ati 4870 power draw in idle

[jinsean]

According to anandtech's review of the 4870, the idle power draw of the 4870 is in my opinion significantly higher than the 4850.

I noticed that the main diff b/t the 4850/4870 is that the 4870 has a much higher core speed. So even in 2d mode, I'm assuming the core speed is reduced, but not as much as the 4850 would be. But could this really be attributing to the ~20w difference @ idle?

[largon]

According to some reviews the difference between HD4870 and HD4850 can be around 35W.
Weird huh? What's more astonishing is that even GTX 280 consumes less power in idle than an HD4850.

[zanzabar]

the 4870 uses a higher volatage and there are 2 idle states that are dissabled int eh 8.6 and hotfix drivers for the rv770, so the consumption should come down with 8.7

[jinsean]

the 4870 uses a higher volatage and there are 2 idle states that are dissabled int eh 8.6 and hotfix drivers for the rv770, so the consumption should come down with 8.7

Oh interesting. Thanks for the info.

[XtaticOverFSB]

http://whatifgaming.com/ati-radeon-hd-4870-review-vroom-vroom-crossfire

They say it's a bit more than 35W difference.

[gosh]

According to some reviews the difference between HD4870 and HD4850 can be around 35W.
Weird huh? What's more astonishing is that even GTX 280 consumes less power in idle than an HD4850.

I think that the idle power is fixed when new catalyst drivers is released i july, the amd powerplay doesn't work in current drivers.

using nVidia you need a motherboard from nvidia.

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1319753
The GTX 200 series power saving features do NOT work on an Intel platform. That’s right. I thought I was the odd one out when I saw countless other websites posting about the down-clocks and down-voltages, whereby the GPU settles at 300Mhz Memory to 100Mhz etc when no 3D app is running. What some of them failed to state was that they only achieved this on an Nvidia platform; while ALL the reviews out there failed to warn consumers that this does NOT work on an Intel platform at all. The writeups out there further confuse you by stating the downclocks are achieved in drivers, while only the full hybrid power features, i.e., shutting down the GPU and offloads 2D to the onboard IGP require an Nvidia platform. They just don’t know what they are talking about.