting down in two of our benchmarks then this would have been a great card to recommend, as it stands though HIS need to look into this issue and pre load this model with a more aggressive fan profile or provide a BIOS update with a more agressive fan profile embedded for cards that are already out. This issue could lead to a lot of unnecessary RMA's which wouldn't be good for HIS.

The IceQ X Cooler with its 92mm fan is more than capable of taming the HD6870 GPU even with its extreme overclock, but not with its default fan profile. The fan isn't even that loud when set to 100% so I don't understand why the HIS labs have is spinning so slow. When I gave the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X a more performance related fan profile in Afterburner (v2.2.0 Beta 3) the problem had all but gone away, it wasn't until I started overclocking it that it reared its ugly head again. Thankfully setting the fan to 100% saw me through my overclocking run and showed what sort of performance the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X is really capable of.

HIS HD6870 Conclusion

Important: In this section I am going to write a brief five point summary on the following categories; Performance, Appearance, Construction, Functionality and Value. These views are my own and help me to give the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X a rating out of 10. A high or low score does not necessarily mean that it is better or worse than a similar video card that has been reviewed by another writer here at Benchmark Reviews, which may have got a higher or lower score. It is however a good indicator of whether the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X is good or not. I would strongly urge you to read the entire review, if you have not already, so that you can make an educated decision for yourself.

The graphics performance of the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X is very good indeed, in four of our ten tests it was able to match the performance of the stock GTX 560Ti and then more so when it was overclocked. This card comes with a pretty high clock already and pushing it further requires the fan profile to be altered if you want it to remain active. Overclocking is always uncertain territory so we should be thankful that there is any headroom at all.

The appearance rating of the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X is up for debate. The bright, in your face aqua/turquoise colored shroud and fan serve as a visual metaphor of ice (hence the name) and give this video card a very unique and individual look that is sure to appeal to some but to me it is a bit too much. The side view is its saving grace, the IceQ cooler looks nicer from the side and makes all the difference once you install the card into your system. There are some that will surely disagree but thanks to the graphic nature of this review you can easily make your mind up for yourself.

Construction is excellent as you would expect from a company with a good reputation like HIS, despite the use of plastic for the shroud the whole package feels quite solid. Taking the card to pieces and reconstructing it was a breeze and everything lined up perfectly, the IceQ heatsink is solid and really adds some weight and girth to the card which reassures you that it is no fragile piece of hardware.

Functionality is very good, I can't help but keep singing praise for the IceQ cooler, it really is so good, even though it was let down somewhat by a relaxed fan profile. There are some extra sensor readings in GPU-Z not seen on all other cards and help you keep track of things in real time when overclocking or load testing.

The HIS Radeon HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X video card model H687QNX1G2M will cost you $229.99 at Newegg and Amazon retailers, and at this price point it sits directly between the much loved NVIDIA GTX460 and the GTX 560Ti and falls between them performance wise too. On average the HIS HD6870 IceQ X Turbo X costs $5.61/FPS in our benchmark tests, and I believe this to be very reasonable for a performance card like this.

I have no problems recommending this card to anyone who is in the market for a mid/high end card. You will definitely want to run the fan speed a bit faster to stop the GPU heating up too fast under a heavy load but that's childsplay... Right?

Pros:

+ IceQ cooler is excellent
+ Fan at 100% is not too loud
+ Excellent build quality
+ Great performance
+ Good value for money
+ CrossFireX Support
+ Clocks over 1GHz
+ Variety of outputs: Display Port, DVI-I and HDMI

Cons:

- Hot air from GPU exhausted into case
- Fan profile is too relaxed for a real heavy load
- Looks are not its best feature

Ratings:

• Performance: 9.00
• Appearance: 8.50
• Construction: 9.50
• Functionality: 8.75
• Value: 8.75

Final Score: 8.90 out of 10.

Quality Recognition: Benchmark Reviews Silver Tachometer Award.

Questions? Comments? Benchmark Reviews really wants your feedback. We invite you to leave your remarks in our Discussion Forum.

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