NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 Reviews

[boxleitnerb]

Okay...but would it be so bad to show the results of several runs, calculate a jitter index for each one and then make an average? At least that would be something. Not to mention this issue at all is no solution either. Cards are slapped/praised for power, noise etc. but not for this, when it is the most important of all metrics (in conjunction with fps) with AFR configurations.

[SKYMTL]

I'm not saying we WOULD NOT do it. I am saying that we are still determining the CORRECT way to do it.

[One_Hertz]

I'm not saying that they have to be consistent with other reviews. What I am saying is that the results are not repeatable. Sometimes microstutter is clearly there. Other times, in the same scene, frametime monitoring doesn't seem to pick it up and when it does, it is never, ever as clearly defined as in the review linked above.

The testing I've done for myself on different crossfire setups has always been extremely consistent. I don't even do anything special. Choose a save game, start fraps recording by frame times, move the mouse a bunch, stop fraps. Repeat this process as many times as I want. The results are extremely similar from run to run every time. On my system anyhow. What does differ A LOT is microstutter from game to game. Some games are not so bad (crysis). Some games are terrible (metro).

[Olivon]

Nvidia GeForce GTX 690 - Hardware.fr

[LeoAndrade]

it beats the CF'ed 7970s in every test. Thats not good for AMD...

[LordEC911]

Why the hell not? Its simple deductive reasoning. 2 680s out perform 2 7970s more than not while using less power. Even if they managed to get 2 7970s at full clocks on a multi gpu board it wouldn't have an undisputed performance lead. Given the power draw thats not going to happen, not unless they decide to out some rediculous thermo nuclear 3 8pin monstrosity... AMD simply don't have the wiggle room on the power envelope that Nvidia has with GK104. Is it so crazy to stipulate that if AMD do release a dual Tahiti board that it will A) under perform the GTX 690 and B) cost less due to A?

Whats so unreasonable in that train of thought?

Just don't count your chickens before they hatch.
Amazing how certain retail GTX680s seem to be losing to stock 7970... Leads me to believe review GTX690s are golden samples.
AMD has quite a bit of wiggle room with 7970 as far as voltage and powertune limits go, add in process maturity and some secret sauce...
That huge performance difference you are talking about could be quite thin or not there at all.

it beats the CF'ed 7970s in every test. Thats not good for AMD...

What reviews have you been looking at?

[Zipelgas]

amd really doesnt seem to care, they think hey our product is slower and has inferior drivers so its 10€ cheaper then nvidia ye buy that
Wait what... ?

[Mungri]

What reviews have you been looking at?

I'd ask yourself the same question.

This looks like the best graphics card ever made to me, though I cant afford one ... yet.

It will make a great choice for my next purchase if the price comes down in the next gen.

[Zloyd]

This card just has no competition, ATI need something to beat 680 by 10% or so .... fast and then force 680 price down so sli becomes 800$

[koc]

The card in neweeg for just $1200

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130781

[OCX600RR]

Lol that's just ridiculous!!

[Chrono Detector]

ATI looks like they are in trouble, because the GTX 690 beats CF 7970 and the 7990 is nowhere to be seen.

Anyway, I like how the card runs as fast as two 680's in SLI and the bonus part is it uses less power than the GTX 590 and SLI'ed 680 which is something NVIDIA hasn't done for a while.

[Andrew LB]

the 680s are sold out too and it was release 6 weeks ago.

GTX 680 in stock here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125422

[Flanman]

GTX 680 in stock here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125422

oos when i just checked it, must have only had a couple in

[Andrew LB]

My local Microcenter here in Tustin, CA has one in stock. Local pickup only tho. http://www.microcenter.com/single_pr...uct_id=0388486

[SKYMTL]

Amazing how certain retail GTX680s seem to be losing to stock 7970...

Say what?

I've reviewed retail GTX 680 cards and their performance is no different from the reference cards. That's to say in most benchmarks they are head and shoulders above the HD 7970 (minus Shogun: TW since the last patch).

[Manicdan]

ATI looks like they are in trouble, because the GTX 690 beats CF 7970 and the 7990 is nowhere to be seen.

Anyway, I like how the card runs as fast as two 680's in SLI and the bonus part is it uses less power than the GTX 590 and SLI'ed 680 which is something NVIDIA hasn't done for a while.

i think a good battle will happen once amd gets working on their drivers. a great review by hardocp showed power consumption in each test, and the few games that 680 killed on, the 7970 was using only 75% of its typical power draw.
also at eyefinity resolutions the difference is quite close and might be able to shift into amds favor with driver updates. anyone who needs 2 of these gps for anything less than 2560x1600 is just wasting them really.

but they did officially dethrone amd with having the fastest gpu (sadly at 1200 newegg dollars giving it the WORST price to perf ratio of all cards in the world, lol)

[LordEC911]

I'd ask yourself the same question.

Only have had time to read through a few reviews but anandtech was one that I know I saw at least half the benches shows 7970CF beating GTX690, a few games are neck and neck and half the games that the 7970CF loses handily CF is borked for whatever reason.

Say what?

I've reviewed retail GTX 680 cards and their performance is no different from the reference cards. That's to say in most benchmarks they are head and shoulders above the HD 7970 (minus Shogun: TW since the last patch).

Didn't read Damien's GTX690 review?

[Chickenfeed]

Just don't count your chickens before they hatch.
Amazing how certain retail GTX680s seem to be losing to stock 7970... Leads me to believe review GTX690s are golden samples.
AMD has quite a bit of wiggle room with 7970 as far as voltage and powertune limits go, add in process maturity and some secret sauce...
That huge performance difference you are talking about could be quite thin or not there at all.

I'd re read what I said there... I'm not talking about the capabilities of a single Tahiti core. I'm talking about 2 on one pcb. AMD aren't miracle workers and won't magically reduce power draw by 150 watts while maintaining full performance. There are some efficiency gains to be had by binning low voltage cores and with using 1 board vs 2 due to overlapping logic but expecting 2 full clocked 7970s under 375 watts isn't realistic, ergo AMD won't have a product that can out perform the GTX 690 with any dual Tahiti varrient.

[cegras]

Say what?

I've reviewed retail GTX 680 cards and their performance is no different from the reference cards. That's to say in most benchmarks they are head and shoulders above the HD 7970 (minus Shogun: TW since the last patch).

Heads and shoulders being 5-10%, according to techpowerup, and worse performance in 99 percentile frame according to techreport?

[SKYMTL]

Only have had time to read through a few reviews but anandtech was one that I know I saw at least half the benches shows 7970CF beating GTX690, a few games are neck and neck and half the games that the 7970CF loses handily CF is borked for whatever reason.


Didn't read Damien's GTX690 review?

You didn't say SLI...

As for the other reviews, they neglect to mention a number of things.

As Anandtech's and our review pointed out Crossfire is still suffering from some massive bugs. Black screens in Witcher 2 EE, a lack of scaling in Skyrim, etc, etc. To me, that's inexcusable from a solution that's been around for almost 5 months now. Other than a small issue with flickering in Wargame which has already been fixed, a relatively new architecture from NVIDIA boasts significantly better stability. To me and most other gamers, that's more important than a few percent framerate difference.

One thing I DO want to say in AMD's defense is the absolutely WRONG conclusion many of the websites have come to regarding Crossfire and Batman: AC. Crossfire does not work in the BUILT IN BENCHMARK which launches through a secondary rendering path but it works perfectly in-game. Yet another reason why sites should avoid built-in benchmarks.....

I'm thinking scaling will improve dramatically as NVIDIA's driver team kicks things into gear because at this point, in many cases, a GTX 680 SLI / GTX 690 setup doesn't scale as well as it should.

[SKYMTL]

Heads and shoulders being 5-10%, according to techpowerup, and worse performance in 99 percentile frame according to techreport?

I go by my numbers in-game numbers (12% overall & 15% where it counts) in addition to feature sets. So yes. Head and shoulders.

[Silver Bullet]

TigerDirect Canada is listing the cards (http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applicatio...rkey=E145-0690) but my Rep says end of the month for stock If anyone gets one of these I'll trade you for GTX680s

[Manicdan]

I'd re read what I said there... I'm not talking about the capabilities of a single Tahiti core. I'm talking about 2 on one pcb. AMD aren't miracle workers and won't magically reduce power draw by 150 watts while maintaining full performance. There are some efficiency gains to be had by binning low voltage cores and with using 1 board vs 2 due to overlapping logic but expecting 2 full clocked 7970s under 375 watts isn't realistic, ergo AMD won't have a product that can out perform the GTX 690 with any dual Tahiti varrient.

keep in mind that amd came out months earlier, so 7970s could have worse yields and needed the extra volts to ensure clock rates, which then means more power. or theyve been binning the good cores just for the 7990.

looking at the TPU power consumption charts. the 7970 is the same as 680. and the 690 was using MORE than even the 590. i think its clearly possible for amd to fit 2 full sized chips into a 7990

[Mungri]

ATI looks like they are in trouble, because the GTX 690 beats CF 7970 and the 7990 is nowhere to be seen.

Actually, as good as the GTX 690 is, AMD arent going to be in any trouble due to how expensive the thing is. They will still sell cards due to their recent price cuts on the 7950 / 7970.

i think its clearly possible for amd to fit 2 full sized chips into a 7990

It is possible, but it will be a lot harder to do with 7970 GPUs than it was with GTX 680 GPUs, as the latter are cooler and consume less power.

I dont think a 2x8 pin board would be enough for a 7990, it would need 2x8 pin and 1x6 pin to sufficiently power it with enough headroom to bring the clockspeeds up to competitive levels with the GTX 690.