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[nextpage title=”Introduction”]

Radeon X1600 Pro is a mid-range graphic chip from ATI, and HIS has launched a factory-overclocked model using this chip, dubbed X1600 Pro IceQ Turbo. While “Turbo” goes for the factory-set overclocking function, “IceQ” goes for the big fan that video cards from this series from HIS uses, which helps removing hot air from inside your PC. Let’s see how is the performance of this factory-overclocked Radeon X1600 Pro from HIS.

Figure 1: HIS Radeon X1600 Pro IceQ Turbo.

Radeon X1600 Pro runs originally at 500 MHz accessing its video memory at 780 MHz. This “Turbo” model from HIS runs at 587 MHz with its memory being accessed at 1.38 GHz. This video card has a sticker on its box stating this values, as you can see in Figure 2. We ran PowerStrip software to check the video card clocks and it was really running at the announced clock rates.

Figure 2: Sticker found on HIS Radeon X1600 Pro IceQ Turbo box.

The funny thing is that this factory-overclocked Radeon X1600 Pro runs at the very same clock rate as Radeon X1600 XT. So it should achieve the same performance of Radeon X1600 XT, given that there is no other technical difference between Radeon X1600 XT and Radeon X1600 Pro. Is that so? Let’s see on our benchmark.

If you want to learn more about ATI’s Radeon X1000 series and its difference from other ATI products, read our article on this subject.
 
You can see in our tutorial “ATI Chips Comparison Table” the difference between this new chip and the other chips from ATI, while on our tutorial “NVIDIA Chips Comparison Table” you can compare it to its competitors from NVIDIA.

Let’s now take a closer look at the Radeon X1600 Pro IceQ Turbo from HIS.

[nextpage title=”HIS Radeon X1600 Pro IceQ Turbo “]

You can check HIS Radeon X1600 Pro IceQ Turbo on Figures 3 and 4.

Figure 3: HIS Radeon X1600 Pro IceQ Turbo.

Figure 4: HIS Radeon X1600 Pro IceQ Turbo, back view.

As we mentioned before, the main advantage of HIS IceQ models is the design of their cooler, which blows hot air produced by the video card out the computer case – and later copied by Sapphire. Also, it is sensitive to UV light, so it will grow if you have an UV lamp inside your case.

We disassembled the video card heatsink to take a look, see Figure 5. The heatsink used on HIS model is entirely made of aluminum and it is actually made by Arctic Cooling (https://www.arctic.ac).

Figure 5: Video card with its cooler detached.

As you can see in Figure 5, HIS added passive heatsinks on the top of each memory chip. We couldn’t remove the passive heatsink from the memory chips, but it uses four GDDR3 chips.

This board also comes with one S-Video cable, one Composite Video to S-Video adapter, one Component Video adapter and two DVI to VGA adapters.

Figure 6: Cables and adapters that come with this video card.

[nextpage title=”Main Specifications”]

• Graphics chip: Radeon X1600 Pro running at 587 MHz.
• Memory: 128-bit 128 MB GDDR3 memory, running at 1.38 GHz.
• Bus type: PCI Express 16x.
• Connectors: Two DVI and one mini-DIN for S-Video and Component Video output.
• Number of CDs that come with this board: 4.
• Games that come with this board: Dungeon Siege 1.1 (full), Flat Out (full), Act of War: Direct Action (demo), Axis&Allies (demo), Half-Life 2 (demo), RollerCoaster Tycoon 3 (demo) and Tribes: Vengeance Single (demo).
• Programs that come with this board: PowerDirector 3 SE Plus, Power2Go 4 and other trial software.
• More Information: https://www.hisdigital.com
• Average Price in the US*: USD 127.00

* Researched on Froogle.com on the day we published this review.

[nextpage title=”How We Tested”]

During our benchmarking sessions, we used the configuration listed below. Between our benchmarking sessions the only variable was the video card being tested.

Hardware Configuration

• Motherboard: DFI LAN Party 925X-T2 (Intel 925X, Sep. 20th, 2004 BIOS)
• CPU: Pentium 4 3.4 GHz LGA 775
• Memory: Two 512 MB DDR2-533 CM2X512-4200 CL4 from Corsair memory modules
• Hard Drive: Maxtor DiamondMax 9 Plus (40 GB, ATA-133)
• Screen resolution: [email protected] Hz

Software Configuration

• Windows XP Professional installed using NTFS
• Service Pack 2
• Direct X 9.0c
• Intel inf driver version: 6.0.1.1002
• ATI video driver version: 4.10 (6.14.10.6483)
• ATI video driver version: 4.12 (Radeon X850 Platinum Edition)
• ATI video driver version: 5.3 (Radeon X800 GT)
• ATI video driver version: 5.9 (Radeon X800 GTO)
• ATI video driver version: 6.1 (Radeon X1600 XT from HIS)
• ATI video driver version: 8.173 beta (Radeon X1000 series)
• ATI video driver version: 8.203.3.0 (Radeon X1900 XTX)
• NVIDIA video driver version: 66.93
• NVIDIA video driver version: 77.72 (GeForce 7800 GTX)
• NVIDIA video driver version: 78.02 (GeForce 7800 GT)
• NVIDIA video driver version: 81.98 (GeForce 6800 GS)

Used Software

• 3DMark2001 SE
• 3DMark03 Business 3.50
• 3DMark05 Business 1.10
• Doom III
• Far Cry 1.3

We adopted a 3% error margin; thus, differences below 3% cannot be considered relevant. In other words, products with a performance difference below 3% should be considered as having similar performance.

[nextpage title=”3DMark2001 SE”]

3Dmark2001 SE measures video card performance simulating DirectX 8.1 games. It is very effective software for evaluating the performance from previous-generation games, programmed using DirectX 8. In this software we run six tests. We run the software in three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32, first without antialising and with no frame buffer, then we put the antialising at 4 samples and the frame buffer at triple-buffering. This improves the video quality but lowers the performance. We were willing to see how much performance we lost by putting the VGA to run at the maximum possible image quality. It is important to note that ATI chips can run at 6x antialising. Since NVIDIA chips cannot run at this configuration, we had to use 4x antialising to use a configuration that is valid to all video cards included in our bechmarks, allowing direct comparison between them.

You may be asking yourself why we added an old program in a review of a latest generation video card. To us, it is as important to know the performance of a video card with the latest games as it is to know its performance in an older game. That’s why we kept this software in our methodology.

At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 6.72% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 9.59% faster than ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, 16.82% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 32.03% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 35.03% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600 and 52.11% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 20.55% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 19.12% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 14.55% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 12.60% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 10.28% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 6.38% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 5.25% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 5.19% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 4.10% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 3.75% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 5.51% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 7.27% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 18.51% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 45.47% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 47.14% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 75.13% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to ATI Radeon X1600 XT and ATI Radeon X1900 XTX.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 26.83% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 25.80% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 21.15% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 19.17% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 17.34% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 11.14% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 10.36% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 9.02% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 6.45% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 8.70% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 16.03% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 52.89% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 70.38% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 105.83% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to XFX GeForce 6600 GT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 44.30% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 39.94% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 37.10% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 32.78% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 30.97% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 21.18% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 19.78% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 19.01% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 12.09% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 11.90% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 4.56% faster.

At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 17.08% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 35.05% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 64.27% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 78.81% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600 and 94.45% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to HIS Radeon X800 GT and Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 30.19% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 27.81% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 23.22% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 20.32% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 14.86% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 7.66% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 6.36% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 5.59% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 5.45% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 3.54% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 5,77% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 24,70% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 52,15% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 89,11% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 116,18% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600 and 127,23% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 48.00% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 41.06% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 37.87% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 30.92% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 24.66% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 22.78% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 15.60% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 15.32% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 5.78% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 4.42% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 4.40% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 17.54% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 49.15% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 118.69% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 142.78% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 198.58% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 132.49% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 109.47% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 108.37% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 102.21% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 97.43% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 85.30% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 52.02% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 49.89% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 43.00% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 36.99% faster, Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, which was 21.51% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 8.33% faster.

[nextpage title=”3DMark03″]

3DMark03 measures performance by simulating games written to DirectX 9, which are contemporary games. We run this program in three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32, first without antialising and anisotropic filtering, and then configuring antialising at 4x and anisotropic filtering also at 4x. This improves the video quality but lowers the performance. We were willing to see how much performance we lost by putting the VGA to run at the maximum possible image quality. It is important to note that ATI chips can run at 6x antialising. Since NVIDIA chips cannot run at this configuration, we had to use 4x antialising to use a configuration that is valid to all video cards included in our bechmarks, allowing direct comparison between them.

At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 9.87% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 21.33% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 34.58% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 82.61% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 114.41% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 155.22% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 86.92% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 76.60% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 69.52% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 55.46% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 48.50% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 44.41% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 27.50% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 26.80% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 8.04% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 5.66% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 3.20% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 9.40% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 23.51% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 35.26% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 86.80% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 121.04% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 163.62% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 110.14% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 97.38% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 85.19% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 66.39% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 61.46% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 56.06% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 33.70% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 32.91% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 13.06% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 6.51% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 5.05% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 8.69% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 28.06% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 35.09% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 88.31% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 136.65% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 180.63% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 131.61% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 113.19% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 100.81% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 94.77% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 73.37% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 66.79% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 41.66% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 39.50% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 17.79% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 5.00% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 3.51% faster.

At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 3.73% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 24.98% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 27.03% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 82.21% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 120.40% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 158.84% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 167.16% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 153.61% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 129.15% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 115.21% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 107.69% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 87.12% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 59.68% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 57.88% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 25.48% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 14.89% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 8.31% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 27.84% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 32.68% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 32.84% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 117.50% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 141.01% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 168.65% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 190.76% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 177.95% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 137.50% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 122.64% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 110.10% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 92.81% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 58.85% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 54.33% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 21.68% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 15.08% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 6.73% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 17.32% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 18.95% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 25.04% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 109.06% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 193.31% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 213.89% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 265.72% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 242.99% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 186.35% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 173.54% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 170.47% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 134.00% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 87.14% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 79.83% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 43.97% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 23.71% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 19.38% faster.

[nextpage title=”3DMark05″]

3DMark05 measures performance by simulating DirectX 9.0c games, i.e., using the new Shader 3.0 model. This programming model is used by Far Cry game and other games to be launched in the future. This new programming model is used by GeForce 6 and 7 series from NVIDIA and Radeon X1000 series from ATI.

We run this program in three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32, first without antialising and anisotropic filtering, and then configuring antialising at 4x and anisotropic filtering also at 4x. This improves the video quality but lowers the performance. We were willing to see how much performance we lost by putting the VGA to run at the maximum possible image quality. It is important to note that ATI chips can run at 6x antialising. Since NVIDIA chips cannot run at this configuration, we had to use 4x antialising to use a configuration that is valid to all video cards included in our benchmarks, allowing direct comparison between them.

At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 6.14% faster than HIS Radeon X800 GT, 46.85% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 47.56% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 61.14% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 149.15% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 195.74% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 210.48% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to HIS Radeon X800 GTO.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 70.41% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 64.75% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 60.19% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 52.69% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 49.67% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 35.25% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 17.77% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 16.59% faster and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 7.06% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 36.44% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 46.31% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 57.08% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 144.16% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 195.58% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 209.88% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 117.92% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 112.56% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 97.36% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 80.68% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 79.05% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 54.20% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 34.35% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 32.89% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 21.83% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 13.18% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 3.84% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 15.26% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 18.10% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 63.13% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 118.43% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 153.32% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 191.24% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 215.86% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 184.29% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 160.48% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 132.10% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 132.06% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 90.64% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 67.56% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 63.72% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 49.90% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 38.51% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 17.85% faster.

At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 10.22% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 19.77% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 91.14% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 136.99% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro, 163.10% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600 and 172.43% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 175.93% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 173.05% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 146.02% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 138.78% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 125.98% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 102.07% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 66.99% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 65.53% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 50.41% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 48.58% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 43.21% faster.

To run at 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements on 3DMark05 the video card must have at least 256 MB of memory, because of that some video cards couldn’t run this test. Here HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 4.30% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 11.62% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 123.66% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 209.12% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 265.87% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 236.30% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 188.75% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 173.66% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 159.69% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 124.28% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 83.46% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 82.96% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 65.31% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 60.97% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 39.76% faster,

To run at 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements on 3DMark05 the video card must have at least 256 MB of memory, because of that some video cards couldn’t run this test. Here HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 67.74% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 189.74% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 532.89% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 435.22% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 325.61% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 321.86% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 279.15% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 236.54% faster, ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 167.61% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 139.37% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 126.21% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 126.01% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 97.17% faster, Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, which was 39.07% faster and XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), which was 27.43% faster.

[nextpage title=”Doom 3″]Doom 3 is one of the heaviest games available today. As we’ve done on other programs, we ran this game at three resolutions: 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32. This game allows several image quality levels and we’ve done our benchmarking on two levels, low and high. We ran demo1 four times and wrote the obtained number of frames per second. The first result we discarded at once, since it is far inferior than the other results. This happens because at the first time we run the demo the game must load all textures to video memory, fact that doesn’t happen from the second time we run the demo on. From the three results left, we consider as our official result the middle result, i.e., we discard the highest and the lowest values. Curiously almost all times the values obtained at the second round on were the same.

A very important detail that we must mention is that Doom 3 has an internal FPS lock: it is only capable of generating 60 frames per second, even if your board is able to produce more frames per second than that. This is done in order to make the game to have the same “playability” sensation independently from the video card installed on the PC. This lock, however, is disabled in the game benchmarking mode.

For further details on how to measure 3D performance with Doom 3, read our tutorial on this subject.

At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 14.39% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 17.56% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 105.83% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 152.38% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 52.04% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 50.79% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 48.58% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 47.96% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 47.96% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 43.71% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 32.86% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 30.03% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 21.23% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 19.34% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 9.59% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), which was 7.86% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 4.72% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 17.69% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 19.95% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 123.98% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 174.38% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to ATI Radeon X1600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 113.90% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 108.20% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 105.92% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 99.32% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 84.05% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 76.54% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 74.49% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 72.67% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 36.45% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 25.51% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), which was 14.58% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 6.61% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 18.11% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 22.75% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 138.93% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 195.28% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to ATI Radeon X1600 XT and HIS Radeon X800 GT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 176.68% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 158.15% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 147.60% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 143.45% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 105.75% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 102.56% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 101.60% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 99.36% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 46.65% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 24.28% faster and XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), which was 17.57% faster.

At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 16.27% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 20.33% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 110.79% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 155.90% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 62.63% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 61.09% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 59.73% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 57.34% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 56.66% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 51.54% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 42.66% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 39.42% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 25.94% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 20.82% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 11.77% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), which was 11.60% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 4.10% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 17.15% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 20.66% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 119.02% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 168.67% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 135.24% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 123.82% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 120.10% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 115.14% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 94.04% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 84.62% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 83.37% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 79.65% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 37.72% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 30.52% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), which was 18.11% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 10.17% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 3.47% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 19.60% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 24.07% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 157.76% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 190.29% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to HIS Radeon X800 GT and ATI Radeon X1600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 195.65% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 167.22% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 153.51% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 151.51% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 105.35% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 104.35% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 102.68% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 101.67% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 GT, which was 45.15% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 26.09% faster, XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), which was 18.06% faster.

[nextpage title=”Far Cry”]

Far Cry is a game based on the new Shader 3.0 (DirectX 9.0c) programming model available on series 6 and 7 from NVIDIA and series X1000 from ATI graphics chips. We’ve updated the game to version 1.3.
 
As we’ve done on other programs, we ran this game at three resolutions, 1024x768x32, 1280x1024x32 and 1600x1200x32. This game allows several image quality levels and we’ve done our benchmarking on two levels, low and very high. To measure the performance we used the demo created by German magazine PC Games Hardware (PCGH), available at https://www.3dcenter.org/downloads/farcry-pcgh-vga.php. We run this demo four times and made an arithmetical average with the results. This average is the result presented in our graphs.

This game has a very important detail in its image quality configuration. Antialising, instead of being configured by numbers (1x, 2x, 4x or 6x) is configured as low, medium or high. The problem is that on NVIDIA chips both medium and high mean 4x, while on ATI chips medium means 2x and high means 6x, making the comparison between ATI and NVIDIA chips completely unfair. Because of that we configured antialising at 4x and anisotropic filtering at 8x manually at the video driver control panel.

For further details on how to measure 3D performance with Far Cry, read our tutorial on this subject.

At a resolution of 1024×768 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 3.21% faster than MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, 4.54% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, 4.55% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, 6.26% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 7.21% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 8.16% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 14.13% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 17.01% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT and 25.37% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to ATI Radeon X1800 XT, Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, ATI Radeon X1600 XT and ATI Radeon X1900 XTX.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 3.18% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 3.15% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 3.08% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 4.03% faster than MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, 4.62% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, 5.21% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, 5.81% faster than ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, 8.56% faster than NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, 8.96% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 17.68% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 55.50% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT, 57.85% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600 and 90.02% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to HIS Radeon X800 GTO, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, ATI Radeon X1600 XT and Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 3.28% faster and HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 3.13% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 without any image quality enhancement, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 8.44% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 12.65% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 33.16% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 87.04% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 98.14% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT and 142.64% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) achieved a performance similar to ATI Radeon X1600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 21.14% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 20.05% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 19.65% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 17.51% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 12.99% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 12.36% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 11.62% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 10.39% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 8.26% faster and NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 7.69% faster.

At a resolution of 1024×768 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 7.61% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 14.47% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 17.89% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 85.13% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 114.70% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 133.83% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 74.83% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 74.69% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 73.85% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 73.03% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 72.02% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 61.39% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 58.38% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 55.02% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 43.88% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 25.10% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 9.33% faster.

At a resolution of 1280×1024 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 8.30% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 18.28% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 23.54% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 102.65% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 115.83% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 124.23% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 146.50% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 132.91% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 129.21% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 124.59% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 122.43% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 119.68% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 76.20% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 68.73% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 49.97% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 25.83% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 16.54% faster.

At a resolution of 1600×1200 enabling image quality enhancements, HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was 4.75% faster than Sapphire Radeon X700 Pro, 7.32% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 GT, 21.58% faster than XFX GeForce 6600 256 MB (which is factory-overclocked), 85.82% faster than Albatron GeForce 6600, 160.70% faster than Sapphire Radeon X600 Pro and 199.00% faster than ATI Radeon X600 XT.

HIS Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo (which is factory-overclocked) was beaten by ATI Radeon X1800 XT, which was 242.94% faster, ATI Radeon X1900 XTX, which was 227.39% faster, ATI Radeon X1800 XL, which was 183.21% faster, MSI GeForce 7800 GTX, which was 177.19% faster, ATI Radeon X850 XT P.E., which was 158.73% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT, which was 149.76% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GS, which was 90.51% faster, NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT, which was 63.60% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GTO, which was 62.50% faster, HIS Radeon X800 GT, which was 32.35% faster and ATI Radeon X1600 XT, which was 16.94% faster.

[nextpage title=”Conclusions”]

Factory-overclocked Radeon X1600 Pro from HIS runs at the very same clock rates as Radeon X1600 XT. Since both chips have identical technical specs, we though that both would achieve a similar performance on our tests. This would be correct if they both had the same amount of video memory. With overclocked Radeon X1600 Pro carrying 128 MB and Radeon X1600 XT, 256 MB, the later achieved a performance up to 167.61% higher. While on old games with no image quality settings enable the performance difference is very small (up to 8%), on newer games and/or increasing image quality settings, the original 256 MB Radeon X1600 XT achieved a performance far higher.

But there is a huge price difference between them, though. While the 128 MB factory-overclocked Radeon X1600 Pro from HIS can be found by USD 127, 256 MB Radeon X1600 XT from other brands is found on the USD 167-USD 200 range.

This puts Radeon X1600 Pro Turbo from HIS competing with cards based on GeForce 6600 GT, and it was up to 91.14% faster than this model from NVIDIA, except in Doom 3: if you want only to play Doom 3, go for a NVIDIA-based solution.

It is also very interesting to note that PowerColor has a Radeon X800 GTO with 128 MB model being sold at the same price range of the reviewed video card from HIS (on our benchmark Radeon X800 GTO was up to 139.37% faster than the overclocked Radeon X1600 Pro from HIS, however it had 256 MB of video memory).

So, if you are looking for an ATI solution to counter GeForce 6600 GT, this model from HIS won’t let you down. However, we would seriously consider buying a 128 MB Radeon X800 GTO instead if we had up to USD 130 to spend on a video card.