Right then, all hail AMDs new budget VGA card. We today will test the Radeon HD 4550, it's actually the most expensive 512MB model at 55 USD [insert giggle here].

Our card is equipped with 512MB 128-bit DDR3 memory, yet a 256Mb GDDR2 version will be available as well. The product is a 55nm fabbed part, has DX10.1 compatibility (though with 80 Shader processors not very much recommended ;)

The Radeon HD 4550 is obviously aimed at the lowest of low budget market. It's in fact competing with mainboard integrated chipsets. And looking at it from that point of view, doing very well. So if you need a dirt cheap graphics card that provides dual-link connectivity (1x dual link, 1x single link) and need to decode a DVD or a Blu-Ray movie over the GPU as your processor is specced too low or something .. look no further. This card will do that for you. And even if you are stuck at say 1024x768, you can even play a game perfectly fine, though preferably older titles.

Fifty bucks or not, it even has the integrated HD audio controller with up to 2 channel 48 kHz PCM stereo or multi-channel (7.1) AC3 enabling a plug-and-play cable-less audio solution over HDMI. So you see value is what it's all about.

Another interesting fact about the ATI Radeon HD 4550 graphics card is that it consumes less than 25 (20W actually) watts under full load, making it the ideal choice for implementation across a large diverse install base of desktop PCs.