Sapphire Radeon HD 4850 X2 Video Card Review

Retail Box and Bundle

The first thing I noticed about the box from Sapphire, other than the attractive caricature of Ruby of course, was the beautiful color that adorns the top and bottom of the carton. Changing from blue to purple and back, the box is certainly eye-catching in the right light.

On the back of the box, we find another picture of Ruby and the Product Highlights, along with a list of what’s bundled inside the box.

Product Highlights:

• Dual GPU Technology
• PCIE Version 2.0
• Microsoft DX10.1
• Shader Model 4.1
• HD Video Decoding
• 7.1 Surround Audio Support

The list of what’s “In the Box!” is a bit misleading, as this is one of the best bundles I’ve encountered recently. Inside I found the user’s manual, DVI to VGA adapter, DVI to HDMI adapter, S-Video Adapter, component breakout cable, CrossFire Bridge, Driver CD, Ruby Rom, PowerDVD and DVD Suite CDs from CyberLink, 3DMark Vantage (benchmarking software) from FutureMark, and power adapters to be sure you have both the 6 pin and 8 pin adapters necessary to power the card, assuming you have a few spare molex plugs.

The only thing missing from the bundle is a full retail game… but finding a single title to make all gamers happy would be virtually impossible. The inclusion of the DVD software from CyberLink and FutureMark’s 3DMark Vantage is a nice touch as this is more likely to be used than some genre specific game title. Well done Sapphire, well done.