Tomb Raider Underworld

Tomb Raider didn't pose much of a problem for either card but the HIS 4870 consistently stayed above 80fps, hence some of the fram drops we did have did not feel as drastic.

Final Words

Overclocking initially hit a roadblock when we were limited with what we can do with AMD's drivers. We received this from ASUS:

Currently there are limitations with overclockingfor this card defined by the Vbios and driver as defined by AMD. 4770default clock: 750E/800M;limitation values : 830E/850M.

We downloaded Rivatuner and did the adjustments from there. Without modifying the core, we green screened when we put the memory slider at 1000MHz, which based on other reviews, was a possible value. Knocking it down to 996MHz was completely stable. We then left the memory at 800MHz and moved the core clock value. Anything above 880MHz also created this green screen crash. We played around with both settings, all the while keeping the video card fan at 100%, we ended up with below.

With the right tweaks, we would imagine you may be able to do a little better. Still, not a bad showing overall from a card that really won't cost much more than $100 shipped.

Performance-wise, we were pleased with the ASUS EAH 4770 Formula. Considering the price-point, the ASUS 4770 provides great value for the money. It is competitive to the GTS 250, though overall a little behind it in the benchmarks. On the otherhand, the GTS 250 is more expensive.

Image quality was very good, both in productivity applications and in video games. In the gaming department, while we did like the performance, we feel that for the more modern games, playing on a 20" monitor at 1680 resolution will not be the best gaming experience. At 1024 resolution and lower, the card excels, and for older games, the higher resolutions were not an issue at all.

There's no fooling an enthusiast as clearly this card is not geared towards those users. Anyone on a system with onboard video, if you have a free PCI-E slot, you really should give the ASUS EAH 4770 Formula a close look.