Ive just switched to a new mATX case so I am wanting a new graphics card that is smaller than my current ATI X1900XT which is huge. Ive had this card for probably 3 years now and it has done me well. But it jsut takes up too much space in my new case and is a power hog. I am ideally looking for a card that matches it specs or that are better. I looked at a Gainward ATI Radeon HD4560 from here: Gainward ATI Radeon HD 4650 512MB DDR2 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail Though the RAM and clock speeds are slower than my current card which has a GPU clock speed of 625mhz and memory clock speed of 1425mhz. Saying that do these specs matter? as im guessing the card is 3 years younger than my current card so it will have a better achitecture etc? I am open to ideas for cards and I would love one with a silent fan or one that I can buy a silent fan for. I currently have a zalman cooler on my GFX card which I can transfer onto the new card I get if it supports it. I did see the HIS ATI Radeon HD 4650 here: HIS ATI Radeon HD 4650 Heatpipe Silent 512MB DDR2 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail Though I dont think it will fit into my Lian Li V350 case due to height restrictions. From what I can see its just might fit but its pure luck if it does. Does anyone know if it they have got this card into this case?
While clockspeeds are important, you also need to factor in how much work is done per clock cycle. If GPU1 runs at 300MHz and does 4 units of work per cycle and GPU 2 runs at 800MHz, but only does 1 unit per cycle, GPU1 should have better performance. In the same period of time, GPU 1 can do 1200 units versus the 800 units GPU 2 can, even though GPU2 runs slower than 1/2 the speed of GPU2. That's just an illustration, but clock speed isn't the best way to compare two different cards here. A lower-end card may run much faster than the high-end offering, but the high-end unit will blow it's slower counterpart away in performance. In short don't look at the clockspeed as they don't indicate how efficient the graphics chip is.
