Closer Look: HIS HD 4770 Graphics Card

The first thing you’ll probably notice from instantly looking at this graphics card is just how short it is. But this is good, it means users will not have difficulties getting the HD4770 installed in their system and it’s likely to run a little quieter than cards with full size coolers.

Much like most ATI graphics cards, the HIS 4770 too has a bright red PCB. Although the colour of the PCB is hardly the most important thing to note, I do like the fact that ATI try to separate their cards from Nvidia with their shiny red colour scheme – much like their logo.

Now the cards heatsink and fan, I know what you’re going to say, “Isn’t that the reference ATI 4770 cooler design”? You’re correct, it is. However, to be fair, if you quickly Google ‘4770’ you’ll see other manufacturers using the same design: ASUS, MSI, GigaByte, Sapphire and ATI to name a few…It seems this was the cooler ATI decided to use on all the first editions of the 4770 so they could quickly get it out on sale. Some of the newer 4770’s now come with different heatsink designs. But I can assure you, there is no problem in using this one, you’ll probably find it’s more effective and quieter than the newer heatsink and fan combinations.

Beneath the heatsink and surrounding the RV740 GPU are the memory chips. Made by Qimonda, these memory chips total 512mb and run at a stock speed of 800 MHz (3.2 GHz effective). Moreover, the memory is GDDR5 rather than the GDDR3 all Nvidia cards and many Radeons use. This gives the HD4770 a slight advantage. However, with only a 128-bit memory interface, the HIS 4770 is limited to just 51.2GB/s memory bandwidth. But then again, the 9800GT only has a 9.6GB/s advantage.

The main heart and USP of the HD4770 is of course the GPU. Clocked at 750 MHz on 640 Stream processors, the RV740 GPU that this card boasts certainly packs punch. Plenty of power for a good price too, in fact, just £70. This is made possible by the 40nm process used to produce this graphics card; it keeps costs lower whilst still offering great performance at a much lower power consumption rate.

Flipping the HD4770 over to the rear PCB you can see that the cooler is attached to the graphics card using four screws. Some other holes are also evident on the PCB; these can be used to install a different cooler should you wish to.

Due to the increasing popularity of multiple graphics card setups, HIS has been kind enough to provide support for the card’s use in Quad CrossFire X configurations as well as normal CrossFire. For games which support this technology, you should experience a hefty boost in frame rates.

Powering the card is a single 6-pin connector. As mentioned in the Features and Specifications, the HIS HD4770 only needs 80W of power. Therefore, a 450W PSU will happily power it.

In terms of video outputs there are dual DVI connections as well as one Composite Video-Out. If your monitor doesn’t support DVI or you want the horsepower pumped through HDMI, you can use one of the VGA or HDMI adapters included.