Bundle and presentation
The box reiterates all the tasty features that make up the ATI Radeon X1800 XL GPU. 256MB of fast GDDR3 memory, Avivo video-processing technology, and a healthy bundle that is required, considering the package's £290 price tag.
The back of the package goes into a little extra detail on the visual improvements that are brought along with ATI's R520 architecture. Gigabyte offers a limited 2-year warranty on this package which is consistent with the majority of other ATI card partners.
Software-wise, the bundle contained full versions of both Counter Strike: Condition Zero and Xpand Rally. Both are decent titles but not the triple-A standard required to make the bundle a genuine value-adding extra over and above Gigabyte's competitors. Handling the 2D elements is a full copy of CyberLink's PowerDirector 3DE and PowerDVD 6.0. Gigabyte does the right thing by including a PCIe-to-molex power adapter and enough cabling to get the most out of the card's VIVO features. However, there's only one DVI dongle included in the package. A second one, most likely to be unused, should still have been included, we feel.
The problem with Gigabyte's bundle is that it's no better (or worse, for that matter) than its competitors. Just how do you choose between, say, 3 competing cards from 3 AIB partners when the card appearance (reference) and bundle are essentially identical? There's nothing intrinsically bad about the bundle here, but, as mentioned, we could be looking at any one of five here, and other card partners have managed to include a similar deal at a lower retail price.
