AMD debuts dirt cheap ATI Radeon HD 4550, HD 4350 graphics cards

NVIDIA managed to generate quite a bit of interest with its $59 GeForce 9400 GT graphics card, and it looks like rival AMD is now taking things one step further with not one but two cards that are even cheaper. Those include the $55 ATI Radeon HD 4550 and the $39 ATI Radeon HD 4350, which pack 512MB and 256MB of memory, respectively, along with some other surprisingly not too shabby specs. Namely, each card packs DirectX 10.1 support, an HDMI port with support for 7.1 channel audio, upscaling "beyond 1080p," and even support for ATI's CrossFireX technology in case you want to pair two of them up. As usual, you can expect the cards to be available from a whole host of different manufacturers, at least some of which should have cards available by October, if not sooner.

[Via bit-tech.net]

[kyle @ Sep 30th 2008 2:25PM]

Looks like its time to upgrade from my x850xt

[aznofazns @ Sep 30th 2008 2:30PM]

neither of these cards will show any real improvement over an x850xt except for dx10.1 and hdmi.

[RikF @ Sep 30th 2008 2:43PM]

I've currently got an X800 - any idea on the level of improvement I might see with one of these?

[WhyFi @ Sep 30th 2008 2:50PM]

And SM3, and it's probably more efficient, more quiet. I just replaced my wife's 800XL with a 4670 - in her small form factor case, it's been fantastic - temps and noise levels have dropped significantly.

[Chris @ Oct 1st 2008 10:09AM]

Don't waste your money. I just picked up an EVGA 9600GSO from newegg for $50 after rebate. I used to have an X800XL. It bumped my 3DMark06 score from ~800 to well over 7000.

[Mr_Armageddon @ Sep 30th 2008 2:27PM]

The passively cooled variant of the HD 4550 could just be the perfect HTPC video card. And for only $55, why not?

[Knives_Out @ Sep 30th 2008 5:18PM]

yea .. love it. I'm picking one up for sure.

[timmy @ Sep 30th 2008 2:29PM]

On a scale of 1 to 10 how do these cards rank compared to their highest end gamer cards? Their naming scheme always befuddles me.

[disciple83 @ Sep 30th 2008 2:49PM]

from highest to lowest:

4870 X2 2GB
4870 1GB
4850 1GB
4850 512MB
4670 512MB
4650 512MB
4550
4350

I'm guessing the higher numbered 3K series may even be better than these things, kinda like the RADEON 9600 PRO was way better than the 9800Pro IMO. Hope that helps.

[WhyFi @ Sep 30th 2008 2:53PM]

3870 is better than the 4670, but not by a huge margin.

[frauhottelmann @ Sep 30th 2008 2:58PM]

I guess you mean that the 9500Pro was better than 9600Pro but definitely not the way you wrote it!

[Aguiluz @ Oct 23rd 2008 1:09PM]

I pwn you all with my ATI Radeon 9550!

Oh, wait...

[kartofeln @ Sep 30th 2008 2:35PM]

"at least some of which should have cards available by October, if not sooner"

For some crazy reason I'm willing to take the bet they wont be out before October... Anyone else see these cards coming out within the next 10 hours?

[disciple83 @ Sep 30th 2008 2:41PM]

well crap, now I have to step up to PCI-X...and my AGP X1650 has served me so well for so long too

[Locke @ Sep 30th 2008 2:50PM]

There is actually a difference between PCI-X and PCI Express...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pci-x

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI-Express

[disciple83 @ Sep 30th 2008 2:54PM]

One thing at a time, I'm on a budget :-D

[ethana2 @ Sep 30th 2008 3:04PM]

Don't bother yourself with PCI-X.

Just don't.

[Crashtheholy @ Sep 30th 2008 3:18PM]

You can or..
you can buy a hd3850 for $140
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102730
or a little less powerful hd3650 for $80
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E1681410276

[looseinthedeuce @ Sep 30th 2008 2:45PM]

I picked up a 2600xt in April as an HTPC card for around $55-$60. It was basically the cheapest card that did AVC and VC-1 on the card. I'd always gone with nVidia, but I can say this was the perfect card for me. No slack at all playing HD content.

[brian @ Sep 30th 2008 2:53PM]

Hopefully some of the oem's will pick these up in place of onboard graphics. Discrete graphics would make their

[WhyFi @ Sep 30th 2008 2:56PM]

ATi's 780G chipsets (integrated graphics) are actually pretty decent.

[Laughing Man @ Sep 30th 2008 3:44PM]

Decent? The 780G and now 780GX vastly out perform per watt any intergated chipset. To get a chipset with better video would cost you enough to justify just buying a dedicated card.

[bradwjensen @ Sep 30th 2008 2:58PM]

Hm.. Does anyone know if these will work well with Compiz-Fusion, or where I can find that information out?

Thanks

[ethana2 @ Sep 30th 2008 3:05PM]

It'll work great, ATi is amazing. Within a year you won't even need to install a driver for it.

[Pfanne @ Sep 30th 2008 4:27PM]

well compiz does work, but you will have problems with videos and 3d games...
if everything goes right and xserver 1.6 is out by end of this year ( and i kind of doubt that) dri2 will be out and hopefully supported in the following release of the fglrx driver...

[TareX @ Sep 30th 2008 3:04PM]

It's dirt cheap for a reason. As usual, all the R&D was done by Nvidia.

[ethana2 @ Sep 30th 2008 3:06PM]

Pssh, whatever. The 48xx chip family is more advanced than anything nVidia's got out there.

If, say, they started failing left and right in notebooks, I'd consider your point of view a possibility.

[TareX @ Sep 30th 2008 3:08PM]

I'm not complaining. If anything, I'm waiting for the day ATI makes its Tegra-equivalent.

[dotAaron @ Sep 30th 2008 3:10PM]

Ha, yeah right! Go away fanboy :P

[ishism @ Oct 1st 2008 10:46AM]

I'd thought you guys would recognize TrollX by now.

[Justin @ Sep 30th 2008 3:11PM]

I just wonder what the performance would be if it weren't for the 64-bit memory bus.

With 128 (or 256), it isn't inconceivable to think these cards would be pretty solid, is it?

[dcoaster @ Sep 30th 2008 3:34PM]

Quick question to the gurus:

I have a ATI X1650 Pro 512MB right now. Would getting one of these be a big improvement over my current card? How much more power would it need? I'm using a Dell E510 with a 305watt PSU.

[Justin @ Sep 30th 2008 4:00PM]

Nah dcoaster, your current card is on par (or above) these models. Even if you have a crippled x1650 variant, it's still going to be about the same. It isn't worth your investment.

[Jonny @ Sep 30th 2008 4:08PM]

The 4550 would be a pretty decent improvement, and it actually uses less power than the 1650 Pro.

[iofthestorm @ Oct 23rd 2008 8:09PM]

I think Justin is wrong actually, the x1650 is 3 generations out of date, and I think even something like the 4550 would be twice as fast or more, although I wouldn't buy anything cheaper than the 4650 personally since the difference between the 4550 and 4650 is pretty significant.

[Kizorblade @ Sep 30th 2008 3:36PM]

Here's a review for all of you people:

http://www.guru3d.com/article/ati-radeon-hd-4550-512mb-review/

[MojoKid @ Sep 30th 2008 3:52PM]

And another here: http://hothardware.com/Articles/ATI-Radeon-HD-4550-Budget-DX101-GPU/

Thanks

[Vinh @ Sep 30th 2008 5:54PM]

does anyone know if i had outputted the video to my tv, would it be possible to send the sound from my pc to my tv?

[WhyFi @ Sep 30th 2008 7:00PM]

Via HDMI, yes.

[slowerpig81 @ Sep 30th 2008 7:05PM]

If you use HDMI, it says there is 7.1 sound support. Otherwise, you could just put a connector that goes from the 3.5mm jack in your sound card or motherboard to RCA jacks (L&R). Some sound cards and mobos have S/PDIF out also. (Thats optical out)

[Mark @ Sep 30th 2008 6:16PM]

Say, I've got a Geforce 7600GT with 256MB onboard. Will one of these cards show a marked improvement over the 7600GT in games? (read: Make Crysis playable...) I'd purchase something in the $150 range, but the economy is killing me.

[zenstylejunglist @ Sep 30th 2008 6:27PM]

Probably. The 7000 series don't cut it anymore. These are like two generations ahead of the 7's, but I doubt you'll get good performance in Crysis either way, maybe with two of em. Two of these would for sure be perfect for a nice htpc.

BTW, what's up with everyone being so nice on Engadget lately? It's like a hippie love fest up in here.

[Juan @ Sep 30th 2008 9:49PM]

I don't think so. From looking at Wikipedia, the 7600GT looks to have higher fill rates.

I've got a 7600GT, too, and I'm not upgrading to one of these. Save up for an 8800GT - they're around $100.

[g8trtim @ Sep 30th 2008 6:23PM]

Real question is if they can do 1366x768 yet

[zenstylejunglist @ Sep 30th 2008 6:29PM]

Yeah...ok? they can do like 1900x1200 @ least.

[zenstylejunglist @ Sep 30th 2008 6:30PM]

What an obscure res.

[zenstylejunglist @ Sep 30th 2008 6:31PM]

Get yourself a tv with a real resolution j/k :D

[TheMarioKarters @ Sep 30th 2008 6:35PM]

Hey guys,

I've an ATI Radeon HD 3870.

Is it worth upgrading to one of these?

Thanks.

[Ihar `Philips` Filipau @ Sep 30th 2008 6:59PM]

No. This are not gaming cards. It can accel video/etc desktop stuff, but probably Pipes screen saver is only what the card is capable 3D-wise.

3870 performance-wise is between 4670 and 4850. It should be "good enough" gaming video for about one more year.

[ssrat_ @ Oct 1st 2008 6:14AM]

Same here, it LOOKS like I will pick up another 3870, for Xfire I'm just wondering when there will be a price cut and if so when.
A single slot 3870 is about $120 new, but if a 4550 of only $55 then it SHOULD drop the others (hopefully)

The 48's just came out WAY to fast for me (3mths?) and since they are not compatible with the 38's I will have to stop myself from buying them until this time next year when the FULL DX11 cards makeit to the shelves