14 DAY TRIAL // It can hardly be said that the past months have suffered from a shortage of unusual inventions, especially with mention of cement flash drives and superdisks 1,000 times more capacious than Blu-ray. Even the Hydra 200 SoC, which lets AMD and NVIDIA cards work together, became popular enough to warrant a trip to the mainstream. Few things, though, could have prepared the industry for what this year's Computex expo will bring, especially a certain pair of upcoming video cards from PowerColor.
Though it already has an extensive collection of DirectX 11-capable graphics cards, PowerColor decided it was time to think outside the box. This led to the spawning of a pair of products that are and aren't video boards.
Known as the Radeon HD 5770 Evolution and HD 5770 Sniper, the two newcomers do more than just feed a screen with video. The HD 5770 Sniper is unusual through the fact that it actually comes with its own network processing unit (NPU), developed by Bigfoot Networks.
This NPU, assisted by the Advanced Game Detect technology, can classify network traffic, giving a higher priority to network games, for a more fluid gaming experience. The Evolution, however, can be considered even stranger because it features the Hydra Engine, similar to what MSI used on its motherboards.
As curious, and unlikely, as that sounds, that is what PowerColor built, an ATI Radeon HD 5770 graphics card with on-board Hydra Engine. Basically, this card will be able to join forces with any GPU, not just from AMD but also from NVIDIA, without the need for extra connectors. According to the official announcement, CrossfireX, 2-way SLI and 3-way SLI configurations are supported. It is unclear how the hardware maker implemented this, but the board itself should prove to be an interesting buy all the same.
Unfortunately, the company chose to leave its fan base in the dark when it came to clock speeds, amount of memory, pricing and availability. Still, Computex is not far off, which means that only a small amount of patience is needed.