Pros: Going from the numbers alone, this card pulled over a 9000 on 3DMark03 compared with 1700 from my 2.5 year old 128MB Sapphire 9600SE. 3DMark05 wouldn’t run on the 9600SE (pixel shader issue) but the x800 scored a 4143. If you consider the mail-in rebate, there isn’t a card that comes close to these numbers for the price in the AGP realm. I had no problems physically installing the card although it is about 1.5 inches longer than the 9600 it replaced. Driver setup, including the Cataylst Control Center, was a breeze using the latest Cataylst v6.5 (drivers + CCC is over 36MB) from the ATI website. Guild Wars went from clunky to amazing with all settings maxed except for anti-aliasing (2x) and shadows (medium). The card gets power from an Ultra 400W PSU which is daisy-chained through 2 PATA hard drives. This has caused no problems what-so-ever. The x800 has breathed new life into my old rig.

Cons: The fan is loud. I would not recommend this card for anyone creating a home theatre system. In my old rig where the case fans and CPU fan are all getting old and noisy, it doesn’t bother me all that much. I’m hoping that the Trixx software will allow me some control of the fan speed so I can reduce the noise a bit.

Overall Review: I can’t speak to the problems people have had with tech support. With a BS in computer science and 7 years in tech industries, I look at it like, if I can’t fix it, no one over the phone can either. Find a geek friend – we don’t eat much and are handy around computers. :P My aging rig consists of: Asus P4P800-E Deluxe Mobo Intel PIV 2.8GHz CPU 512MB Corsair PC3200 RAM Maxtor 120GB hard drive (primary drive) Seagate 8GB hard drive (for posterity sake)

Pros: Runs Skyrim on all highest settings with temps topping out at 45°C and 35% fan. Scores a 7.9 in graphics and a 7.9 in gaming graphics in the Windows Experience Index.

Cons: It didn't arrive in time for the Guild Wars 2 beta weekend (9 days to deliver). Some other brands that were out of stock offered a free Dirt 3 game which this model did not.

Overall Review: I bought this to pep up an aging system with a Sapphire HD 4850. The 4850 is about 3/4 of an inch longer and 1/8 shorter than the 7850 so the 7850 easily fits in my Cool Master case. Sits at 36°C and 28% fan when idle. The single 6 pin power connector is another plus. I didn't bother with the drivers on the included CD. I grabbed the latest ones from the PowerColor web site - Catalyst Version 12.3. No driver issues so far. System Specs: MOBO: MIS X58 Pro PSU: Corsair TX 650W CPU: i7-920 RAM: 18GB G.Skill 7-7-7-21 HDD1: 150GB WD Raptor HDD2: 1TB Fujitsu

Pros: After having this card for a little over a week now, I continue to be impressed. Since mine came with an R430 core and the correct fuse configuration, I was able to unlock the extra 4 pipes with ease. Using the ATITool v0.24, I boosted the core and ram speeds just a bit. So, 3DMark05 12 pipes, no OC = 4341 (correction from earlier post of 4143). 16 pipes, no OC = 4866. 16 pipes, 425 core, 550ram = 5122. No OC is 400 core and 490 ram, btw. Not only has the performance been boosted by almost 20%, my idle temps are the same (37-39°C) and my full load temps are only 5-7° higher (65-67°C). The ATITool also allows some fan speed tweaking so the card isn't nearly as noisy any more.

Cons: Be VERY CAREFUL when using the "Find Max Core" and "Find Max Mem" functions of ATITool. Neither worked properly for me causing lockup and/or major artifacting. Just don't walk away from your system while it's doing the tests in case you have the same issue I did. *doh* On the up side, the card recovered very, very well for me. :D

Overall Review: I'm using v6.5 of the driver and v0.24 of ATITool. v0.25 beta didn't work for me and probably isn't necessary unless you have a x1x00 card anyway. Again, my aging rig has a Asus P4P800-E Deluxe Mobo, Intel PIV 2.8GHz CPU, 512MB Corsair PC3200 RAM, Maxtor 120GB hard drive (primary drive), Seagate 8GB hard drive (for kicks and grins)