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Hardware AMD Radeon 7970 3GB GHz Edition Review

Discussion in 'Article Discussion' started by Baz, 22 Jun 2012.

  1. Skulldragon

    Skulldragon What's a Dremel?

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    Nice review. Hopefully this card will start a bit of a price war with nVidia.

    Just a couple of things:
    1.If you get around to testing some older cards with the new drivers, will you update the charts with their frame rates, or will we have to wait for another review. Only I generally don't install beta drivers, but might make an exception if my HD5770 stands to gain performance in Arma 2. On this note, kudos to AMD for such a great performance boost from these drivers.

    2. Not really to do with the 7970, but I noticed that the GTX 680 & 690 have lower minimum frame rates in Arma 2 than in the 690 review. Is this attributable to an issue with the beta drivers, or error in the testing, or something else entirely.

    Anyway, as I said, nice review. Keep 'em coming!
     
  2. Baz

    Baz I work for Corsair

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    Older cards? Perhaps, but it's time consuming. We tend not to test cards no-longer on sale. I'll be updating our graphics rigs and benchmarks later this year, so I might run some legacy cards then. The Caymen architecture of the 5770 is older and already well optimised, so don't expect similar increases.

    The 690 results are higher following our new driver re-test in ARMA 2, and the 680 are pretty much the same. We re-ran the tests with the new beta driver, and there's usually a 1-fps margin of error with most benchmarks. We do repeat 3-times and average though.
     
  3. rollo

    rollo Modder

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    main question here

    why wouldnt you just buy a custom cooled 7970 3gb for £350 and overclock it to 1100mhz + yourself

    most overclocked 7970s are already above 1ghz and offer the same performance

    id give this an E for effort by AMD

    MSI and company already did the work for them with there custom cooled cards that offer much better thermals and better energy consumption to boot.

    it was never choice between 7970 and 680 when they cost 450 each. Most people are still gonna bulk at £400 when you can get a overclocked 7970 that is quicker for £381

    http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-...ddr5-1050mhz-dvi-i-hdmi-2-x-mini-display-port

    or get the asus direct cu 2 version for similar price with much better cooler and the exact same speed + mem speeds.

    AMD hasnt really done alot from my perspective

    where is this duel gpu card they are so late to the party its funny
     
  4. Baz

    Baz I work for Corsair

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    I make this exact point in the final paragraph of the conclusion, albeit not as specifically.

    "with pre-overclocked HD 7970 3GB’s instead looking the more attractive option."

    I think perhaps AMD is just trying to save face a bit. With no dual-GPU to rival 690, it went after that single-GPU crown instead.
     
  5. andrew8200m

    andrew8200m Multimodder

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    so.. 1GHz edition performs the same as 1GHz clocked 7970...

    Pointless. Overpriced. Performance crown seeking con artists.

    I actually hope nVidia release a 1100MHz edition GTX680 just so they can flip the bird whilst paddling in the river of tears AMD will no doubt shed.
     
  6. Harlequin

    Harlequin Modder

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    Baz

    AMD have allready shown a dual gpu card ;)

    so i would think one is waiting
     
  7. Harlequin

    Harlequin Modder

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    i`ve actually owned both cards and IMO the gtx 480 simply feels faster , i think its more to do with the `lows` not being as `low` as the 5870
     
  8. jrs77

    jrs77 Modder

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    Still waiting for the nVidia GTX 660 to be released, allthough I'm a little bit afraid of it's pricetag.

    The high-end cards are sure the thing to look at when you want to know about who makes the absolute best cards, but I'm simply not willing to spend so much money on hardware. For a complete system (mobo, CPU, GPU, RAM) I'm not paying more then some €600 every two years.

    Keep the reviews coming tho, it's nevertheless interesting to see what's possible atm.

    I'm more happy with nVidia-cards since the 460 was released and especially games seem to favour nVidia-cards, but this is simply due to better drivers and optimization. Still it's allways the reason why AMD looses the race.
    If we look at tests like SmallLuxGPU or other OpenCL stuff then AMD beats nVidia by a mile tho.
     
    Last edited: 22 Jun 2012
  9. andrew8200m

    andrew8200m Multimodder

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    GTX660 months off mate
     
  10. Harlequin

    Harlequin Modder

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    and welcome to the GAME - AMD can now say after 6 years they have the fastest single core card again.... it also means yields are good enough for 1ghz cards from them , and possibly up to 1.2ghz from partners.
     
  11. teppic

    teppic What's a Dremel?

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    It's also because a lot of reviews compare new cards against reference models, even if few people actually buy those. The 7970 at 925MHz doesn't look very appealing in benchmarks, even though they pretty much all go above 1.1GHz at stock voltage, taking them usually to the top.
     
  12. Skulldragon

    Skulldragon What's a Dremel?

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    In response to Baz's reply to my earlier comment, fair enough about the old cards and also, you were right about the 5770 not benefiting much :(. What about the HD 7770/7750, though. These new drivers could boost their performance to the point where they're worth buying.

    Also, are we going to see a review of that 900MHz version of the 7750, or is it too insignificant a change to be worth the time?
     
  13. MjFrosty

    MjFrosty Minimodder

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    Yeah it's the same every time round in fairness. The 480 was a glorified tessellation showcase. Massively more power hungry than the 5xxxx though, so I can see why Bit-tech haven't emphasised on it quite so much this time round, it's not nearly as much difference. Note worthy though that I had both too, and found the 480 to be the better card, although it's been a while so couldn't tell you why lol
     
  14. Harlequin

    Harlequin Modder

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  15. The_Crapman

    The_Crapman World's worst stuntman. Lover of bit-tech

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  16. rollo

    rollo Modder

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    100 watt lightbulbs even still exist thought max was 60

    Isnt the energy effeicient ones like 18 to 23 watts
     
  17. rollo

    rollo Modder

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    2gb phantom is overclocked by default the 4gb version is not
     
  18. Harlequin

    Harlequin Modder

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    they do - bought 1 earlier ;) - but even so , turn off 3 lights then to save power if your worried about 100watts.....
     
  19. fdbh96

    fdbh96 What's a Dremel?

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    Don't know this for sure but I guess that the GHz editions are cherry picked 7970's, so may be able to OC higher.
     
  20. andrew8200m

    andrew8200m Multimodder

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    From reviews I would say no.. not really.. 50MHz if your lucky.
     

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