Diamond ATI Radeon HD4850 Review :: Diamond HD4850 Bundle

• ATI CrossfireX bridge interconnect
• Video Out via Composite and S-Video
• HDTV Component Out (YPrPb)
• DVI to VGA Adapter
• ATI Radeon DVI-I to HDMI with audio
• Driver CD

The card that was sent for evaluation was an Engineering Sample Radeon HD4850, but was sent in a Diamond HD4850 retail box. There was no packaging or bundle included, as the drivers were downloaded off ATI’s reviewer’s site. Therefore any discussion of the retail bundle will have to be about what’s listed on the box ATI sent.

Diamond usually forgoes game bundles on their high-end Viper cards and the HD4850 is no exception. They do include a HDTV Out cable (YPrPb) and a Composite and S-Video cable listed. One interesting addition to the bundle is the DVI-I to HDMI Adapter. This allows the video card to be used on a HDMI TV or a HDMI monitor for High Definition gaming on a big screen.

ATI has released the Catalyst 8.6 drivers in the last day or two. They have also released a HotFix driver for the HD4800 series today, too late to do retesting of the card with the Hotfix. ATI releases new drivers every month or so and the new Catalyst 8.6 drivers are an improvement in terms of functionality. They carry anti-aliasing settings from application controlled to 24x samples (8x tent filter) and anisotropic filtering settings from application controlled to 16x.

CrossfireX is the use of two or more ATI video cards working together to improve performance in games or applications. There are two Crossfire bridges on the card which allows for a daisy chain of up to four HD4850 cards on a supported motherboard. ATI says they have improved scaling on HD4850 cards to allow higher performance with the new drivers.