Product Listing

ASUS EAX1950PRO (Radeon X1950 PRO 256MB)

By Vincent Chang - 20 Oct 2006

Conclusion

Conclusion

In recent months, ATI has been setting things right for its present generation of Radeon graphics cards. With the Radeon X1950 PRO, this transformation is almost complete. While we have shown that NVIDIA's offerings fared better for most of this generation, ATI has finally revealed that it could compete effectively in performance, price and features as competitively too. CrossFire looks more viable now than ever with the new Native CrossFire mode while the heat issues have become more manageable with the new 80nm cores.

At the moment, we have no hesitations in recommending ATI for quite a few price segments. The lower to mid-range still seem to favor NVIDIA slightly but who knows, things may change again by the end of this month, when the Radeon X1650 XT gets released. However, the high-end segment is definitely more balanced now, with ATI having the slight edge. Of course, you may disagree, especially if the 'dual GPU' GeForce 7950 GX2 is your fancy while there is also the shadow of NVIDIA's GeForce 8 series hovering to spoil the ATI party. Everything should be made clear by mid November however, so it looks like an exciting period for enthusiasts.

If the plain vanilla hardware is what you're looking for, the ASUS EAX1950PRO fits the criteria.

As for the ASUS EAX1950PRO, its miniscule hop in clock speeds compared to the reference version will not result in any discernible performance increment. For that matter, the ASUS was for the most part the performance equal of the PowerColor Radeon X1950 PRO, which was also slightly overclocked. It just goes to show that how ineffectual such 'overclocking' is in real life. However, we also found that the Radeon X1950 PRO seemed to be quite intolerant of overclocking, so enthusiasts will probably not have too much luck pushing this card. Other aspects of the ASUS fared generally on par with what we have seen with the PowerColor. But there are some things about the ASUS that may not bode well with some of you.

For example, the ASUS EAX1950PRO has the capabilities to do Native CrossFire but apparently, ASUS is taking another marketing approach by having a standard edition, which is what we've reviewed today, and a CrossFire Edition that supposedly has a beefier bundle and the all-important pair of internal CrossFire bridges. So unlike ATI's vision where every Radeon X1950 PRO should have one bridge supplied in the package, the approach that ASUS takes locks users from pairing with any other brand since one will have to hunt for an extra bridge. That's not an easy affair in the current early days and a hassle to consumers. Together with a lack of VIVO (that was present on the PowerColor and some other brands) and a sparse bundle, you can probably make the assumption that this is the 'budget' version of the Radeon X1950 PRO (albeit the hardware itself looks fine and is above our expectations).

There's nothing wrong with trying to differentiate products in order to reach out to different consumers. However, removing the CrossFire connector from the product does seem like an awkward approach that's going back to the old days. No doubt, ASUS probably wanted to focus on its CrossFire version but then this lesser version doesn't come cheap either. We were quoted a price of US$225 (S$349) and considering its overall package, the ASUS EAX1950PRO is not very price competitive. Although the hardware itself looks fine and is above our expectations, ASUS products often tend to be slightly pricey due to the brand and general perception that its products are of better quality; so if you buy into that, this card is a lean and bloat free Radeon X1950 PRO.

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