GPU Sapphire Pulse RX570 ITX 4GB - Ongoing impressions

confusis

John Morrison. Founder and Team Leader of SFF.N
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@TheHig asked me in the "Show your new toys" topic for a short review on the Sapphire Pulse RX570 ITX 4GB card. This is kind of that, kind of an evolving thread outlining my thoughts on the card.

From the thread;
----
I bought this one as in NZ it sat at the 1050 TI price range but with a reported 55% better perf according to UserBenchmark.

There's a bit of a wattage jump but 50% perf increase is not to be sniffed at - especially when NVIDIA's next model up, the 1060 3GB, at 11% faster than the RX570, comes in at NZ$410 vs the NZ$250 I paid for the 570.
---

First thoughts;
Solid build quality (I've always had great experiences with Sapphire cards, having owned.. 10.. 15.. 20.. a LOT over the years). Taller than a normal PCIe card - time will tell if it fits in its intended home.

Fanless mode - not advertised, mightily confused me! The card has a fanless mode up to 55c or thereabouts - a bonus unadvertised feature. No mention on the product page or on the website - a shame as this is an awesome feature. Loading the card up with Furmark, it maxed at a HWMonitor reported max of 120W and 70C (ambient of 22). The fan is so much better than the Gigabyte "ITX" card fans (I'm looking at you R9-370) - no whining, just a subtle whirr. The quietest fan equipped GPU I've tested, ever, under Furmark load.

Performance Results? Well, as much as I'm happy with my testing, the results at GPUBenchmark (linked above) are collated from hundreds of test samples - much more reliable than 2-3 tests on my one system :) In time I'll update with game perf though - just waiting on my case to arrive from Taiwan ;)
 

TheHig

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Oct 13, 2016
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Thanks for this! Personal experience and causal reviews are very interesting to me. Word of mouth from trusted sources is the best marketing ever IMO.

HUGE oversight by Sapphire not mentioning the fan off feature! We need to contact them on this. Especially when many SFF cases are desktop design statements as well as workhorse machines sitting at arms length from the user.

Silent light computing is a must for me these days.
 
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rfarmer

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Jul 7, 2017
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I have a XFX RX550 I am using in my HTPC, mainly for the HDMI 2.0 support. Realized after buying it that it has a 0 fan mode, which is absolutely perfect for a HTPC build. I am surprised they don't advertise this feature more.
 
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confusis

John Morrison. Founder and Team Leader of SFF.N
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Update: In gaming, the fan isn't the quietest - although is about on par with any 92/100mm fan GPU i've used thus far (excepting the whiny b***h Gigabyte R7-360)

Performance is as expected, meaning that at WQHD, I can run SEUS shaders in Minecraft above 30 FPS :D
 

InfernoZeus

SFF Lingo Aficionado
May 23, 2017
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I've got the same card. Before the Vega 56 Nano from PowerColor, this was the best AMD ITX option available here in Europe. As @confusis mentioned, it's not the quietest card when gaming, but that's to be expected when dealing with the smaller heatsink/fan combos.

I haven't done any benchmarking though. Perhaps I should have a go..
 

TheHig

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Interested to see some undervolt results too.

Wattman is so much nicer these days than say a year ago.
 

CC Ricers

Shrink Ray Wielder
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Nov 1, 2015
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Technically there is a RX 580 in ITX form... but.. it's in a Gaming Box enclosure. And with it comes the oversized fan that some people have issues with. The 570 still is the far better value, especially with the used market for them.
 

confusis

John Morrison. Founder and Team Leader of SFF.N
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My fan bearing just failed. RMA time :|
EDIT: Before this reflects on reliability of the model - remember this was a "refurbished" card :p
 
Last edited:

randog311

Efficiency Noob
Jul 21, 2019
6
0
@TheHig asked me in the "Show your new toys" topic for a short review on the Sapphire Pulse RX570 ITX 4GB card. This is kind of that, kind of an evolving thread outlining my thoughts on the card.

From the thread;
----
I bought this one as in NZ it sat at the 1050 TI price range but with a reported 55% better perf according to UserBenchmark.

There's a bit of a wattage jump but 50% perf increase is not to be sniffed at - especially when NVIDIA's next model up, the 1060 3GB, at 11% faster than the RX570, comes in at NZ$410 vs the NZ$250 I paid for the 570.
---

First thoughts;
Solid build quality (I've always had great experiences with Sapphire cards, having owned.. 10.. 15.. 20.. a LOT over the years). Taller than a normal PCIe card - time will tell if it fits in its intended home.

Fanless mode - not advertised, mightily confused me! The card has a fanless mode up to 55c or thereabouts - a bonus unadvertised feature. No mention on the product page or on the website - a shame as this is an awesome feature. Loading the card up with Furmark, it maxed at a HWMonitor reported max of 120W and 70C (ambient of 22). The fan is so much better than the Gigabyte "ITX" card fans (I'm looking at you R9-370) - no whining, just a subtle whirr. The quietest fan equipped GPU I've tested, ever, under Furmark load.

Performance Results? Well, as much as I'm happy with my testing, the results at GPUBenchmark (linked above) are collated from hundreds of test samples - much more reliable than 2-3 tests on my one system :) In time I'll update with game perf though - just waiting on my case to arrive from Taiwan ;)
I don't know if i'm posting this question in the correct place or not? I just purchased one of these Sapphire RX 570 ITX 4GB Cards and I have been unsuccessful in getting the Graphics Driver to Load properly, the system is currently housed in a HTPC Silverstone GD07 Case, Motherboard started life in an Optiplex 960, I5 2400 Win 7 Pro, C: SSD 240 GB D: 2 TB Sata, 8 GB DDR3, Corsair CX750M and an Optical Drive. I have Cleared Previous GeForce GT 740sc (GT 740sc worked fine since mid 2016 until earlier this week it Died / Black Screen) Software and subsequent Install attempts using CCleaner Tool, I have tried Install from Supplied Disc and from SapphireTech.com and also from AMD.com Websites while in Administrative Mode. warning received reads: "No AMD graphics driver is installed or the AMD driver is not functioning properly. Please install the AMD driver appropriate for your AMD hardware". Any suggestions or direction in Solving this issue would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance, randog311
 

TheHig

King of Cable Management
Oct 13, 2016
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Often the case with OEM /Dell boards its possible that the system is in Legacy mode in bios. You need to be in UEFI mode in bios to use newer cards like a 1050 or rx570 I believe. Press f2 on boot and if you are in Legacy Bios mode you need to get to bios, disable secure boot , enable UEFI mode and then do a complete fresh install of 64 bit Windows 7,8 or 10. You can't change from Legacy to UEFI without a complete OS do over unfortunately.

May be the issue- just a guess though.
 

confusis

John Morrison. Founder and Team Leader of SFF.N
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I've come across Dell, HP, etc boards that outright blacklist cards unless they are a specific model - thanks OEMs -_-
 
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randog311

Efficiency Noob
Jul 21, 2019
6
0
Often the case with OEM /Dell boards its possible that the system is in Legacy mode in bios. You need to be in UEFI mode in bios to use newer cards like a 1050 or rx570 I believe. Press f2 on boot and if you are in Legacy Bios mode you need to get to bios, disable secure boot , enable UEFI mode and then do a complete fresh install of 64 bit Windows 7,8 or 10. You can't change from Legacy to UEFI without a complete OS do over unfortunately.

May be the issue- just a guess though.
Thank you "The Hig",
I believe you are correct as to the conflict I'm having with the GPU driver...
BIOS is definitely set to "Legacy" with Win 7 Pro.
From what I understand, Microsoft will no longer support Win 7 after the New Year 2020
What Operating System would you recommend switching to since a fresh install of the OS is required after switching to UEFI?
Win 8, Win 10 or Other?
Thanks again, randog311
Galveston Island Texas
 

TheHig

King of Cable Management
Oct 13, 2016
951
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I have gone with with win10 pro on all our PCs at home. Mostly because it’s easy and we all game.
 

randog311

Efficiency Noob
Jul 21, 2019
6
0
I have gone with with win10 pro on all our PCs at home. Mostly because it’s easy and we all game.
I ended up taking the HTPC Rig to a local PC Shop that also does Custom Builds, he had it almost a week...
He concluded that my "Open Box / Ebay" purchased resulted in receiving a "Failed/ Defective" RX 570 itx Graphics Card after having installed Windows 10 Pro.
I sent the Failed Unit back to Ebay for credit.
He said he had a couple new MSI GeForce GTX 1050 4GB itx Cards, he installed it successfully.
After getting it back with Failed WMC installation attempts...
I ended up doing a "Full Win 10 Pro Reset deleting files".
Prior to restart, I disconnected the Internet connection, installed WMC-V8.8.4 previously saved to drive D:
When I reached to point in "Settings", I reconnected the Internet and was able to complete the settings and "Bingo", the Guide populated properly.
FYI I am using a Hauppauge Quad tuner Card for received OTA signals.
Thanks again to all that replied, randog311