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(More customer reviews)The goal was actually pretty simple. With a donated micro-ATX case, power supply and Asus AM3 motherboard, build an inexpensive media PC that would use my 32" Samsung television as a monitor. I plugged this card into the PCI Express x16 slot and ran VGA to a 15" Dell monitor. Upon powering up the system for the first time, no video whatsoever was displayed. Tried again and I thought I did something wrong. Still no video. Decided to go on a hunch and plug it into my television's second HDMI output. Not only did it recognize the input, but self calibrated to 1280x720 resolution. I was able to install Windows 7 (64-bit) without a hitch. Flawless. Once I installed the video drivers, not only did it recognize and label my Samsung, but offered 3 more resolutions, of which I picked 1600x900. 1080p material would run compressed. I went to Youtube and a few sites that have some streaming 720p and 1080p video just to see what this card could render.
My system setup is fairly inexpensive, but extremely pleasant overall. It consists of:
ASUS M4N68T-N Socket AM3 motherboard
AMD Athlon II Regor Dual-Core CPU @ 3.0 GHz
A-DATA DDR3 4GB 1600 Overclocking 240-pin RAM (2GB x 2)
ASUS Nvidia GeForce 8400GS DDR2 video card (sound routed through the card)
ASUS 24x speed SATA DVD Burner
Using a streaming sample of Planet Earth about 13 minutes long, I set the video at 720p and I was thoroughly satisfied. I set it to 1080p and was blown away. I proceeded to use other high-def sample trailers like the upcoming Thor and Battle: Los Angeles along with some 720p Top Gear clips. With this setup, there were no hiccups, no chop, no buffering and no lag whatsoever. I'm not an overclocker by any stretch of the imagination, but this setup runs quality high-def video and graphic rendering like it's nobody's business. Plus, using this system for AutoCAD and Inventor drafting and design software, rendering images is smooth and vibrant.
Who would have imagined I'd get this much quality out of an inexpensive card? But then again, I've yet to run into bad ASUS product.If I'm getting this out of a DDR2 card, God help me when I upgrade...which may not be for a while!
...and since I have the PC version of Mass Effect lying around...
Click Here to see more reviews about: Asus nVidia GeForce 8400GS 512MB DDR2 VGA/DVI/HDMI Low Profile PCI-Express Video Card - EN8400GS/DI/512MD2(LP)
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