PowerColor RX 7800 XT Hellhound Review

As impressed as we were with AMD's reference RX 7800 XT, the PowerColor RX 7800 XT Hellhound has improved on the MBA design quite significantly and is well worth looking at if you're in the market for one of these new graphics cards.

Thermal performance, for instance, is 13-16C lower with the Hellhound – depending which BIOS mode you opt for – while noise levels are also cut down to near-inaudible levels. In fact, the Silent BIOS spins the fans so slowly at just 720rpm, my sound meter hit the noise floor while testing – it's that quiet.

The addition of dual-BIOS is a strong value add too, and something I always like to see on a partner card. Not only do you get the choice between the OC and Silent modes, but it offers extra redundancy should something go wrong while flashing a new BIOS. Plenty of more expensive RTX 4070 custom cards don't have this feature, so that's a strong positive for the Hellhound 7800 XT.

Actual gaming performance is nothing to write home about, the card has a mild factory overclock and runs 2-3% faster than reference. It did overclock very well however, delivering further gains of 10-12%, even rivalling the RTX 4070 Ti in Cyberpunk 2077 and God of War.

The overall aesthetic of the card is pretty inoffensive. It has quite a flat-looking dark grey shroud, which is very colour-neutral but perhaps not the most exciting thing to look at, though I quite like the understated design. The main oddity for me around the looks is that LED toggle switch, as the Hellhound only lets you choose between blue or purple LEDs – there's no RGB here. It's certainly not the end of the world but in this day and age where almost everything offers you a choice of 16.8 million colours, having to pick between just two does feel a little strange.

At £520, the Hellhound comes in with a £40 – or 8% – price premium over the reference card, and it's still priced £50 lower than the cheapest RTX 4070s, while more premium models are well over £600. I personally think the improvements delivered by the Hellhound absolutely justify that 8% price increase and it's genuinely impressed me. We will have to wait and see until I can review more cards, but I think the Hellhound has set the bar very high for what an aftermarket 7800 XT can achieve.

We found the PowerColor RX 7800 XT Hellhound on pre-order for £519.99 from Ebuyer HERE.

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Pros

• Excellent thermal performance.
• Best noise-normalised thermals of the 4 cards we've tested.
• Near-silent operation.
• Overclocked very well (+10-12%).
• Relatively small price increase versus the reference card.
• Dual-BIOS.

Cons

• No RGB is a shame.
• RTX 4070 may be worth thinking about for those who highly value ray tracing, DLSS and efficiency.

KitGuru says: As partner cards go, the PowerColor Hellhound is a strong improvement over the reference design for just 8% more money. The phrase ‘no brainer' comes to mind.

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