Best PCI Express (PCIe) Card For £60: Tie
Radeon HD 6670 DDR3
Good 1680x1050 performance in most games
| Radeon HD 6670 DDR3 | |
|---|---|
| Codename: | Turks |
| Process: | 40 nm |
| Universal Shaders: | 480 |
| Texture Units: | 24 |
| ROPs: | 8 |
| Memory Bus: | 128-bit |
| Core Speed MHz: | 800 |
| Memory Speed MHz: | 800 (1600 effective) |
| DirectX/Shader Model: | DX 11/SM 5.0 |
| Max TDP: | 66 W |
We're really sad to see the Radeon HD 5670 evaporating from retail. Although it's true that the Radeon HD 6670 DDR3 has a more capable GPU featuring a 25 MHz-faster core clock, four more texture units, and 80 additional shader cores, the 5670 wields more than two times the memory bandwidth thanks to its 1 GHz GDDR5 subsystem.
Nevertheless, without any significant competition, the Radeon HD 6670 DDR3 assumes our £60 recommendation.
GeForce GT 440 GDDR5
Exceptional 1680x1050 performance in most games, 1920x1200 in most games with lowered detail
| GeForce GT 440 GDDR5 | |
|---|---|
| Codename: | GF108 |
| Process: | 40 nm |
| Universal Shaders: | 96 |
| Texture Units: | 16 |
| ROPs: | 4 |
| Memory Bus: | 128-bit |
| Core/Shader Speed MHz: | 810 / 1620 |
| Memory Speed MHz: | 800 (3200 effective) |
| DirectX/Shader Model: | DX 11/SM 4.0 |
| Max TDP: | 65 W |
Now that the GDDR5-equipped Radeon HD 5670 is all but gone, the GDDR5 flavor of the GeForce GT 440 is a viable alternative to the Radeon HD 6670 DDR3. While the GF108 GPU is weaker than AMD's Turks graphics processor, Nvidia's board sports two times as much memory bandwidth thanks to its GDDR5 memory, and that helps performance a lot.
Eh? You can still buy these... Shouldn't the Best PCIe Card For ~£170 still be the 6950?