Introduction

In recent weeks, ATI has continued to roll out its “Evergreen” Radeon HD 5 series range of DirectX 11 graphics cards. The Nvidia v. ATI rivalry that has existed in previous GPU ranges has been a non-starter with ATI able to set out its performance, mainstream and lower end segment cards without response from Nvidia. Indeed, the Fermi cards are not due to hit the markets until late March, six months on from ATI's headline act – the Radeon HD 5870.

The performance GPUs (5800 series and higher) make use of the Cypress chip architecture with the more mainstream cards using the smaller Juniper core. This mainstream segment of ATI's DirectX 11 range was filled with the joint launch of the HD 5770 and HD 5750. So what's the difference between the two 5700 cards? Effectively, the 5770 is the full-fat version of the Juniper chip making use of all ten of the SIMD cores with the 5750 trimmed down a little.

Today's review takes a look at the Sapphire Radeon HD 5770 to discover whether Juniper is able to deliver to the extent the Cypress chip was able to. Let's delve a little deeper...

Sapphire on the Radeon HD 5770

“Now, more people than ever can experience real innovation in DirectX® 11 gaming with ATI Radeon™ HD 5700 Series graphics processors. Loaded with advanced technology, these GPUs have the power and premium features you need for fully immersive gameplay. Expand your visual real estate across up to three displays and get lost in the action with revolutionary *ATI Eyefinity Technology. Using ATI Stream technology, accelerate even the most demanding applications and do more than ever with your PC.** The first GPUs in this class to offer full support for DirectX 11, these GPUs enable rich, realistic visuals and explosive HD gaming performance so you can dominate the competition.”

Features

• Microsoft DirectX® 11 Support
• ATI Eyefinity Technology(B.C.)
• ATI Stream Technology(A.E.)
• 40 nm Process Technology
• 1.36 TeraFlops Processing Power
• 800 Stream Processing Units
• Advanced GDDR5 Memory Technology
• 2nd Generation TeraScale Engine
• Microsoft Windows 7® Support (F.)
• ATI CrossFireX™ Technology (D.)
• Enhanced Anisotropic Filtering
• Accelerated Video Transcoding
• Display Flexibility, Supports DL-DVI, DP, HDMI and D-Sub
• HDMI 1.3
• Dolby® TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio™ Support
• ATI PowerPlay™ Technology8 – Enhanced Support for GDDR5 memory(E.)
• ATI Avivo™ Technology Enhanced Unified Video Decoder 2 (UVD 2)(E.)
• Supports OpenGL 3.2(G.)
• DXVA 1.0 & 2.0 Support

Specifications

• SKU Number: 21163-00
• I/O Output: Dual DL-DVI-I+DP+HDMI, Triple Display Support
• Core Clock: 850 MHz
• Memory Clock: Effective 4800 MHz
• PCI Express 2.1 x16 bus interface
• 1024MB /128bit GDDR5 memory interface
• Dual Slot Cooler with Auto Fan Control
• On-board HDMI, supports HDMI 1.3 with High Bitrate Audio
• On-board DisplayPort
• Maximum Board Power: 108 Watt; Idle Board Power: 18 Watt