ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 - AMD Back On Top

by Marco Chiappetta — Tuesday, August 12, 2008, 12:01 AM EDT

The Radeon HD 4800 series didn't exactly overwhelm NVIDIA's GTX 200 series with raw performance. In fact, the GeForce GTX 280 and 9800 GX2 were more powerful than the Radeon HD 4870. The Radeon HD 4800 series cards, however, were still excellent cards and they were offered at extremely competitive prices, which put significant pressure on NVIDA. At the time of their launch, the Radeon HD 4850 and Radeon HD 4870 were both less expensive and more powerful than the GeForce 9800 GTX and GeForce GTX 260, respectively. Since then, NVIDIA has reacted with a quick round of price cuts.

While enthusiasts were contemplating the purchase of a new Radeon or GeForce, AMD then planted another seed and released some concrete details regarding the Radeon HD 4870 X2, as if to say, "Yeah, we've got you covered at the $300 price point and a new, ultra powerful behemoth is coming real soon too. Maybe you should hold onto your upgrade money for a bit?"

That behemoth is the Radeon HD 4870 X2 and it arrives today. As its name suggests, the card features two RV770 GPUs running in tandem, for what is effectively a Radeon HD 4870 CrossFire configuration on a single PCB. Other than its pair of GPUs, however, the Radeon HD 4870 X2 has a few more differentiating factors we're now able to tell you about. Read on for the full scoop...

ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 - AMD Back On Top

Tags: AMD, ATI, Radeon, HD, X2, Radeon HD 4870, 4870, Radeon HD, ATI Radeon, AC, AM, K

Marco Chiappetta

Marco's interest in computing and technology dates all the way back to his early childhood. Even before being exposed to the Commodore P.E.T. and later the Commodore 64 in the early ‘80s, he was interested in electricity and electronics, and he still has the modded AFX cars and shop-worn soldering irons to prove it. Once he got his hands on his own Commodore 64, however, computing became Marco's passion. Throughout his academic and professional lives, Marco has worked with virtually every major platform from the TRS-80 and Amiga, to today's high end, multi-core servers. Over the years, he has worked in many fields related to technology and computing, including system design, assembly and sales, professional quality assurance testing, and technical writing. In addition to being the Managing Editor here at HotHardware for close to 15 years, Marco is also a freelance writer whose work has been published in a number of PC and technology related print publications and he is a regular fixture on HotHardware’s own Two and a Half Geeks webcast. - Contact: marco(at)hothardware(dot)com