Budget - £180 can push £200. Been wanting to upgrade my 6870 for sometime, it was meant to be a temporary card to tide me over for a few months on my then new build. Never got round to the upgrade. So I finally have cash and would like a card to last me a good two years or so. The 7870 XT seems like the best bang for buck, can be had for £165. My main worry is that 2GB Vram seems a tad low (I game at 1080p and will do for the foreseeable future), I don't really want to find that in a years time I can barely manage high settings on games as the card is running out of VRAM. It's a similar situation my current 6870 is in with its 1GB Vram. So think I should save for the 7950 with its extra Vram and higher memory bus or pick up the XT which performs similarly and can overclock incredibly well and save me a good £40 or so. I realise the new generation of consoles will up VRAM requirements but I'm guessing with the Unified ram and the development cycles we wont be seeing games using significantly more VRAM right off the bat. TLDR: 7950 3GB VRAM 384bit or 7870 XT 2GB VRAM 256bit for much cheaper, similar overall performance.
Yea that's the one I have been looking at. Its not the boost edition and is not going to overclock all that well (I assume, looks fairly basic). The problem is that the XT clocks far higher than the 7950 and stock for stock it is very close before overclocking either card. I have seen the XT easily go to 1200-1250 without adding any volts (PowerTune) and reach stock 7970 levels of performance (Non-GHz Ofc). So I would probably have to spend closer to 240 to get a decent 7950 that could clock far enough to separate itself from the XT. Then again I could always add an aftermarket cooler at a later date to the 7950 and update the bios to the boost edition.
Boost is irrelevant if you're overclocking, and you should be able to hit around 1GHz on that card with the stock cooler, and around 1450 on the RAM. That'll see it past a stock 7970. Remember that whilst the 7870 might clock further, the heat output will also rise exponentially. My advice? Get over to the marketplace and post a wanted ad. You'll be able to get a 7950 with a better cooler for £160-180.
7870 XT is available for ~£160 which makes it a bargain, given that it's just a 7950 with 2GB memory and slightly less memory bandwidth.
That £210 7950 has a shocking cooler. The 7870 le's will overclock but in order to hit 1200-1250 on the core you're almost maxing out the voltage and they start to get a bit loud as the cooler is not great. They're also a real hassle to stop them downclocking. I got one for 175 and sold the bundled games making it about 130 odd. I second the 7950 second hand. I missed a few 7950 Iceqs that were for sale. I'm a bit miffed about that. Don't forget the game codes if buying new!
Thanks guys (or gals), lots of useful (but conflicting) advice If I did get a new AMD card id sell the bundle (25-30ish I'm guessing) which brings the cost down a tad, it would mean I was getting the XT for 145 which is not a bad price. Would take the 7950 down to 180-210 depending on the model. The second hand route might be a good option (Certainly if I can get a decent 7950 for 160) but I do worry about warranty claims etc... though I am guessing that depends on the age of the card and the seller. As a side note, what happens if I go overseas (Outside of the EU) to a warranty anyway? If I were to buy from Scan would I still be able to get them to replace the card?
Thanks for the replies. I actually had a curve ball thrown at me. My friend has decided to sell one of his two 7970s (XFS DD 1000 and 5700mhz non GHz edition) as its pretty much overkill for him considering he only games on 1080p. Neither have been overclocked and both are under warranty. £220 is the asking price. Seems like a good deal to me.
Replacing a 6870 for a 7870 is false economy so save your cash there. 7950 or a 670 both are similar cost similar performance, if you go second hand you can pick up a 680 or 7970 for your cash.
Thanks everyone Went for my friends 7970 XFS Double Disapation Black Edition in the end, it has the XFS Lifetime Warranty and he is prepared to handle any claims if they arise. So for 220 I don't think I got a bad deal, a little more than I wanted to spend but worth it . It's a huge step-up from my 6870. Have run it through its paces and it handles everything I throw at it with massive room to spare.
Hmmm, here in Germany the 670 and the 7970 cost about the same (~320€) and the 7950 boost edition is 50€ cheaper. (That's not counting th game bundles) (NVidia doesn't want to sell any cards, obviously)