Box and bundled bits

The box isn't quite what we were expecting after seeing the press shots back in May. It gets the salient points across. Oh, except the one where you know the cooler's passive. The box shown in the press shots lets you take a look at the board, since the box is transparent, so there's a chance the box is just placeholder for the press sample and retail packaging will be what you see here.

Inside the box and aside from the card, we found the driver CD, 3DMark06 install CD (why oh why?), a copy of PowerDVD 7, and all the bits and pieces needed to claim your free Valve Black Box release and currently available free copies of Half-Life 2: Lost Cost and Half-Life 2: Deathmatch.

Connector wise there was the DVI-to-HDMI active dongle, DVI-to-VGA convertor, S-Video connector and a component video cable that supports HD displays.

No bundled game (unless playing 3DMark06 is your thing) is something we don't object to, but the PowerDVD 7 version not supporting HD-DVD or Blu-Ray movie playback is a bit of a let down. We realise PowerDVD 7 Ultra is currently $100 or so, which even at OEM-friendly bundle pricing would be a significant add to the cost of the Ultimate, but we still lament the fact that HD video playback software (with HDCP support, for satisfying the movie studios needs, we should say) is currently so expensive on the PC.