Not every PC needs to have two GTX 480’s, a 5870, or even a 5770. Sometimes you need something quiet, low power, and just enough power to get the job done. Today I will be taking a look at the HD5550 Ultimate from Sapphire. With a large heatsink and no fan this card is perfect for builds where sound is critical, today we are going to find out how well it performs.
When putting together a gaming rig, unless you’re rolling in the dough you have to make compromises with every part of the build. If we didn’t everyone would be running around with systems like this, and ATI and NVidia wouldn’t be putting out budget cards like the 5770 from Diamond Multimedia that we are going to take a look at today. With a low price point and low power requirements this may be a perfect card for my portable LAN rig.
It wasn't too long ago that multiple displays were considered to be a pure enthusiast sport. Nowadays, with both hardware and software becoming more multi-task friendly, even the average user can find themselves short of desktop area. If you have the luxury of built-in dual outputs on your video card, that's great. But what if you don't or what if you find yourself craving a third what do you do? And what about laptops, for that matter? Diamond Multimedia has developed an adapter to help in all those situations and more, and has sent us one to see for ourselves.
*Our 200th Review!* Most video card manufactures stick to the reference design’s from Nvidia and ATI. Sparkle and international graphics card manufacture that has been pushing into the US recently has a product line called Calibre. The Calibre line is perfect for enthusiasts who are looking for better overclocking and/or quieter video cards. Today I have the chance to take a look at the Sparkle Calibre X265, a GeForce 260 with a slick looking cooling solution and a performance bump.
