The new Sapphire HD4850 X2 has beaten the next generation of cards by a matter of months, at a time when many enthusiasts are keeping their wallet closed and their eyes open for previews.  A pair of 1GB HD4850s sit on this single PCB card, with speeds of 1GHz for the GDDR3 and 650MHz for the two cores and it sports a Crossfire bridge so you can pick up a second card and have Quad-Crossfire.  The performance is solidly above a single HD4890 and the GTX 285, though as you would expect it still falls behind the 4870 X2.  Drop by motherboards.org for the hard numbers.

“The HED 4850 is an interesting beast of a video card. In terms of performance, the card is faster than the GTX 285 and faster than a single HD 4890 yet lacking against the HD 4870 x2 as is to be expected with the lower clocks and GDDR3 memory instead of the GDDR5 memory on the HD 4870 x2. In terms of price versus performance, the HD 4850 x2 from Sapphire is clearly a better value than many single chip video cards with solid performance across all benchmarks. The caveat of any video card purchase today is the next generation of video cards will likely launch in the near future. As with any transition period, it might be better to see what the future will bring before spending $300 on a dual card today. Having said that, the Sapphire HD 4850 x2 is out today and delivers on what they promised which is a good thing. For those who want dual card action, but cannot afford the 4870X2 series is a solid Hot Product.”

Here are some more Graphics Card articles from around the web:

Click Here to go to 

Video Cards  Graphics Cards