PowerColor Radeon HD 6770 PCS+ Vortex II Graphics Card Review

Being the first PowerColor card that we’ve received, we were unsure as to what to expect, as with all new products that you see for a first time. It’s not only the branding that we were unsure of, but the essence behind the card, which comes down to the cooler and the overall package when put together. The general design of the card is nothing short of being sexy and has some fantastic colouring that works perfectly with our testbed Asus Maximus IV Extreme-Z motherboard and Corsair Vengeance red coloured memory and is somewhat unique with the styling around the cooler.

Performance is typically what we expected for a budget to mid-range card and the slight overclocks allow for a little bit better performance when comparing against the older 5770 and 5830 Xtreme of which in the majority of tests, the 5830 Xtreme only nudged ahead ever so slightly which in our eyes means the card would have to pay off in other areas including price.

Adding to the overall value, the Dirt 3 coupon is a nice bonus and will allow you to install the card and start racing straight out of the box, but you will have to tinker with the settings, as we can’t expect maximum settings on this particular card.

Price is certainly a key feature of this card, as in our eyes, it’s a make or break situation but sadly PowerColor aren’t that big of a brand in the UK and thus not a lot of retail action is seen, and we wasn’t able to find it for sale anywhere on the net, but hopefully this will change in the near future. In the US however, the card is available for $129.99 from Newegg which is $20 more compared to their stock AX6770 which in our humble opinion is worth it when looking at the merits of the Vortex II cooler which allowed for lower temperatures and quieter operation and also remembering that for your money you get a much better looking cooler and a mix of four display connectors opposed to the standard three.

The bottom line is that while this card is good, it’s not perfect. It’s still very old technology when you compare it to the likes of some Nvidia cards on the market for around the same price based around the fresher, younger Fermi architecture. If AMD is your thing, then the card won’t let you down and will be perfect for light to medium gaming but don’t expect anything amazing when bumping up the resolution or quality settings, as the frame-rate will be hindered. It will also be useful in a HTPC scenario as it uses little power and remains inaudible throughout operation but we are left feeling a bit glum when you look at a Radeon 6850 only being slightly more expensive, but getting so much more GPU power for your money.