InsaneTek

Conclusion and Thoughts

Let us turn our clocks backwards to the time when the Radeon X850 series and Geforce 6800 series were flagship video cards.  At the time, the 6800 GT was considered to be the best bang for your buck.  It easily overclocked to Ultra speeds and easily beat out anything that came close within the price range.  ATI later released the X800XL as an attempt to bring the 6800 GT down on its knees.  The X800XL was a great card and I loved it, but unfortunately, it was not overclocking friendly due to the 0.11 micron die.  It still gave the 6800 GT a good tough battle though.  Those cards were and still are considered to be slightly higher than midrange.  Let us move to midrange video cards now.  Nvidia dominated with the 6600 GT.  ATI's poor attempt with the X700 series only seemed to be a hilarious joke to Nvidia.  For quite some time, ATI had nothing to fill in the gap.  After months and months of Nvidia reigning the midrange crown, ATI fires back with their new midrange line--X800 GT/GTO.  I don't think I would have to say much other than Nvidia got PWNED.  The performance of the X800 GT is simply awesome for the price.  It is worth every penny you spend on it, even if it does not mod.  A quick check in some of the popular online retailers shows that the PowerColor X800 GT comes in at around ~$160-165 while the cheapest 6600 GT with 256MB runs for ~$185-195.  It costs $30 cheaper and provides better performance?  Do you even have to think?  Not only that, the use of the R480 core allows potential for modifications to enable even more pipelines.  Although my sample did not mod, I am very positive that PowerColor's X800 GTO VIVO has the potential.  It comes with a PCI-E power connector and should also use the R480 core as well.  ATI has a winner with the X800 GT and PowerColor has done a great job with it.  A decent bundle, a decent price, and a great overclock can only mean a winner.

Pros:

• Very affordable
• Great performance
• Insane overclocker
• Runs quietly
• Comes with full version of Pacific Fighter

Cons:

• Memory receives no cooling
• Did not mod (might just be my sample)

We would like to thank PowerColor for providing us the sample.  If you have any questions or comments, feel free to hit us up in the forums. You can also check out more of our latest reviews on the front page.