HIS Radeon 5670 IceQ 512MB
Sitting at sub $100, and sporting a custom PCB and cooling design, this card breaks away from the pack. We find out if it’s worth it.
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It doesn’t seem all that long ago that AMD’s 5xxx series first appeared, but already AMD has DX11 parts in all three market segments. We’ve looked at the 57xx series but today’s product comes from the 56xx series. The card in question is the and it can be had for under $100. use a custom PCB design for their take on the 5670, and further deviate from the standard card by also using custom cooling, the venerable but highly effective IceQ cooling set-up. The specifications however, match the AMD reference. This looks to be an interesting card; it’s sub $100, needs no external power, can perform Software CrossfireX (CrossfireX without the use of a bridge connector) and supports all the 5xxx series features such as DirectX 11 and HDMI Audio Bit-streaming. This card has mainstream gamer and/or HTPC written all over it, so let’s check out the . |
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Specifications
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The box for the HIS 5670 IceQ 512MB (128bit) GDDR5 follows the latest HIS theme of white and blue, with images of icebergs and Excalibur. The rear of the box uses a lot of logos and lists to give you as much information as possible on the features of the card and what you’re getting. Inside the box is another blue box with the contents.
Included with the HIS 5670 IceQ 512MB (128bit) GDDR5 package is the card itself and a small folder with the software disk. Of note, is that the driver available on the AMD/ATI website at time of writing, the Catalyst 10.1 suite, is not the driver you need. Hopefully, the 10.2′s will support the 5670, but until then the driver on the disk is the one to use.
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The card is very distinctive in the HIS manner; it’s a two slot set-up with the clear IceQ cooling set-up The Fan is a translucent blue and goes well with the blue PCB and the blue sticker.
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HIS have the cabling for the cooling sleeved and tucked neatly into the side of the cooler. The back of the card is completely uneventful although it does show off nicely the blue PCB colouring.
The IO back panel for the card is a two slot set-up An air exhaust grill runs along the top edge with the three ports below. There is a single VGA, a single (Native) HDMI and a single DVI port.
Overall the card is quite small, extending out about an inch longer than the PCIe slot it occupies, but it is of course a two slot cooling set-up so keep that in mind. Quite a nice looking card.
Testing
Test Setup: Intel Core 2 Duo 6420 @ 3.20GHz, 4GB of OCZ PC2-6400 Ram @ 960MHz, Asus Blitz Formula, Silicon Power M10 32GB + WD640AAKS, Asetek Waterchill Watercooling, Hyper Type M 730w PSU. All latest drivers as of December 2009 and the OS is Windows 7 64bit.
For comparison, we are using an MSI GT240 Card and an MSI 4670.
Software
Left 4 Dead 2 – Recording a custom demo on the Dead Center – Hotel level (inside in the inferno), we used FRAPS to record frame rates as we played back the demo on all cards at same settings.
Enemy Territory: Quake Wars – ETQW gives us our lone OpenGL test results as we run through a recorded demo on the Slipgate level. Settings for all cards were the same.
Racedriver: GRID – Grid has some very good looking visuals. We used FRAPS as we took a Skyline for a test drive around the Ring. Settings for each card were set to highest possible for that card.
Assassin’s Creed – We headed for the nearest tower from the bureau roof in Acre and repeatedly climbed to the top. With 2 leaps of faith and a good look of the city from on high, we once again used FRAPS to record our frame rates. Settings for each card were set to highest possible for that card.
Crysis Warhead – We used the Framebuffer benchmark tool to run through the Ambush demo and recorded the results with FRAPS. Settings for each card were set to highest possible for that card.
Devil May Cry 4 (Benchmark) – DMC4′s benchmark provides a nice way of testing that anyone can do. Results are all from the benchmark itself, and include average frame rates as well as 4 graphs for each level tested. Settings for all cards were the same.
Left 4 Dead 2
As I mentioned earlier, the drivers available for the card are not the 10.1′s so I’m hoping that a proper driver for the card will correct the poor framerates in Left 4 Dead 2. In everything else, the card performed as expected but for this test at least, with the included driver, the frame rates were a little lower than expected.
Enemy Territory: Quake Wars
For this test, the HIS 5670 puts in a better showing although the GT240 does slightly pip it to the top spot.
Racedriver: GRID
GRID does very well on the 5670, easily beating out the GT240 and maintaining an average over 60 fps at 4xMSAA.
Assassin’s Creed
Again, the HIS 5670 comes out on top here, but it is pretty close when you don’t look at the numbers and actually play the game. Still, the HIS 5670 allows you to play with medium to high settings (all settings in game dropped by one) at 1680×1050.
Crysis Warhead
Crysis Warhead does exceptionally well on the GT240, so don’t let the graph full you. The GT240 is using Gamer settings, or middle ground. To maintain similar framerates the HIS 5670 had to drop to Mainstream. Still, for a lower end ATI card, the numbers are pretty good.
Devil May Cry 4 Benchmark
HIS 5670
MSI GT240
MSI 4670
The GT240 and the HIS 5670 are pretty close in this test. I’d still pick the 5670 over the GT240, as it offers slightly higher frame rates, but both cards had to run at 0xMSAA, Super High settings to score a Solid A score.
Overclocking
Overclocking the HIS Radeon 5670 IceQ 512MB (128bit) GDDR5 went pretty well, although the Catalyst Control Center limited me to ‘only’ 850MHz on the core. In the end I had to switch to GPUTool to get the highest clock. A nice boost to 900MHz core was the highest stable I could achieve, but I didn’t fare so well with the memory. By default, the GDDR5 comes clocked at 1000MHz, but anything over 1050MHz produced lock ups and graphic corruption in games after extended play. Still, the boost to the core was nice, although the end result was only a few FPS extra in games.
Final Words
This has been a pretty interesting review and I’m actually hesitant about my conclusions. On the face of things, looking at the results, the is a pretty good card, but it is a little over priced for the area it’s performing at. On the other hand, throughout the testing, I’ve had indications of poor driver support. I’ve left the review an extra week or so to see if things improve on that front but nothing has changed as yet. I honestly won’t be surprised to see a jump in frame rates right across the board when a better driver appears, but that’s not something I can guarantee obviously. Still, it’s there, in the back of my mind every time I use the card …
This is a very quiet card, in fact I’d go so far as to say it’s one of the quietest, if not the quietest actively cooled card I’ve … er … never heard. With it’s small size, low power requirements and quiet performance, the has HTPC written all over it. But that’s not to say it won’t play the odd game as well, which, with slightly reduced settings, it’ll handle even on a big screen TV.
If you want more from your games, then you should probably look elsewhere, and it has to be said that the price is a little high considering the performance, but if the drivers improve in the next couple of months, then the will certainly be the card of choice at this price bracket.
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