Radeon HD 7950 benchmarked, pitted against several other cards

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The Radeon HD 7950 is the next card in the 7000-series to be released by AMD, and today we get a sneak-peak at performance figures as well as a comparison to various other cards benchmarked in the same system powered by an Intel Core i5-2500K processor...

http://flyingsuicide.net/wp-content/...chmarked-2.jpg

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Sauce

That looks like it's going to cause serious damage in the price/performance department if priced well.

But unfortunately it won't at only aprox $100 cheaper, both are roughly giving you as much perf/$$$. A swedish etailer had leaked the price, there it was aprox that much cheaper at least.

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Originally Posted by RPGWiZaRD

But unfortunately it won't at only aprox $100 cheaper, both are roughly giving you as much perf/$$$. A swedish etailer had leaked the price, there it was aprox that much cheaper at least.

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Leaked prices are indicating $450 for 7950. With the gtx 570 and 6970 at around 320-330 dollars, it is hardly going to be the value proposition. The 1.5gb memory 399 will get it closer, but AMD has priced there cards so there are hardly any need for price drop on their old cards. The only casualty of this is the gtx 580.

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Originally Posted by tajoh111

Leaked prices are indicating $450 for 7950. With the gtx 570 and 6970 at around 320-330 dollars, it is hardly going to be the value proposition. The 1.5gb memory 399 will get it closer, but AMD has priced there cards so there are hardly any need for price drop on their old cards. The only casualty of this is the gtx 580.

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Yeah it's looking like we'll have to wait for the HD 8000 series for true value performance. I would imagine all the cards would be based off GCN by then

Well i believe a 7950 - 1.5gb should be not so bad value/performance. ( depend the price ofc )... this card will goes for peoples who dont need 3gb, mostly play on a 24". And with similar performance in nearly all games ( well outside when memory hit a wall ).

hmmm seems ok to me. GTX 580 performance at just below GTX 580 price with double the standard VRAM, good OC headroom, PCI-E 3.0 and lower power usage... whats not to like. people forget that when its better it costs more. look at the 5870 and 5850. they were really expensive when nvidia only had the GTX 285 type cards... this is EXACTLY the same thing. don't expect AMD to pricing these things out for $250.00 for no reason... people pay for things that are better. not to mention they have very competitive performance at the lower price points already. until team green brings something new to the table AMD has given us a better value.

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Originally Posted by [XC] hipno650

hmmm seems ok to me. GTX 580 performance at just below GTX 580 price with double the standard VRAM, good OC headroom, PCI-E 3.0 and lower power usage... whats not to like. people forget that when its better it costs more. look at the 5870 and 5850. they were really expensive when nvidia only had the GTX 285 type cards... this is EXACTLY the same thing. don't expect AMD to pricing these things out for $250.00 for no reason... people pay for things that are better. not to mention they have very competitive performance at the lower price points already. until team green brings something new to the table AMD has given us a better value.

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Being able to unlock it to a 7970 will have me sold. $450 for top of the line performance really isn't a bad deal when you think about it. Not cheap, but certainly a nice investment

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/sho...php?t=18366789

7950 up to 1.18Ghz with voltage tweak

Looks like you can flash it to 7970 bios, but it won't unlock the shaders as of now :(

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Originally Posted by [XC] hipno650

hmmm seems ok to me. GTX 580 performance at just below GTX 580 price with double the standard VRAM, good OC headroom, PCI-E 3.0 and lower power usage... whats not to like. people forget that when its better it costs more. look at the 5870 and 5850. they were really expensive when nvidia only had the GTX 285 type cards... this is EXACTLY the same thing. don't expect AMD to pricing these things out for $250.00 for no reason... people pay for things that are better. not to mention they have very competitive performance at the lower price points already. until team green brings something new to the table AMD has given us a better value.

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but when the 285 was the best NV card the best of that gen was the 4890 and i got mine the summer before the hd5 launch for $150 when it was still faster than the 285 and the 285 was like $300 i think. but now we dont see the hd6 cards cheap even thought the hd7 spanks it and we also (even though it rarely happens) NV dropping the price ether so we need more cards in th eupper mid-high not top range

... and I'm still sitting on my 4870 :rofl: I need to upgrade :hitself:

If this pushes the GTX580 down in price then the GTX570 will drop, which in turn will make the HD6xxx series drop. This will be good for the consumer.

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Originally Posted by Sparky

... and I'm still sitting on my 4870 :rofl: I need to upgrade :hitself:

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It's ok you aren't the only one.

Suppliers won't drop prices so long as they are able to sell all of their inventory. Once they reach a point where the quantity supplied is greater than that which is demanded then surplus causes prices to drop until equilibrium is reached.

So, as long as more people are happy with the performance for the $$ than those who are not, prices will stay where they are. So all this talk of pricing... It would be foolish for them to sell them for less if the current supply would be exhausted at the higher price. ;)

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Originally Posted by jam2k

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/sho...php?t=18366789

7950 up to 1.18Ghz with voltage tweak

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£350 w/ VAT means $399, right? If that's the case I may get one solely for the extra ram...

Next gen consoles are just a year away, and Windows 8 only a few months away.
I can't think of a worse moment to upgrade my 5870.

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Originally Posted by Sparky

... and I'm still sitting on my 4870 :rofl: I need to upgrade :hitself:

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Yep, thanks to consoles, I don't need to upgrade my 4870 either.

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Originally Posted by Utnorris

If this pushes the GTX580 down in price then the GTX570 will drop, which in turn will make the HD6xxx series drop. This will be good for the consumer.

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They will be EOL, they won't drop in price, they just won't make any more of them.

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Originally Posted by Utnorris

If this pushes the GTX580 down in price then the GTX570 will drop, which in turn will make the HD6xxx series drop. This will be good for the consumer.

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This is something I am waiting for to some degree, an extra 6950 would be nice. ;)

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Originally Posted by Iconyu

They will be EOL, they won't drop in price, they just won't make any more of them.

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You are assuming that the GTX7xx is actually going to come out in February, which I doubt and if it does it took the GTX480 a while to sell through current inventory and it dropped in price once the HD6xxx hit the market, so I am not sure why anyone think this will be different. At $500 - $600 you would be foolish to get a GTX580 with the HD7970 on the market at the same price with better performance.

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Originally Posted by Iconyu

They will be EOL, they won't drop in price, they just won't make any more of them.

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GTX580 can't drop in price much more, they're too expensive to make. They'll go EOL.

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Originally Posted by El Maño

Next gen consoles are just a year away, and Windows 8 only a few months away.
I can't think of a worse moment to upgrade my 5870.

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I believe next gen consoles have been a year away for the last three years. ;)

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Originally Posted by Utnorris

You are assuming that the GTX7xx is actually going to come out in February, which I doubt and if it does it took the GTX480 a while to sell through current inventory and it dropped in price once the HD6xxx hit the market, so I am not sure why anyone think this will be different. At $500 - $600 you would be foolish to get a GTX580 with the HD7970 on the market at the same price with better performance.

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There aren't many 7970's, and when you can find one it won't be the same price as a 580GTX. Nvidia won't lower prices on high end cards unless it's to clear inventory but that probably won't happen until April.

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Originally Posted by zanzabar

but when the 285 was the best NV card the best of that gen was the 4890 and i got mine the summer before the hd5 launch for $150 when it was still faster than the 285 and the 285 was like $300 i think. but now we dont see the hd6 cards cheap even thought the hd7 spanks it and we also (even though it rarely happens) NV dropping the price ether so we need more cards in th eupper mid-high not top range

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Im not really sure which type of 4890 you had but I can't remember them being faster than the GTX 285 at all... they were good cards don't get me wrong but it was like the GTX 580 compared to the 6970 is now. a small handful of games puts the 6970 on top but the vast majority the GTX 580 was faster. thats how I remember things playing out anyways I remember the GTX 275 and the 4890 trading blows pretty good.

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Originally Posted by zanzabar

but when the 285 was the best NV card the best of that gen was the 4890 and i got mine the summer before the hd5 launch for $150 when it was still faster than the 285 and the 285 was like $300 i think. but now we dont see the hd6 cards cheap even thought the hd7 spanks it and we also (even though it rarely happens) NV dropping the price ether so we need more cards in th eupper mid-high not top range

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My thoughts exactly. I've stated this a few times in other posts. As others have stated, AMD has been anxious to jack up the prices on their high end for a while now. It looks like this gave them the opportunity and people will probably get accustomed to the new pricing tiers. I got a 4890 for $150 back then as well and boy was that a lot of bang for the buck. I think those days may be gone unless something really changes in the industry. I think the high end pricing is now outrageous by both camps. Of course, plenty of people on here will justify it for one reason or another. To each their own....

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Originally Posted by [XC] hipno650

Im not really sure which type of 4890 you had but I can't remember them being faster than the GTX 285 at all... they were good cards don't get me wrong but it was like the GTX 580 compared to the 6970 is now. a small handful of games puts the 6970 on top but the vast majority the GTX 580 was faster. thats how I remember things playing out anyways I remember the GTX 275 and the 4890 trading blows pretty good.

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now im not sure what 285 u were looking at, when both cards were current they were about even and the 4890 is xfire did alot better than the 285 in sli, and the 4890 oced better and scalled better with the OC. now once the 285 was outdated there was the image quality nerf that made it quicker but u always needed more AA with the 285 and the 285 did not do proper MSAA so it was costly were the 4890 did dx10.1 so it was free 4x and low cost 8x.

Just a heads up, I'll have some percentage based performance graphs for two or three tests up very soon. Unfortunately I can't give exact figures, but you can work out very accurate approximate performance via the ratios. I can also say that the 7950 is much much quieter than the 7970. Unfortunately, it won't come near the 7970 due to its castrated core, 6+1 VRMs and two 6-pin PCI-e connectors. However, stock vs stock it's an average of only 14% slower than the 7970 so it'll still offer meaty performance. My information is not via the grape-vine, but first hand.

Instead of posting another thread, I'll build on this one. This is exclusive to FlyingSuicide and out of respect for the wishes of the person who showed me I won't publish the exact figures.

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While many crave for Radeon HD 7970 performance but can’t afford it, AMD has the answer with the Radeon HD 7950 which offers slightly lower performance at the lower price point of US $449 which should soon drop to US $399. With the unified shader count dropped from 2048 to 1792, the TMU (Texture Mapping Unit) dropped from 128 to 112 and the ROP (Render OutPut unit) count staying at 32, the HD 7950 is a moderately crippled HD 7970...

http://flyingsuicide.net/wp-content/...rk-vantage.jpg

http://flyingsuicide.net/wp-content/...-3dmark-11.jpg

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Read more

Interesting only 14-15% under... this can let some good headroom for higher clocked models.... Just curious to see the difference in particular game and clock to clock

Baah as this thread still alive i post this here:

http://developer.amd.com/samples/dem...TimeDemos.aspx

AMD have put online the realtime demo "Leo" ...

The video link is broken for now, but i hope it will be fixed soon.

For 7970 owners, download the exe and enjoy.

( thanks D. Baumann on Beyond3D for the info )

Leo Demo

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The Leo demo showcases a real-time, DirectX® 11 based lighting pipeline that is designed to allow for rendering scenes made of arbitrarily complex materials (including transparencies), multiple lighting models, and minimal restrictions on the number of lights that can be used -- all while supporting hardware MSAA and efficient memory usage.

Specifically, this demo uses DirectCompute to cull and manage lights in a scene. The end result is a per-pixel or per-tile list of lights that forward-render based shaders use for lighting each pixel. This technique also allows for adding one bounce global illumination effects by spawning virtual point light sources where light strikes a surface. Finally, the lighting in this demo is physically based in that it is fully HDR and the material and reflection models take advantage of the ALU power of the AMD Radeon HD 7900 GPU to calculate physically accurate light and surface interactions (multiple BRDF equations, realistic use of index of refraction, absorption based on wavelength for metals, etc).

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Ptex and PRT Technology Preview

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This technology preview, using OpenGL, demonstrates a way to implement Ptex (http://ptex.us/) in real time, making one of the latest film industry techniques practical for use in games. Ptex greatly simplifies the process of texture mapping and is already supported in a number of industry standard tools. Because Ptex also naturally eliminates seams, techniques such as vector displacement are easily enabled without need for manual seam fixup. Real-time Ptex per-primitive resolution control and the more efficient packing relative to traditional methods allow for higher quality textures, yet with very little computational overhead. Partially resident textures (PRT), accessible through an OpenGL extension, also allow for simpler Ptex addressing methods by enabling variable-sized slices in texture arrays, an addressing method which would otherwise be far too costly in memory usage.

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I add a Youtube link i have find http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gIq-XD5uA8

( huum little hint, look the shadows and what this system of lights give )

what's the clockspeed? 800?

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Originally Posted by [XC] Oj101

Just a heads up, I'll have some percentage based performance graphs for two or three tests up very soon. Unfortunately I can't give exact figures, but you can work out very accurate approximate performance via the ratios. I can also say that the 7950 is much much quieter than the 7970. Unfortunately, it won't come near the 7970 due to its castrated core, 6+1 VRMs and two 6-pin PCI-e connectors. However, stock vs stock it's an average of only 14% slower than the 7970 so it'll still offer meaty performance. My information is not via the grape-vine, but first hand.

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Any word on being able to unlock the other cores?

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Originally Posted by mAJORD

what's the clockspeed? 800?

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yes ....

A lot of sites pre-listing it say its 830Mhz

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Originally Posted by AliG

Any word on being able to unlock the other cores?

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I did cover it :p: I'm 98% sure it's locked at a silicon level unfortunately :(

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Originally Posted by mAJORD

A lot of sites pre-listing it say its 830Mhz

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Regardless of what other sites may or may not show, this sample was 800 MHz. Remember, there will be factory overclocked versions ranging from probably around 820 MHz to around 900 MHz - factory overclocks are normally small, just enough to give the edge over a stock card.

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Originally Posted by Lanek

yes ....

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Not bad then, the difference isn't really that big if you take into account clockspeeds (800 vs. 925).

Lets see what the pricing is gonna be like on this ..... could be a real performance/$ king.

MSRP is stated in the link ;)

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Originally Posted by GoldenTiger

Not bad then, the difference isn't really that big if you take into account clockspeeds (800 vs. 925).

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The HD 7950 got 1792 shaders instead of 2048 for HD 7970, so ~ -14% for shaders and ~ -15% for frequency :

http://tof.canardpc.com/view/2b078fb...1654a60fb8.jpg

http://www.hardware.fr/articles/848-...rclocking.html

edit :

http://tof.canardpc.com/preview2/7df...65f7f542a9.jpg http://tof.canardpc.com/preview2/da4...9a51a062f2.jpg

http://tof.canardpc.com/preview2/f0f...77dc9654f1.jpg http://tof.canardpc.com/preview2/76f...628a6dfb10.jpg

http://www.chiphell.com/thread-350613-1-1.html

edit2 : New driver + OC 925/1350

http://tof.canardpc.com/preview2/435...9112c7151f.jpg http://tof.canardpc.com/preview2/0b0...7975998661.jpg

price war again

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Originally Posted by Olivon

The HD 7950 got 1792 shaders instead of 2048 for HD 7970, so ~ -14% for shaders and ~ -15% for frequency :

edit :

http://tof.canardpc.com/preview2/7df...65f7f542a9.jpg http://tof.canardpc.com/preview2/da4...9a51a062f2.jpg

http://www.chiphell.com/thread-350613-1-1.html

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wow that's quite a cheapo cooler + no vrm cooler.. i thought heatsink covers the entire board..

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Originally Posted by ryan92084

It's ok you aren't the only one.

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Same here. 4870x2 showing it's age in BF3

BTW. I'm expecting ~200% scaling in CFX with dual 16x ;)

Ok this will be a real performance/$ king after nvidia release there :banana::banana::banana::banana:e .... Im thinking GTX660 will take this on and they will both sit around 350$. Well nvidia will prolly sit at 370.

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Originally Posted by kaktus1907

wow that's quite a cheapo cooler + no vrm cooler.. i thought heatsink covers the entire board..

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W/o the shroud it just looks like an entry level card.:eek:

If this was $400 instead it would be a better deal and worth the cost.

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Originally Posted by Zloyd

Ok this will be a real performance/$ king after nvidia release there :banana::banana::banana::banana:e .... Im thinking GTX660 will take this on and they will both sit around 350$. Well nvidia will prolly sit at 370.

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MSRB says $450.

$465 - $500 on newegg...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...ription=hd7950

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Originally Posted by MrEs

$465 - $500 on newegg...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...ription=hd7950

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Seems a bit bad positioning compared to the 7970, stock hsf isn't worth a damn and the good versions are reeeeeeaaaallllyyyy close to price of 7970. They have around 12 models if you search 7950.

Say thanks to NewEgg, normally should be around 449$ and may quickly go down to 400$ ... I believe they want to charge on first orders ....

Note the second, is a DirectCU II with 900mhz instead of 800.

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Originally Posted by Lanek

Say thanks to NewEgg, normally should be around 449$ and may quickly go down to 400$ ... I believe they want to charge on first orders ....

Note the second, is a DirectCU II with 900mhz instead of 800.

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All of em are high... http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...7950&x=21&y=28 If they drop quickly that wouldn't be so bad.

review

http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon...ew-2-and-3way/

http://www.guru3d.com/article/his-ra...d-7950-review/

http://www.guru3d.com/article/powerc...50-pcs-review/

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/P...7950_PCS_Plus/

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/A...950_CrossFire/

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/HD_7950/

http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphi...ics-processor/

May as well add ours too...

Reference design + HIS Tech "V2" Review: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...o-arrives.html


XFX HD 7950 Black Edition Double Dissipation Review: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...on-review.html


Sapphire HD 7950 Dual Fan OC Review: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...oc-review.html

Nice thanks.

Can i ask you if the beta driver used, 20jan is the 8.95 or 8.91 ? I find your 3Dmark11 pretty high for the 7970.

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/..._card_review/1

http://www.hardocp.com/images/articl...Xi2wl_15_1.gif

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If we see the price drop to $399.99 or below in 60 days, we will change the award to a GOLD.

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:D

Ryan from Anandtech forgot to update his XFX card's BIOS with the version that's shipping with retail cards. :( :(

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Originally Posted by SKYMTL

Ryan from Anandtech forgot to update his XFX card's BIOS with the version that's shipping with retail cards. :( :(

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What#s the difference between both ?

Our results post retail BIOS update:

http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/im...-HD7950-39.jpg


Anandtech's results:

http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/graph5476/43913.png


Basically, XFX emailed all media days before launch stating that their retail cards had revised fan speed profiles that allowed for slightly increased temperatures but kept the fans MUCH quieter. They sent us all a the retail BIOS file with the proper speeds. What you see above are the differences between the beta and the final release BIOS. :)

Some reviews for you all including a video review:

http://www.eteknix.com/reviews/graph...s-card-review/

and

http://www.eteknix.com/reviews/graph...-video-review/

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Originally Posted by SKYMTL

Our results post retail BIOS update:

..........

Basically, XFX emailed all media days before launch stating that their retail cards had revised fan speed profiles that allowed for slightly increased temperatures but kept the fans MUCH quieter. They sent us all a the retail BIOS file with the proper speeds. What you see above are the differences between the beta and the final release BIOS. :)

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Cant be much clear.... thanks.

ASIC quality and overclockability analyzed between AMD HD 7950, Sapphire HD 7950 OC Edition and AMD HD 7970 here. On that link you can find also the results with AMD reference HD 7950 overclocked to 1250MHz GPU / 1750MHz memory.

Finnish review muropaketti.com
http://plaza.fi/s/f/editor/images/X-...0424713817.png

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Originally Posted by SKYMTL

Sapphire HD 7950 Dual Fan OC Review: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...oc-review.html

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Shame the pricing of the whole series is so relatively high... that card looks great, but not $500 great (on newegg at the moment) for crossfire ($1k). Noise level and cooling capabilities seem nice on it. Hopefully once Kepler hits pricing on both that and it will be lower. I'd love a Kepler with that sort of HSF for SLI :D.

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Originally Posted by zanzabar

now im not sure what 285 u were looking at, when both cards were current they were about even and the 4890 is xfire did alot better than the 285 in sli, and the 4890 oced better and scalled better with the OC.

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Umm... at high resolutions the GTX285 in SLI ran better than the hd4890 CF.

The 285 in SLI flat out destroyed 2x 4890 in CF while running Vantage.

http://tof.canardpc.com/view/5104252...92c26e8297.jpg

Hardware.fr

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Originally Posted by Lanek

Cant be much clear.... thanks.

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I've discussed a bit more with Ryan.

Seems I was wrong as he DID update the BIOS but it still looks like this numbers are quite high. I wonder whether the heatsink on his card is mounted well since I had to remount the cooler on my XFX HD 7970 in order to get optimal fan speeds.