A Closer Look:

    Sitting on a red printer circuit board, the ASUS EAX1300PRO doesn't look all that impressive. Don't let the looks fool you. This budget card has some nice features that allow you to play almost any game.

   The heart of the EAX1300PRO is the ATI RV515 graphic processing unit. This GPU runs at 600MHz while the RAM clocks at 800MHz (400MHz DDR2).

   You may be thinking that the GPU is 100MHz on the X1600, so why should I consider this one? This is perhaps true, but the graphics processing units are different: RV515 versus the RV530. The RV515 features 4 pixel pipelines compared to the 12 pixel pipelines on the RV530. This can make a big difference when playing games. The more pixel pipelines, the faster the video card can process pixels.

  The heat sink on the graphics processing unit is an all copper design. The top half of the heat sink is finned to aid in heat dissipation. Towards the bottom right of the heat sink is the location of the fan. This fan slings air toward the fins of the heat sink.

    The RAM used on the MSI unit are Infineon HYB18T256161AF-25.  The eight RAM chips, four on each side of the PCB, are rated for an 800MHz (2 x 400MHz) operating frequency and have a combined capacity of 256MB. The RAM chips on the back side of the card are not cooled. By the way, these are the same RAM chips used on the MSI X1600 I reviewed. So, at least they are not skimping on the RAM for the lower end card.

    The included items with the ASUS EAX1300PRO are the DVI to VGA adapter, and a cable for video out with a RCA plug on the end.