X-bit labs

PowerColor Bravo X700 Graphics Card Review: High-End Features at Affordable Price? (page 9)

Category: Video

by Alexey Stepin

[ 09/14/2005 | 01:58 PM ]

Doom 3

The reduced memory frequency of the PowerColor card leads to its being just a little step ahead of the RADEON X600 XT in the “pure speed” mode. The situation improves somewhat in the “eye candy” mode, but the Bravo X700 still resides on the last but one place. The gap between the PowerColor and the standard RADEON X700 is about 20% in the highest resolution! We should also note that this game is optimized for the GeForce 6/7 architecture and uses the OpenGL API, so among ATI’s cards with their less efficient OpenGL driver the RADEON X700 PRO is the only one to ensure a comfortable frame rate in Doom 3 , and only in 1024x768.

It’s the same on the d3dm4 map, but the RADEON X700 manages to overtake the GeForce 6600 in high resolutions of the “eye candy” mode. The PowerColor Bravo X700 is just a little slower than the entry-level solution from NVIDIA. It’s important to have fast memory after all, and 500MHz is not sufficient for playing modern games.