7990 1ghz edition to debut at computex 2012

[Rollo]

You won't find a 7970 ghz edition reference card from what I hear. There will be quite a few nice aib models.

For just over the price of a GTX680 you can get a nice Sapphire non-reference card that beat the pants off of the GTX680 at higher resolutions. No tweaking necessary.

Or you can buy a 7970 try clocking it yourself and buy a nice cooler. Fail, I don't think so. This move will at least sell some 7970s.

Links to "beating the pants off a GTX680 at higher resolutions"?

The initial launch reviewshad the 680 winning at 25 X 16 and 57 X 10, the only "higher resolutions" that matter, so I sort of doubt this refresh will switch them from "losing" to "beating the pants off". I don't doubt this refresh results in trading benchmarks at higher resolutions, but there's that whole missing featuee set issue.

The launch reviews are the opinions a lot of people will form of these cards, so AMD did themselves no favors just adding the new bios to the reference model, shipping it out and saying "Review this!". I bet there will be reference models, and beyond that, there were GTX480 models with nonstandard coolers with vastly different power/heat/noise properties as well.

Reference is what gets reviewed to start, and largely what people think of with cards.

People don't think of the MSI Lightning when you mention a GTX680, they think of reference. And reference to reference, this is a fail. The new 4890.

[BeepBeep2]

I think he is talking about the 1000 MHz Sapphire card that would beat the 680 in pretty much everything at 2560x1600.

[BababooeyHTJ]

Links to "beating the pants off a GTX680 at higher resolutions"?

7970 at 1050mhz according to TPU is 8% faster at 2560x1600 on average. Also in the games where GTX680 is faster like Skyrim or BF3 7970 isn't exactly struggling. Any game where the GTX680 does struggle at higher resolutions like Crysis 2, Metro, Crysis, Stalker, Alan Wake, etc the 7970 is a fair bit faster.

WTF do I care if one card performs at 70 fps and the other performs at 76fps since that always seems to be the case with when the GTX 680 is the faster card. GTX 680 chokes at higher resolutions in a lot of games, you can see it in minimums, and you can see it in gameplay. It sort of reminds me of 4870 vs GTX 260, except the other way around this time. There is a reason that i like big gpus. They tend to perform more consistently.

I don't see any games where a GTX 680 is this much faster than a 7970.

[Manicdan]

everyone can cherry pick reviews, the difference between these on average is very close, but in many games can vary by a large amount.
unless we test every resolution and setting and AA mode, reviews will have a slight bias nomatter what.
thats why i would only recommend a certain card if they were looking for a certain game or feature.

[BababooeyHTJ]

'From what you hear' is straight from the mouth of techreport.

I don't read techreport reviews. I heard that on Rage3d.

If your views were more consistent I wouldn't call you out on it. You're a childish fanboy, grow up.

Also, stop talking in circles any time someone trys to have a discussion with you.

everyone can cherry pick reviews, the difference between these on average is very close, but in many games can vary by a large amount.
unless we test every resolution and setting and AA mode, reviews will have a slight bias nomatter what.
thats why i would only recommend a certain card if they were looking for a certain game or feature.

Which is why I mentioned the TPU review. They tend to test a wider array of games. Yes you can cherry pick reviews all that you want but at higher resolutions 7970 appears to be the better card. I'm sorry but GTX 680 chokes in a lot of games at 2560x1440 from what I've seen. Yes, the two are close but if I were running 2560x1600 or 1440 or eyefinity I would lean towards the 7970 personally.

[DilTech]

Realistically the choice narrows down to what features you want, and what games you play. I'd still go for the 680 at the $500 range without giving it a second thought, but I'm also locked in with NVidia thanks to going for a 3d vision set up. I don't see AMD making any moves to catch NV on that front in the foreseeable future.

I will say this much though, fastest single gpu title still belongs to the KFA2 HOF edition GTX 680.

[BababooeyHTJ]

Oh, yeah. 3d vision is a lot of fun and GK104 seems to be great at 1080p 120hz. I've just been a little disappointed at 1440p.

[cegras]

I don't read techreport reviews. I heard that on Rage3d.

If your views were more consistent I wouldn't call you out on it. You're a childish fanboy, grow up.

Also, stop talking in circles any time someone trys to have a discussion with you.

I'd love for you to point out my inconsistency, which you strangely have failed to do so thus far. Instead, what you seem to do is debate with a fictional 'cegras' who you stuff fictitious points into so you can yell at a wall, irrespective of how many times I clarify myself. It's tiring and inane. You've managed to spent a lot of time flailing near the bottom of this:

http://api.ning.com/files/GQiSZKPZHi...500&height=380

Judging from how you immediately jumped to the bottom of the pyramid, I'll just assume you read what I wrote, and being angry about having nothing else to say, had to argue about something vague and tangential.

[tbone8ty]

waiting for someone to flash the ghz edition bios to a regular 7970, gotta love the dual bios switch!

[BababooeyHTJ]

waiting for someone to flash the ghz edition bios to a regular 7970, gotta love the dual bios switch!

It looks like Wizzard uploaded it to the database.

Instead, what you seem to do is debate with a fictional 'cegras' who you stuff fictitious points into so you can yell at a wall, irrespective of how many times I clarify myself. It's tiring and inane. You've managed to spent a lot of time flailing near the bottom of this:

http://api.ning.com/files/GQiSZKPZHi...500&height=380

Judging from how you immediately jumped to the bottom of the pyramid, I'll just assume you read what I wrote, and being angry about having nothing else to say, had to argue about something vague and tangential.

Just responding to you with the same respect that you gave me in your last post, pal. Stop being such a hypocrite. I'm done responding to you if you can't have a civil conversation.

I'd love for you to point out my inconsistency, which you strangely have failed to do so thus far.

I'm not going to bother trying to respond while you talk in circles like you tend to do here. You've made my ignore list.

[cegras]

It's like you deliberately cultivate illiteracy so you can claim ignorance. And yet you still fail to engage in a debate in any sense of the word. You can't even show how I have talked in circles. At least you're doing me the service of not responding to me anymore, so I won't have to deal with you. See ya, I won't miss you!

[STEvil]

I hope the two of you keep out of each other's hair..

[zalbard]

waiting for someone to flash the ghz edition bios to a regular 7970, gotta love the dual bios switch!

That doesn't work, VR-Zone tested that. It was posted earlier in this thread.

[[XC] Oj101]

If only you knew what you were talking about.

Really?

[Olivon]

and you will find only cards from AIB with the coolers they have allready developped

Club 3D Introduces its Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition Graphics Card - TPU



http://www.club-3d.com/index.php/pro...z-edition.html

[Lanek]

Not sure you will see a lot of them on stock .. Its seems they want to be first to annonce it. ( they surely keep their cooler for the royal " king " "queen" series. )

Sapphire Toxic, vapor X moving to ghz edition
http://vr-zone.com/articles/sapphire...ion/16379.html

[Chrono Detector]

That TPU review shows the 7970 GE pretty much outperforms the GTX 680 in almost every benchmark... hmm....

This card would have been more appealing if it used less power, but I guess at the end its more about its performance.

[Rollo]

That TPU review shows the 7970 GE pretty much outperforms the GTX 680 in almost every benchmark... hmm....

This card would have been more appealing if it used less power, but I guess at the end its more about its performance.

The TPU review was also unique in that they showed the smallest difference in the 680 and 7970 to start with, by far. I'm calling "shenanigans".

If you look back through TPUs reviews you can find a bunch where a whole generation update provides an 11% increase in performance, yet we're supposed to believe this 13% tweak on clock speeds magically provided an 11% boost in 25x16 performance on average.

*cough* bullsh*t *cough*

[Lanek]

Not really hard, the 7970 was allready faster of the 680 in numerous game at 2560x1600 .. and when the card was not, the difference was of 1fps in many games if not say equal ( where a card got 33.04 and the other 33.21fps, i will not say one is faster of the other.

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...review-15.html


If you had overclock a 7970, you should know how scale GCN with core speed.

[JohnZS]

These are extremely fast cards, Kudos to ATi for pushing up the Mhz.
However I think the GTX 680 is a more feature rich product, you get CUDA, PhysX, 3d Vision, and better OpenGL support than what ATi can offer. However if none of those features are what you require the new Radeon cards are blisteringly fast and give good value for money. My only concern is that Crossfire is pretty poorly supported compared to SLi
John

[Chickenfeed]

I'm sorry but GTX 680 chokes in a lot of games at 2560x1440 from what I've seen.

I won't disagree here but at the same time a "single" 7970 chokes here as well, a swing of 10-20% in either product won't make or break performance in most cases. 2560x1440 is NOT single gpu territory unless you are playing old titles in which case hardware from either camp will be sufficient. Those high resolutions are in multi gpu land unless you are content with low performance. The added vram of the 7970 would be the main "potential" benifit here when that comes into to play but either way, one card isn't enough in my opinon. If you are okay with only 30fps performance, all the power to you but I honestly don't see the point of running a nice high dpi display and to on the experiance with crappy performance.

[cegras]

The TPU review was also unique in that they showed the smallest difference in the 680 and 7970 to start with, by far. I'm calling "shenanigans".

If you look back through TPUs reviews you can find a bunch where a whole generation update provides an 11% increase in performance, yet we're supposed to believe this 13% tweak on clock speeds magically provided an 11% boost in 25x16 performance on average.

*cough* bullsh*t *cough*

Percentages and averages, while useful, really obscure the data set. Look no further than Anandtech's conclusion, which explicitly states that your choice of card should depend on games you want to play.

[BababooeyHTJ]

I won't disagree here but at the same time a "single" 7970 chokes here as well, a swing of 10-20% in either product won't make or break performance in most cases. 2560x1440 is NOT single gpu territory unless you are playing old titles in which case hardware from either camp will be sufficient. Those high resolutions are in multi gpu land unless you are content with low performance. The added vram of the 7970 would be the main "potential" benifit here when that comes into to play but either way, one card isn't enough in my opinon. If you are okay with only 30fps performance, all the power to you but I honestly don't see the point of running a nice high dpi display and to on the experiance with crappy performance.

Yeah, but 10-20% can and in a lot of cases does mean the difference between playability after turning down a couple of settings.

[zalbard]

Yeah, but 10-20% can and in a lot of cases does mean the difference between playability after turning down a couple of settings.

I agree. A lot of games tend to really poorly scale with settings, too. There can be a 4x difference in looks between min and max quality and just 2x in performance.

[Chickenfeed]

I suppose its down to ones personal view of whats considered playable. You may be able to "play" a game at "x" performance level but whether you enjoy it is another question. As such I don't find 30fps playable is the majoirty of games out there but again this is highly subjective. I cringe at the thought of another 7 plus years of consoles games at 30fps, but odds are...

As far as this GHz edition model goes, if AMDs board partners release their own skus with quality aftermarket cooling and without inflating the price, these might be relavent. Otherwise these will be a big pass, considering there are already aftermarket 7970s that cost at least $50 less.

This sku would have made much more sense in their line up if they had improved the reference design and heatsink and maintained the price point. A louder more power hungry product that performs on par isn't exactly attractive. I think many consumers can look past the higher power draw but 3x the noise level? Don't think so. Anyone whos used a reference 6990 will already know how loud these can get.

I wish both AMD and Nvidia would make better reference designs but they seem to be content with having their board partners do the legwork and marketing as well as footing the addtional cost.