To be fair to the HD7850 IceQ X it is an aging card and 'only' comes with 1GB. There are however 2GB versions available which in fairness would no doubt compete more favourably to the GTX650Ti BOOST. Clearly though, the HIS HD7850 can still holds its own when performance is compared to newer entry level GPUs. We have a 4GB version of the HIS HD7850 IceQ coming up soon so if the results today are anything to go by, the HD7850 with 4GB may well be the card to go for.

The design of the card was a little odd, with the shroud overhanging the PCB for no apparent reason other than aesthetics which if we are being honest, looked a little cheap with the chrome surround fan. Acoustics were however good and temperatures among the best we have tested at this price point so clearly, there is method to the madness.



The HIS HD7850 IceQ X stands between the HD7790 and NVIDIA GTX650Ti BOOST. When we first reviewed the GTX650Ti people still claimed the HD7850 was the faster card and while this is still true, it is not the best performing card. Sure it is slightly faster in terms of raw power when churning out raw FPS figures in many games but we feel the NVIDIA card gave us better fluid gameplay, a feeling that was reinforced by our frametime analysis results.

Value for money has to go to the HIS HD7790 however, this card struggles when filtering is applied so we would reserve this recommendation to those who are on a strict budget and only use for basic, no frills gaming. All three cards struggled with Crysis 3, none of them managing over 30FPS. We wouldn't recommend any of these cards if that is the one game you want to play most.

To summarise:
The HIS HD7850 IceQ X is still a good graphics card. While newer cards are on the market, the HD7850 is still a very good entry/mid level buy and as long as you don't expect huge FPS, you won't be too disappointed.