Sapphire HD6950 FleX Review (hardware)

Sapphire HD6950 FleX  Introduction

There are quite a few of video cards on the market these days, with numerous manufacturers trying to one up each other, either by offering some flashy LEDs, or software to help enhance the user experience. Very few take the smart route and not only offer quality components, but also install features whose monetary value can be seen immediately. Sapphire’s new 6950 FleX edition video card, not only offers quality components but brings to the table its highly touted fleX technology. For those new to the term, fleX is an ingenious invention to allow for Eyefinity multi-monitor solutions with three DVI monitors straight out of the box without the need for an addition $30-120 display port adapter, offering gamers and enthusiasts alike an immediate added value. With its release, the 6950 fleX becomes the highest performing card on the market , and to make sure the card stays cool and has a longer lifespan, it also comes with Sapphire’s highly advanced Vapor-X technology.

Sapphire HD6950 FleX  Features:

This card is loaded with features, as soon as I started reading them I immediately was reminded of the Superman TV show announcer, “faster then a speeding bullet, more powerful then a locomotive…”

• Sapphire fleX Technology: supports 3 displays without the requirement of DisplayPort monitors or Active DP adapters, and can support up to 5 displays with the use of a DisplayPort monitor or Active adapter.

• Vapor-X Cooling Technology

• 2GB of GDDR5 Memory

• Sapphire TriXX OC Utility Support

• Dual BIOS

• Up to 800 MHz Engine Clock, 1250MHz for memory = Effective 5 GHz Memory Clock

• 1408 Stream Processors & 88 texture processing units

• Microsoft DirectX 11 Support

• AMD Eyefinity Technology

• AMD HD3D Technology

• PCI Express 2.1 x16 bus interface

• HDMI 1.4a support with Deep Color, 7.1 High Bitrate Audio and 3D Stereoscopic support

• Display Port 1.2

• ATI CrossFireX multi-GPU support

• Enhanced Unified Video Decoder(UVD 3)

• Dynamic power management with ATI PowerPlay technology including memory clocks

• Dolby TrueHD and DTSHD Master Audio Support

• GPU acceleration support for Microsoft Office 2010

Specifications:

• Bus Interface PCI-E x16 (PCI-E 2.1)

• Memory 2048MB / 256-bit GDDR5

• Clock Speed 800 MHz Eclk / Effective 5000 MHz Mclk

• Cooling System Dual slot Fan with auto fan control

• Bracket Full Height

• Display Support

  • DL-DVI-I

  • SL-DVI-D

  • Mini Display Port x 2

  • HDMI

  • VGA (Via included adaptor)

• HDCP Yes

• Crossfire Support Native Hardware Crossfire

• External Power PCIe Graphic External 2x 6 pin

• Software Driver CD

• TriXX Support

System Requirements:

• Windows 7, Vista, XP or Media Center edition 2005
• DVI, HDMI, Display Port or VGA Monitor
• PCI express Slot with 1 x16 lane slot available
• 500 watt or greater power supply
• Min of 1GB of System Memory