Introduction

Only days ago we heard of an announcement by Palit that they will soon release their own HD 4870 X2 version. Today we bring you the full review. The Palit Revolution 700 Deluxe as it is called is the first graphics card to feature a triple slot cooling solution (at least as far as I know). Palit has also increased the clock speed on the memory to offset their new product even further from the competition's offerings. Another exclusive feature is the output configuration. The user can select from one DVI port, one DisplayPort, one HDMI port and one VGA output.

Packaging & Contents

The big package which features Palit's Green Frog mascot has the most important specs on the front in the red "Deluxe sticker" area. More details in multiple languages can be found on the back.



You will receive:

• Graphics card
• Documentation + Driver CD
• HDMI to DVI adapter

The Card

Palit's card is huge and weighs in at 1110 grams, which is just 100 grams more than the regular HD 4870 X2. The card is dominated by the two big temperature controlled fans. With a space requirement of three slots this is probably the biggest graphics card ever built (in terms of total volume occupied).


The card has one DVI port, one HDMI port, one DisplayPort and one analog VGA output. This is certainly one of the most flexible output configurations available today. On the other hand there are not many DisplayPort users yet, and I doubt many people are going to use this card with an analog VGA output. In case you need a second DVI output, you can use the included HDMI to DVI adapter. The HDCP output features the usual HDCP+Audio, which allows easy setup of a media PC.


Here are the front and the back of the card, high-res versions are also available (front, back). If you choose to use these images for voltmods etc, please include a link back to this site or let us post your article.

Disassembly

In the first step we removed the fan assembly which occupies the top most slot. You can clearly see the two fans which are controlled via a single fan output, which means that each fan's speed can not be optimized to its GPU's temperature.


After removal of the fan assembly you can see the two heatsink modules. Each one has two heatpipes and is dedicated to cool one RV770 graphics processor.


This metal plate came off the back and cools the eight memory chips on the back of the card.


After removal of the two heatsink modules you can see the two cores. Please note that Palit uses some sort of thermal epoxy on the cores. It took a lot of force to remove the heatsink modules. Also, it is almost impossible to clean up the hardened thermal compound if you don't have a good solvent cleaner. I used Arctic Silver Arctic Clean which worked like a charm.


The base of the cooler is made from copper to improve the heat transfer to the heatpipes and cooling fins.


As last step we removed this black metal plate from the front of the PCB. It cools the voltage regulation circuitry, the PCI-Express bridge chip and eight memory modules.