| HIS X1800GTO IceQ3 Turbo 256MB Graphics Card Review at MaXit |
| Written by Maxit | ||||||
Supplier: www.chillblast.com  Manufacturer: HIS If you need a graphics card for some performance gaming, the HIS X1800 series of graphics cards offers plenty of bang for very little of the green stuff. HIS Digital have cornered a niche for themselves by offering quality cards with fantastic cooling systems. The IceQ cooling system replaces the stock cooler found on reference designs and offers clever design features to help keep noise down and hot air outside your case. The question is, are HIS cards worth the price premium, alebit a small one, over stock reference models... The X1800GTO is ATis recent answer to the rather excellent nVIDIA 7600GT in the upper mid-range. As with its competition, the X1800GTO is a 12 pixel pipeline product, but has the advantage of a full 256 bit memory interface. Today we are looking at the HIS variant, which as usual brings more to the table than your normal reference card copy. 
With this product HIS has replaced the tried and tested pale blue
background box with a new design; a black minimalist look with IceQ 3
emblazoned on the front. It certainly looks stylish, and has a window
in the back to see the card. All of the relevant specs, facts and
figures on the side.  Opening up the box and you will be greeted by the rather huge card itself, as well as a plethora of goodies, including video out cables for Composite, HDTV Component and S-Video, VIVO cables, a PCIe power adaptor lead, 2 DVI-VGA Adaptors, and full copies of the game Flat Out and Power DVD 6. HIS also includes a manual, driver disk and ATI bonus demo disk into the mix as well. As you can see this is an extremely good bundle, right up there with the best we have seen here at BSR. When you consider the card costs just over £140 inc VAT, this is exceptional value.  The Card Spec Click for full picture The card itself is really massive as previously mentioned, and uses the same PCB as the X1800XL. This is not true for X1800GTOs from other manufacturers which have one less mosfets on the PCB. This made us think that the X1800GTO from HIS could possibly be unlocked to all 16 pipelines without too much difficulty more on this later. The IceQ cooler makes a welcome return, though this version is considerably weightier than previous models, with more copper and an impressive heat pipe derived design. Clock speeds are 500MHz for the core and 1GHz for the DDR3 memory, though HIS guarantees a clock speed of 520MHz for this IceQ Turbo model. The Lab WorkoutThe X1800GTO has only one competitor in this class the 7600GT. We used an Asus model in our comparison, but it features the same clock speeds as the reference example. As this is a mid-ranged battle, extreme resolutions and maximum anti-aliasing settings were not tested. If you need maximum eye candy, you should splash out on one the mega cards from the ATI or Nvidia stable.Quake 4 Not the most exciting title but the engine is highly regarded and sure to be licensed by lots of other developers. Performance is a good indicator for future games.  One of the most important multiplayer titles around and one of the most intensive on your PC.  Half Life 2 Still arguably the best looking PC game and one of our favourites at MaXit HQ. Half Life 2s engine is amazingly CPU limited until you load up the Lost Coast HDR-demo level.  3DMark06 The best 3DMark for many years, 06 takes into account CPU scores as well as video, and features some very high end HDR lighting tests.  Overall, performance leadership is split between the X1800 GTO and the 7600GT. Regardless of which of these solutions you choose, the performance lead over the previous generation of X1600XT technology is significant and undisputable. Overclocking and UnlockingOverclocking HIS cards is almost always a pleasure, as the IceQ cooler is typically a lot more effective than the stock solutions. In this case we found a difference of around 17 degrees between the reference cooler and the HIS cooler a hugely impressive reduction, especially when you consider that the IceQ 3 is nearly silent.Overclocking the Core was very easy, and rewarding with over 90Mhz extra possible without any problems. Above this the system would hard lock, suggesting it is a lack of voltage rather than insufficient cooling causing problems. Memory overclocking was far less successful, with just a few extra MHz possible without artefacts. Nevertheless, there are other ways to improve the performance of this particular X1800GTO Unlocking pipelines on the X1800 GTO Several conflicting reports have been released around the web about whether the X1800 GTO can be unlocked to an X1800XL. We therefore simply had to give it a go! The tools you require are ATITool, Winflash and the BIOS file from an X1800XL. Install ATi Tool and check the value from the GB_PIPE_SELECT. If your card has 0x3FE4, you are good to go. If it is any other value, unfortunately you will not be able to unlock your pipelines. From what we have seen, all HIS cards have the 0x3FE4 GB_PIPE_SELECT value. 
Next, download the X1800XL BIOS here. Run winflash105.zip and click
load image. Select the X1800XL BIOS and check the force option.
Finally click program.
Once you have done this, restart the machine. If you go into ATiTool
again you should now see that the number of pipelines says 16. 
To verify this we ran 3DMark 2006. Since 3DMark 2006 is quite CPU
limited there would be more gains in real shader-heavy titles, but even
so, the difference is clear to see.
 
So far it seems that only HIS (and some Connect3D) cards can be
unlocked. The bottom line is that if you want a card that can be
unlocked to an X1800XL, you should definitely invest in the HIS card
over other brands. The Bottom LineAs it stands, the HIS X1800GTO is a superb mid-ranged option and a bargain at just over £140. It equals fast the 7600GT, winning most of the more intensive shader-heavy titles by a few fps. As usual HIS has pulled out all of the stops and delivered a solution with a superb bundle. The IceQ cooler is a design champion and far ahead of the noisy standard alternatives found on reference models.When you consider that this card can be unlocked to an X1800XL in around 2 minutes, the card becomes a champion performer. Hardware enthusiasts looking to do this should plump on the HIS IceQ 3 Turbo model, as others may not have the correct GB_PIPE_SELECT value. Once the pipelines have been unlocked you have a high end 16 pipeline card that will rip through even the hardest titles with most settings at their highest. Without doubt this is simply the best mid-ranged video card you can buy right now. Now all we need in a HERS version to keep the other half happy! Pros - Great bundle of games, software and cables - IceQ 3 cooler is a triumph of quietness and performance - Extremely quick in the latest games - Excellent warranty - Can be unlocked to the 16 pipe X1800GTO with ease Cons - Slightly let down by memory overclock potential. 
For more information on HIS products visit their website at www.hisdigital.com and tell them MaXit sent ya for a good card!
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