Page 3: Overclocking and Conclusion
<B>Overclocking</B>:
This card's performance was much improved after I overclocked it. With such low stock core and memory speeds, you get some nice performance gains. 414/267 (534 MHz DDR) was the top that I achieved. That is a huge increase in the core speed. In fact, the core is the major bottleneck in terms of speed. By just increasing the core, I had much higher scores. Increasing the memory had an effect as well, but was minimal compared to the core adjustment. Anyway, I reran the benchmarks and they did improve.
UT2K4:
<table width="100%"><tr><td>Resolution</td><td>HIS 9550 VIVO</td><td>9550 OC</td></tr>
<tr><td>1024x768
1280x1024
1600x1200</td><td>67.67
44.11
44.11</td><td>85.15
63.16
63.08</td></tr></table>
Far Cry:
<table width="100%"><tr><td>Resolution</td><td>HIS 9550 VIVO</td><td>9550 OC</td></tr>
<tr><td>1024x768
1280x1024
1600x1200</td><td>19.53
13.13
13.27</td><td>27.21
18.72
18.97</td></tr></table>
3D Mark 2K1:
<table width="100%"><tr><td>Resolution</td><td>HIS 9550 VIVO</td><td>9550 OC</td></tr>
<tr><td>1024x768</td><td>7612</td><td>9970</td></tr></table>
If you can overclock the card this much, it's well worth it. The core alone increased by 66% from stock speed, simply amazing. I mean, if you really think about it, it's because the card is clocked very low to begin with, but hey, you take what you can get.
<B>Conclusion</B>:
The <a href="http://www.hisdigital.com">HIS</a> 9550 VIVO is <a href="http://ase.dealtime.com/dt-app/SE/KW-9550/FD-0/linkin_id-3002062/NS-1/GS.html">priced around $99</a>. For this price, you can get a number of other cards that may suit your needs just fine. This particular card is not for avid gamers, or even the moderate gamer. It is for the multimedia junkie or the amateur digital filmmaker. For those types of tasks, the card is perfect. The bundle with the card will support all the functions you could want, and for the price it is a fairly good deal. Like I said, if you're a gamer, look elsewhere. If not, this card is worth the C-note. Now, <a href="http://www.hisdigital.com/html/retailer.htm#america">let's see if you could at least find the card for sale somewhere, because I couldn't</a>!
I'd like to thank Peter at <a href="http://www.hisdigital.com">HIS</a> for sending the card for review.
This card's performance was much improved after I overclocked it. With such low stock core and memory speeds, you get some nice performance gains. 414/267 (534 MHz DDR) was the top that I achieved. That is a huge increase in the core speed. In fact, the core is the major bottleneck in terms of speed. By just increasing the core, I had much higher scores. Increasing the memory had an effect as well, but was minimal compared to the core adjustment. Anyway, I reran the benchmarks and they did improve.
UT2K4:
<table width="100%"><tr><td>Resolution</td><td>HIS 9550 VIVO</td><td>9550 OC</td></tr>
<tr><td>1024x768
1280x1024
1600x1200</td><td>67.67
44.11
44.11</td><td>85.15
63.16
63.08</td></tr></table>
Far Cry:
<table width="100%"><tr><td>Resolution</td><td>HIS 9550 VIVO</td><td>9550 OC</td></tr>
<tr><td>1024x768
1280x1024
1600x1200</td><td>19.53
13.13
13.27</td><td>27.21
18.72
18.97</td></tr></table>
3D Mark 2K1:
<table width="100%"><tr><td>Resolution</td><td>HIS 9550 VIVO</td><td>9550 OC</td></tr>
<tr><td>1024x768</td><td>7612</td><td>9970</td></tr></table>
If you can overclock the card this much, it's well worth it. The core alone increased by 66% from stock speed, simply amazing. I mean, if you really think about it, it's because the card is clocked very low to begin with, but hey, you take what you can get.
<B>Conclusion</B>:
The <a href="http://www.hisdigital.com">HIS</a> 9550 VIVO is <a href="http://ase.dealtime.com/dt-app/SE/KW-9550/FD-0/linkin_id-3002062/NS-1/GS.html">priced around $99</a>. For this price, you can get a number of other cards that may suit your needs just fine. This particular card is not for avid gamers, or even the moderate gamer. It is for the multimedia junkie or the amateur digital filmmaker. For those types of tasks, the card is perfect. The bundle with the card will support all the functions you could want, and for the price it is a fairly good deal. Like I said, if you're a gamer, look elsewhere. If not, this card is worth the C-note. Now, <a href="http://www.hisdigital.com/html/retailer.htm#america">let's see if you could at least find the card for sale somewhere, because I couldn't</a>!
I'd like to thank Peter at <a href="http://www.hisdigital.com">HIS</a> for sending the card for review.