Unreal Tournament 3 is our only DX9 based game.  Its graphics engine has a lot to challenge any VGA card however.  Using the Defiance map with 12 bots in Deathmatch we took a look at our card's performance.  All settings within the game were set to max with FSAA turned off through the Catalyst Control Panel as there is no in game setting to turn FSAA on or off.  Screen resolution was set to 1920 x 1440.

As with Assassin's Creed, pushing the HD4670 at 1920 really make the card struggle at times in Unreal Tournament 3.  By kicking the resolution down a notch, game play instantly became loveable again.  Inching back on the resolution normally would be sinful, but not when you have an $80 card competing with a $300 card.

Here's a look at Futuremark's 3DMark06 and Vantage benchmarking programs which are back by popular demand.  I'm still not into the synthetic benchmark rodeo but I have been in the past and many of you still use these tools to tweak out your systems.

Image Quality

We have Assassin's Creed below to look at as a sample of the HIS card's image quality.  Rather then me telling you what looks good and what doesn't, you be the judge.  As you will recall, Assassin's Creed is at max quality at 1920 resolution just like in our benchmark.

Conclusion

When ATi came back into the graphics game they did so swinging.  First they took the performance crown of the ultra high end and now they have their sights on the entry level market.  HIS is no stranger to tweaking products to be that much more performance oriented, added their venerable IceQ cooler and a factory overclock to the HD4670.  Performance was definitely down from that of the HD4850 and HD4870 but those cards are from an entirely different category priced $100 and $200 more respectively.

The HIS HD4670 IceQ Turbo represents a fantastic option in the sub $100 arena offering performance you would expect for twice the price.  Our only real disappointment was the lack of a Crossfire bridge cable.  But given what this card is, it is hard to argue anything other than success for this card that is both powerful and compact.  A very worthy purchase.  Here's a link to the HIS HD4670 IceQ Turbo on sale now at Newegg.

Pros

• Great value for your pixel pushing dollar

• Factory overclock WITH a warranty

• Good performance

• Quiet operation

• Card is less than 7 1/2 inches long

• Does not require additional power

• Supports Blu-Ray and HD Video

• HDMI 7.1 Audio

• CrossFireX ready

• Did I mention this card is $80?

Cons

• No Crossfire cable

BACK                    HOME

Pg. 1 - Introduction
Pg. 2 - The Card
Pg. 3 - Test Bed/Benchmarks
Pg. 4 - Benchmarks/Image Quality/Conclusion