PCWizKid understands that just because today's latest standard for graphics cards is PCI Express slot many people still have the older AGP slots on their motherboards. This means you either get a new motherboard or system with PCIe slots or you search around hoping to find a recent AGP card that can get you by a while longer. Well Sapphire Technology has thought about you with its recent HD4650 AGP card. This model has 1GB of DDR2 memory which until now had been on higher end GPU cards.
This card should bring relief to all those currently using integrated video instead of a separate discrete video card. The requirements are reasonable with a 400Watt PSU , 1GB of system memory and a 4x or 8x AGP slot your good to go.
Video Review
Key Features and Benefits
I/O Output
VGA+DL, DVI, DVI+HDMI
Core Clock
600 MHz
Stream Processors
320
Memory Clock
400 MHz, 800 Mbps
Interface
AGP 4x/8x bus
Memory
1024 MB/128 bit DDR2
Cooling
Single Slot Active Cooler
HD Video
HDMI On-board (video support only)
Graphics Support
Microsoft DirectX 10.1
Shaders
Shader Model 4.1 support
Features:
Microsoft® DirectX® 10.1 support, Shader model 4.1 support
320 Stream Processing Units
128-bit Memory Interface
24x Custom Filter Anti-Aliasing and High Performance Anisotropic Filtering
AGP 4x/8x Bus Interface
Dynamic Geometric Acceleration
Game Physics Processing Capabilities
Unified Video Decoder (UVD 2) for Blu-ray and HD Video
Accelerated Video Transcoding (AVT)
DVD Up scaling
Dynamic Contrast
System Requirements
AGP Slot supporting 4x or 8x APG Speeds.
400 Watt or greater power supply with 6-pin power connector
Certified power supplies are recommended. Refer to http://ati.amd.com/certifiedPSU for a list of Certified products
1GB of system memory
Installation software requires CD-ROM drive
Conclusion
As demonstrated in PCWizKid's Video Review, the performance of the Sapphire HD4650 AGP was surprising. As a budget mainstream upgrade for an older AGP system this is a terrific boost of GPU processing power that delivers decent quality graphics in many recent game titles. The fact that it supports DirectX 10.1 and shader model 4.1 will keep PC Gamers happy playing newer game titles bring back to life their older PC. So time to dust off that 5 year old PC and give it a another change to shine. This AGP card from Sapphire makes it a recommended alternative to any integrated and older AGP video cards hands down!
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