The Vaporizer - Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 2GB GDDR5

One Last Hurrah

As things stand now, we are coming to an end of an era for graphics cards. The RV700-class GPU, introduced almost exactly a year ago in the form of the Radeon HD 4850 and HD 4870, has brought ATI back into game after a long period in the wilderness. ATI graphics cards were competitive again, and even if NVIDIA would not openly admit it, we like to think the guys in green were a bit taken aback by just how good the Radeon HD 4800 series was.

Fast forward to today, and we are coming to the end of the Radeon HD 4800 series' shelf life. If all goes well, we should expect the new RV800-class GPUs to make their debut later this year before Christmas. Of course, the same goes for NVIDIA's new G300 series GPUs. But before the older Radeon HD 4800 cards take their bow and make their grand exit, there is time still for one last hurrah, and it is coming from none other than one of ATI's most committed vendors, Sapphire.

This is the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890. As its name suggest, it employs vapor chamber cooling technology. Without going into much detail, vapor chamber technology is a method of cooling that promises faster heat transfer by the means of liquid vaporization and condensation. To our knowledge, Sapphire is the only major vending that employs vapor chamber technology in their graphics card and it should be intriguing to see how it stands up against conventional coolers.

Let's get on with the review proper then, shall we?

The Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 2GB GDDR5

As you would expect, the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 comes factory-overclocked, but only midly. Its core clock speeds have received a 20MHz bump from 850MHz to 870MHz, whereas memory clock speeds have been improved more significantly to 4200MHz DDR as compared to a stock card's 3900MHz DDR. It should be noted that these clock speeds are bit on the conservative side, considering the overclocked Sapphire HD 4890 that we've reviewed earlier this year came clocked by default at 900MHz at the core and 3900MHz DDR at the memory. Given the superior cooling technology on this card, we expected more. Still, this should give us some boost in performance.

Aside from the increased clock speeds, the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 is also one of the few Radeon HD 4890 cards to come with 2GB of framebuffer. To be honest, we are not sure if today's applications will be able to make full use of the full 2GB of video memory, and we doubt it will offer any substantial increase in performance over cards with a 'mere' 1GB of framebuffer. Guess we'll find out soon enough.

Test Setup

Windows Vista SP1 Test System

• Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6850 (3.00GHz)
• Gigabyte X38T-DQ6 motherboard
• 2 x 1GB DDR3-1333 Aeneon memory in dual channel mode
• Seagate 7200.10 200GB SATA hard drive
• Windows Vista Ultimate with SP1

We'll be comparing the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 closely against the previously reviewed PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890 Battle Forge Edition . Although the PowerColor card comes with higher clock speeds, it will serve as a good reference point as both cards feature customized cooling solutions and both come factory-overclocked. We'll also be putting in a reference clocked Radeon HD 4890. And from the green camp, we have the usual suspects of NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 275 and GeForce GTX 260 Core 216, the Radeon HD 4890 primary rivals.

• Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 2GB GDDR5 (Catalyst 9.6)
• PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890 Battle Forge Edition (Catalyst 9.5)
• ATI Radeon HD 4890 1GB (Catalyst 9.5)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 275 896MB (ForceWare 185.63 Beta)
• Palit GeForce GTX 260 Sonic 216 SP (ForceWare 181.20)
• NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 (ForceWare 181.20)
• ATI Radeon 4870 512MB (Catalyst 9.1)

The cards were tested using the following benchmarks:

• Futuremark 3DMark06
• Futuremark 3DMark Vantage
• Crysis Warhead
• Far Cry 2
• Unreal Tournament 3

Windows Vista Results - 3DMark06

Beginning with 3DMark06, it was no surprise that the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 was outperformed by faster clocked PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890. Still, the Sapphire card was some distance ahead of a bone stock Radeon HD 4890 and scored noticeably better than any of the NVIDIA cards.

Windows Vista Results - 3Mark Vantage

On 3DMark Vantage, the PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890 continued to lead the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890. It seems then that clock speeds still count for more as opposed to framebuffer size. Also, we see the NVIDIA card staging a comeback, with the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 275 being the best performer here.

Windows Vista Results - Crysis Warhead & Far Cry 2

The trend continued as we moved on to Crysis Warhead. PowerColor was the best performing Radeon HD 4890 card, with the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 a distant second. In fact, the Sapphire card was only marginally quicker than a reference Radeon HD 4890 and was only about on par with the Palit GeForce GTX 260 Sonic 216 SP.

On to Far Cry 2, the PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890 remained the top performing Radeon HD 4890 card, although the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 did manage to squeeze ahead on the most demanding resolution of 1920 x 1440 with 8x anti-aliasing turned on. It seems that the extra 1GB of frame buffer is finally being put into good use here, but 30.61fps is barely playable.

Windows Vista Results - Unreal Tournament 3

The ATI cards were dominant on Unreal Tournament 3 and once more, the PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890 was the top performing card from the red camp thanks to its higher clock speeds. The results thus far indicate quite clearly that 2GB of video memory is redundant for most of today's applications.

Temperature

Vapor chamber cooling technology has been touted as one of the quickest and most efficient cooling methods around and the Sapphire is perhaps the only major graphics vendor to offer this technology on their cards. Sadly, this was not reflected by the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 as we measured its operating temperature. Its reading of 71 degrees Celsius is only a meagre two degrees cooler than a stock Radeon HD 4890's 73 degrees Celsius. And at 68 degrees Celsius, the PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890 managed better with its traditional fan and heatsink combo. If it's any consolation, the cooler on the Sapphire card did run pretty quiet in our tests.

Power Consumption

Unlike other Radeon HD 4890 cards, the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 required an 8 and 6-pin PCIe power connector, leading us to fear that it would record higher power consumption figures. Fortunately, its readings were in line with our expectations from a Radeon HD 4890.

Overclocking

The Radeon HD 4890 gained much fanfare thanks to its fantastic overclocking potential - it became the first consumer graphics card to clock an amazing 1GHz at the core. Hence, it was disappointing that we only managed to get the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 up to a paltry 920Hz at the core and 4400MHz DDR at the memory, the lowest clock speeds we've ever got on a Radeon HD 4890. At these speeds, it was hardly any faster than the PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890 at default.

For comparisons' sake, the PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890 managed an overclock of 1020MHz at the core and 4400MHz DDR at the memory, whereas the reference design based Sapphire HD 4890 that was reviewed previously managed to achieve an impressive 1000MHz at the core and 4800 MHz DDR at the memory.

Don't Believe the Hype

Despite the hype over vapor chamber technology, it seems that it is no more efficient than traditional fan and heatsink combos - at least in Sapphire's implementation. In our tests, we found that the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 was only marginally cooler than a stock Radeon HD 4890, and in fact lost out to PowerColor's PCS+ cooling system, which uses the tried and tested combination of a fan and heatsink. In fact, this is not the first time a well-design fan and heatsink combo cooler has outshone its vapor chamber technology counterpart. In our evaluation of the Sapphire HD 4870 Toxic Edition , which also used a vapor chamber technology based cooler, we found that it was comprehensively ousted by HIS's legendary IceQ 4+ cooler.

In addition, the 2GB of framebuffer on the Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 did little to help performance. Against the PowerColor PCS+ HD 4890, which might only have a single GB of video memory, but thanks to its faster clock speeds, it obviously the faster of the two cards. 2GB might sound impressive, but the truth is 1GB is sufficient for most of today's applications.

Our biggest gripe, however, is the card's poor overclocking performance. Granted, overclocking has a lot to do with luck of the draw, but given that this is Sapphire's top SKU, you would think Sapphire would have at least tested the chips to ensure a certain degree of quality. Furthermore, the Radeon HD 4890 has a reputation for being a keen overclocker, and this makes it all the more puzzling why we could only achieve a tame 920MHz at the core.

The Sapphire Vapor-X HD 4890 could have been a great card, but it was let down by its average performance, and less than ideal cooling. We expected more from the vapor chamber technology cooler. Moreover, at a price of US$250, it is about a good US$40 more than most other Radeon HD 4890 cards. And given the less than special cooler and useless additional GB of video memory, you'll essentially be paying more for pretty much nothing.

However, if for some reason you must insist on a graphics card with vapor chamber technology, then you'd be better off getting the 1GB variant of this card. Yes, Sapphire offers this card in 1GB flavor too, and that costs about US$210. We doubt the cooler on that is going to be any more efficient, but at least it costs roughly the same as other Radeon HD 4890 cards, which means you are not paying more for a cooler that doesn't work and extra memory that doesn't help.

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