Tahiti LE?

[Daveburt714]

I'm not a huge gamer, but it's been quite a while since I've upgraded my video card and the bundle AMD is offering just looks too good to pass up!
FC3, Bioshock and Tomb Raider all look like games I'd be interested in...

I'm in the market for a 7870 and I noticed that a few cards use the "Tahiti LE" chip...
Is there any advantage to looking for a card using this chip or are they all pretty much the same regardless of the uarch?

Price wise they don't look all that different, if Tahiti offers any benefits I'll go that route. This is the card I was thinking about:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...irtualParent=1

Honestly, I'll probably enjoy seeing how far I can clock the card as much (or more) than I'll enjoy the games.

If the Tahiti's offer a power/clocking advantage I'll go that route...

Thanks,
Dave

[zanzabar]

my 4890 just stated to crap out so i ordered a card, i was looking at a 2GB 7870, but i got a 7950 boost power color for $250 with a $20 rebate for $230 total (before tax.) so at this time i think it is best to look for the 7950.

on topic of the LE, that card looks nice, but there is not much of a price difference right now so is it worth $30-40 more to you for 1GB more ram and a bit better performance from the near full card that has more overclocking headroom.

[PaganII]

7870 Tahiti LE is a 7950 chip with couple hundred less stream processors and 1gb less ram. Sapphire calls theirs the 7870XT. The 7900 bundle gives you Crysis3 and 7800 bundle gives you Tomb Raider. So I bought a Sapphire 7870 Ghz edition as the power jacks are in a better position to fit a little cube case. The Tahiti cards are a little longer so might as well get the 7950 with Crysis3. Just depends on your application. The 7870 Ghz and 7870 Tahiti have 2 power jacks while most 7850s have 1.

[zanzabar]

7870 Tahiti LE is a 7950 chip with couple hundred less stream processors and 1gb less ram. Sapphire calls theirs the 7870XT. The 7900 bundle gives you Crysis3 and 7800 bundle gives you Tomb Raider. So I bought a Sapphire 7870 Ghz edition as the power jacks are in a better position to fit a little cube case. The Tahiti cards are a little longer so might as well get the 7950 with Crysis3. Just depends on your application. The 7870 Ghz and 7870 Tahiti have 2 power jacks while most 7850s have 1.

i bought this one, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814131478 , it has the 7970 pcb. they were just on sale on newegg and it looks like the 7950 with the good pcbs are getting cheap as they are all EOL.

with the current price it seams like you are only saving $20-30 for the xt instead of the 7950 with a good pcb right now if you wait for it to go onsale.

[Daveburt714]

Thanks Folks...

I was actually looking to buy locally. MicroCenter has the 7870 I mentioned for $250...
http://www.microcenter.com/product/4...ion_Video_Card

My monitor does 1980x1200 so the extra memory would probably help, but it's not like I'll be running Eyefinity or anything. I know $50 isn't that big a difference but every little bit counts...

The fact that the Tahiti is a cut down 7950 gives me hope, and I have a decent aftermarket cooler to stick on it so maybe I'll get lucky when it comes to clocks...
Like I said, I'm not a huge gamer and I've played the "top of the line Video Card" game in the past and been disappointed a number of times.

Both you guys info really helped and I think thats the card I want.
I'll probably go pick one up tomorrow/ mod the cooler and show some results.

Thanks again for the Info!

[zanzabar]

there is this one http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814202030 , it is sapphires on the reference amd 7970 board.

[Andi64]

i bought this one, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814131478 , it has the 7970 pcb. they were just on sale on newegg and it looks like the 7950 with the good pcbs are getting cheap as they are all EOL.

with the current price it seams like you are only saving $20-30 for the xt instead of the 7950 with a good pcb right now if you wait for it to go onsale.

That is not a HD7970 PCB. That HD7950 is a reference 7950 PCB and cooler. I have an XFX with that PCB, and it's pretty good. 1250Mhz core no problems.

The HD7870LE (or HD7930 :P ) it's a good card. They hit 1150-1200Mhz easily. But I'm not sure if that translates to performance as linear as the HD7950/HD7970. I'm not sure about it, but I recall some reviews where the scaling while overclocked wasn't very good. You should research on that to make any conclusions.

[PaganII]

I would have bought the 7950 or 7870XT but the little case it is going in has a brace that will not allow power plugs on top and the Sapphire 7870 Ghz has the plugs on the end. (I looked at a lot of cards haha) Already have a 7970 in the main gamer. Buddy of mine has the opposite problem. Plenty of room on top but most high powered cards are too long. Would be better to get another case with more room. Seems like no 2 cards are the same length even within the same chip type. Different coolers, heatpipes, PCB, power plugs...

[Ket]

In terms of performance, the Tahiti LE cards need +100-200MHz to get the same performance as a 7950 clocked 100-200MHz less, so a Tahiti LE is very much a little powerhouse. So much so I actually regret getting a 7950.