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Competing
in the video card market is much like swimming in school
of sharks. Each manufacturer has the potential to
pack a potent punch, but the slightest sign of weakness
can quickly incite a feeding frenzy. We?ve seen it
time and again. S3 released the Savage 2000, which
was inhibited by shoddy drivers and 3dfx?s promising
Voodoo5 family succumbed to the GeForce2. Hercules
encountered a similar predicament back in 1999, only
Hercules? problem was financial rather than technological.
Guillemot quickly purchased the struggling company and
turned it into a multimedia powerhouse. Even with
Guillemot?s help however, Hercules has still encountered a
few tense situations.
After
adopting the Kyro II into its value-oriented lineup (and
besting the GeForce2 MX in the process), Hercules had
upset NVIDIA, and the damage to their relationship was
beyond repair. Hercules made the transition away
from NVIDIA, and is now using ATI?s RADEON processors to
fuel its high-end 3D Prophet family. The 3D Prophet
8500 128MB utilizes ATI?s current flagship GPU, coupled
with 128MB of DDR memory and ATI?s Rage Theater video
in/out chip.
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Specifications and Features of the
3D Prophet 8500 |
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VGA, DVI, and
TV-Out |
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RADEON
8500
- 275MHz GPU
- VGA, TV In/Out, DV
- 256-bit Graphics
Accelerator
DirectX
8.1 Support:
- Truform
- Smartshader
- Charisma Engine II
- Pixel Tapestry II
Smoothvision Anti-aliasing Engine:
- Programmable
multi-sampling
- Also supports
super-sampling
TV Out
Jack:
- On-board TV-out
support both composite and S-video.
Cooling
solution:
- On-board active
heat-sink cooling fan
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Specifications:
- Controller: RADEON
8500
- Bus Type AGP
- Memory 128MB DDR
- Core Clock 275MHz
- Memory Clock 550MHz
DDR memory
- Dual RAMDAC 400MHz
- API Support
Direct-X, Open GL ICD for Windows
- Connectors VGA, DVI,
TV In/Out
Features at a Glance:
- AGP 4x compatible
with fast writes
- 256-bit 3D and 2D
graphics accelerator
- ATI Hydravision
multi-monitor support
- HyperZ II
- Smoothvision
Anti-aliasing
- Video Immersion II
- TV Out connector
- DVI connector
Package
Contains:
- 3D Prophet 8500
video card
- Driver CD
(Contains Software Driver, ATI Multimedia Center &
user's manual)
- 3Deep
- PowerDVD
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The 3D
Prophet 8500 is very similar to ATI?s own reference card.
However, there are distinct differences that indicate
Hercules has made their own enhancements. In terms
of cooling, the card features a large heat sink and fan
combination (in Hercules' signature blue color) along with
RAM sinks covering the 16MB BGA modules. A thin
layer of thermal adhesive is applied between the heat sink
and RADEON 8500 processor, to ensure proper heat transfer.
Whereas the RADEON 8500LE is set to operate at 250MHz, the
3D Prophet 8500 is set at a more aggressive 275MHz core
frequency. The memory is clocked synchronously, also
at 275MHz.
Hercules
opted for a sparse bundle, likely with the intention of
keeping the price competitive with other RADEON 8500
boards on the market. We can certainly appreciate
that strategy. However, it would have been nice if
Hercules had included a full set of cables, like ATI.
It should also be noted that the version of PowerDVD
included with the 3D Prophet 8500, only supports
two-channel output. So if you have a Dolby Digital
system, you'll want to find another DVD application.
Screen Shots, Overclocking, and
Drivers
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