Hardware ATI Radeon HD 6870 Review

(emphasis mine)

Frankly I'm surprised and Very disappointed at this decision by AMD. My setup requires TWO dual-link DVI ports. If I have to give up another port I'm OK with that but at this rate I don't see buying another AMD GPU.

I see your regular Shreddies and raise you my diamond Shreddies: (Link) (source)

 

ebuyer have the Sapphire 6870 in stock for £176, now that is good value!

 

No better value than £200 elsewhere from what I've heard

 

So what happens next series?

7870 gets released, same performance as the previous 5870 & 6870 but £100 cheaper again?!

Useful. I'm not won over like some of you. Yes cheaper is better, but no performance increase? Then it doesn't deserve the 6870 branding. They should just call it a 5870v2 at a new bargain price.

 

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE Educate yourself before opening your mouth, the number scheme has changed. 68XX is the NEW mid range and 69XX is now high range.

 

Ugh, this sentence hurts to read. "Rather than leave this hotly contested and highly profitable section of the market barren of ATI choice, ATI has chosen to continue making and selling the Radeon HD 5700. "

 

Can you draw me a diagram?

So the 69XX compares to the 59XX high end?

Then the 68XX compares to the 58XX midrange?

See, I still don't get it!

 

for the most part its something like this

6990 > 5890
69XX > 58XX
68XX > 57XX
67XX > 56XX

Theres a bit more to is but thats pretty much how the number systems compare not the actual performance really just how the transition is taking place.

 

Sorry I mean 6990 > 5970

 

I wonder if we completely ignore the series numbers and go purely on price-points, and then make the comparisons of benchmark per pound/dollar. That would now make more sense.

ATi changing the naming structure has rendered it useless between the 5 series and 6 series. Although I admit when the 7 series comes around it'll make much more sense to compare between the 6 series and 7 series ... ASSUMING the ATi marketing department don't go through another number change.

 

What's that "ATi" you're talking about?

 

@ Hawkest

I'm not upset there's no Crysis numbers on THIS gpu. After all it's not any faster than a 5870.

But bit-tech, PLEASE bring back Crysis Very High at least ONE more time for the Cayman cards. We might finally, 3 years later have a single gpu that can master this game. It's still perhaps the most challenging game on the market and should be a staple for testing the new gpu king!

Also, as others have said, it's not "ATI" Radeon any more.

 

Since when have arbitrary numbering schemes ever been a viable be all and end all way to rank cards? If that were the case AMD completely dominates the market since their cards are in the thousands and nVidia is in the hundreds! Looking at performance versus cost should always be the way you decide what card you're getting.

That's if adding 100 is too much for you. Look how easily HourBeforeDawn set that up. Or, read any review site's report on it and it is explained in full. Yes, there is text between the pretty pictures and graphs.

 

I've been using this exact method for CPU reviews on BT for some time now. I just thought it was common sense

 

+1 on the minimum FPS argument. It used to drive nuts that this wasn't included in benchmarks at all (2-3+ years ago). Smooth gameplay is so much more important than headline grabbing figures!!
Personally I do prefer the FPS to be shown in a graph vs. time - GPU data can be overlaid on one graph, and colour-keyed for 'easy' comparison between cards.

 

Do CPUs age in a more linear fasion than GPUs, I would have to say yes. Honestly, never thought of calculating a rough score for GPUs! it does seem to make sense... as a rule of thumb, but will the old harware really hold up against new games, what has been published before is sometimes it does sometimes it doesn't.

From all the comments here I only totally adhere to the price point theory, a card that costs £200 is the equivilent of a card that costs £200 in a previous generation, my card was worth about £200. As new games come out and hardware support is dropped, my previous experience suggests it is still entirely possible to skip generations of high end cards and not take a massive performance hit, those Radeon X800 were contenders for ages, as was the Nvidia 8800 GT/GTS, but then some technology breakthrough or new rendering requirement will become prevelent and lay these cards low in one fell swoop.

I do like reading the card roundup article when it comes along as the results are always surprising, it usually happens a little bit after a new benchmark gets rolled out so we will see!

 

(Just to repeat my comment from the 6850 thread)

Bit-tech guys,
I've read elsewhere that some people have been able to enable the extra shaders on the 6850 (and some got cards with the shaders already enabled), thus getting a sort of 6870 card for free.
Could you please try this with your cards? I'd like to see if it works on more than a couple of cards.

EDIT: a couple of links:
http://www.fudzilla.com/graphics/item/20604-hd-6850-with-1120-shaders-went-to-reviewers
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/HIS/Radeon_HD_6850/

 

really this could be even more money saver then hmm could you post a couple links to those who talk about doing this?

 

Now we just need some games for it....

 

Greetings!

Release notes of Catalyst 10.10: