CrossFire
So you heard that the X16xx series can plug and play into CrossFire mode? Well that USED to be the case, this is not Asus fault by any means, the onus is entirely on ATI/AMD. Looking through the catalog Asus sent me (remember, there was no information about this card on their website at time of writing) you would see an “Asus EAX1650XT-CF” available, that is the CF Master needed to run CrossFire
Being the consummate reviewer, I attempted to run CF with the X1650XT in PCIe slot1 and the X1600Pro in PCIe slot 2, I then attempted it reversed, both tries gave me 2 video cards, but no CrossFire.
Overclocking
Built into the Asus driver CD is a little application called “Asus SmartDoc”. Beyond the “What is my card doing now” function, there is the ability to OC as well. This is a good thing as my favorite ATI OC tool, ATITool, does not support it yet (at time of writing).
I was able to garner a respectable 621MHz for the RV560 and 1446MHz for the GDDR3.
The results increased the fan speed just a little, well, a little is condescending; I heard the small Asus fan over the 120MM pumping away on my TechStation.
Not a solution I could live with on a day to day basis, however if you must OC, it is here and very viable as the results below will show.
Image Quality
With SM3.0/HDR the Asus EAX1650XT does not disappoint. Quake 4, COD2 and even F.E.A.R played well and looked damn good doing it. Here are some snapshots of COD2 and Quake 4 with and without AntiAliasing / Anisotropic Filtering.
No AntiAliasing/Anisotropic Filtering left, 4x AntiAliasing/8x Anisotropic Filtering right
Over on the 2D side of things, we found the DVI quality to look very good, as good as we have seen in fact. For desktop use, the fonts were clear at 1680x1050 and very readable on a Dell 2005FPW
Final Words
While the availability of the X1650XT has been spotty, the results appear to be worth the wait. has done a nice job, and maybe the added external power is the oomph needed to allow this card to outperform equal costing cards on the nV side of the house.
The enables you to make a viable HTPC graphics solution. Great graphics output, and interconnect cables for DVI (which would include a DVI-->HDMI cable solution) and HDTV (YpbPr). The silence of the cooling solution (as long as you are not Overclocking it), along with the affordable price point makes this a logical choice for such a solution. If you are seriously looking at building an HTPC, the should be at the top of your list.
As a gaming card it performs well enough for the intended target market. Quake 4 played very nice, as I mentioned earlier, the engine on this game is beginning to age and the hardware has more then caught up especially with iD's implementation of dual core CPU support. While turning on AA/AF was noticeable, it wasn't enough to deter me from playing it with AA/AF enabled. Go ahead and play at 1680x1050, turning on AA/AF is an option. Call Of Duty 2 was quite difficult to run at 1680x1050; it was just about playable, however there was noticeable lag in the mouse response to your position when the action got hot and heavy. Turning on AA/AF made it impossible to play as the lag was so great that you couldn't hit any of the targets unless you were in sniper mode and not moving at all. You will want to play at 1280x800, and without AA/AF on for the smoothest play possible.
Unfortunately, ATI has muddied the waters with the whole CF Master scenario again, I liked it much better when it was plug and play similar to the nVidia SLI... So is the a proper replacement for your aging X850XT? I would answer most certainly, is it a proper replacement for that X1600Pro? A tougher call to be sure!
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