14 DAY TRIAL // AMD has once again refreshed its lineup of DirectX 11 graphics solutions with its introduction of the Radeon HD 5450 card. While the Radeon HD 5670 will be covering the mainstream segment, this latest addition will cater to the needs of entry-level systems for HD media and DirectX 11 features. Naturally, as it is customary after AMD or NVIDIA launch a product, other hardware manufacturers are releasing cards of their own. MSI has just launched a pair of customized HD 5450 graphics adapters, known as the R5450-MD1GH and R5450-MD512H.
In addition to DirectX 11, the new models have built-in support for the ATI AVIVO HD technology. This feature set makes them excellent for HTPC users and any kind of multimedia applications, even while their power consumption is actually lower than that of previous-generation cards, such as the HD 4550. The R5450-MD1GH and R5450-MD512H are based on the Cedar graphics processing unit and use a black PCB, with 80 stream processors and a GPU clock of 650MHz. The two models have 512MB and 1GB of memory, respectively, with a clock set at 1600MHz.
The DirectX 11 gaming standard provides this entry-level solution with 3D gaming capabilities. In parallel, the AVIVO HD and UVD 2.0 video technologies process video content very smoothly, without consuming too much of the PC's resources. As such, these last two ATI exclusive features make HD movie playback easy. In addition, the cards consume such a low amount of power that they can be passively cooled. As such, they are totally silent, making them an excellent choice for home-theater personal computers, especially considering the native HDMI connectivity that can deliver video to any LCD TV or display device that supports this interface.
In addition to HDMI, the two video boards also boast DVI and D-Sub connectors. Both the 512GB and the 1GB versions are said to become available very soon, with the latter already listed at only 57 Euro.