Quote Originally Posted by SpuTnicK View Post
This is true if the number of SPs are equal. meaning that one VLIW4 SP is 20% faster than one VLIW5 SP.
Though I don't have confirmed info on SP number for both 6970 and 6950 cards.
If some one has, please, let me know. I'll buy him beer
No, a VLIW4 SP is most likely a tad slower than a VLIW5 SP. But a 1536 (384) shader VLIW4 chip will have 20% more real useful SPs than a 1600 (320) VLIW5 chip.

A 320x5=1600 chip will have a lot less useful power than a 384x4=1536 chip.

Even if a Cayman shader is 96% of a Cypress one performance wise, there are still 20-50% more of them depending on which rumor to trust.

Your number of 20% higher performance is based on 20% more shaders.