HIS Excalibur X600 XT VIVO Edition

Overclocking

Overclocking the HIS X600 XT was more fun than anything because of the freedom it gave us! While we did not receive as high of an overclock as other sites, we did receive a notable increase in performance from a 100% stable overclock. When only overclocking the core, we reached 533Mhz, which is up from the default of 500 Mhz. When only overclocking the memory, we increased to 425Mhz (850Mhz DDR), which is up from 378Mhz (756Mhz DDR). Finally, when overclocking both the core and the memory, we were stable at 528Mhz on the core and 423Mhz (846Mhz DDR) on the memory. All overclocking was done using ATI Tool 0.0.23 as seen in the screenshot below.

Conclusion

Justin’s Thoughts:

As we have stated, the HIS X600 XT video card has been around for a little while now and there are lots of mid-range cards available for competition. However, I would like to point out a few things that make the HIS implementation of the X600 XT stand out.

First of all, HIS has seemed to have picked some high-quality parts to use in the manufacturing process because I have seen nothing but positive feedback from other reviews around the web (especially in the overclocking area), and I must this review is not much different for it being a mid-range card. This card was indeed a great overclocker with a 45Mhz increase in memory and a 28Mhz increase on the core.

As far as performance of the HIS X600 XT goes, it performs slightly better than expected by significantly out-performing its AGP counter-part: the 9600XT. While one my have a hard time playing Doom 3 with any increase in eye-candy, this card seemed to have no trouble handling other big titles like Half-Life 2 and Far Cry v1.3.

I must also note that HIS’ bundle allows for all the features of this VIVO edition card to be used to its fullest. So no worries on not being able to buy this card and start copying your VHS tapes to your hard drive!

A major concern you may have if you are interested in this card would be availability in the US. HIS has been slowly introducing its product lines in America for a little over a year now, but a quick search on Dealtime did not yield a match with this HIS X600 XT VIVO Card.

Legit Bottom Line:

If you are looking for a mid-range card with VIVO functionality for your new PCI-E based system, this HIS X600 XT will not disappoint with its higher than expected performance at an affordable price-point. However, American readers may have a hard time finding this card.