XFX Radeon HD 4890 1GB Video Card Review

Overclocking and Power Consumption

Knowing that the XFX Radeon HD 4890 is an excellent overclocker, we knew that we would be in for a treat when it came time to get busy with our card. Our XFX sample did not leave us disappointed!

I chose to use ATI Overdrive in the CATALYST Control Center, where we were able to max out the core clock speed at 1GHz! Memory also got a huge boost, all the way up to 1100MHz! These are a solid 150MHz on the core and 125MHz on the memory.

Power Consumption

For testing power consumption, we took our test system and plugged it into a Seasonic Power Angel. For idle numbers, we allowed the system to idle on the desktop for 15 minutes and took the reading. For load numbers, we measured the peak wattage used by the system while running 3DMark Vantage.

With the CPU overclocked we were using a bit more power at idle than would be used at stock settings. The XFX Radeon HD 4890 has a good power profile; at idle it’s able to keep un-needed power consumption in check. Under a gaming load it does use a bit of power but nothing to get worked up over.