AMD HD6950/HD6970 1GB in a few weeks (the people's high end gpu)

[RaV666]

You are new to this forum, but when i said something similar to your line (for a while ago, before the release of 6970) I got flamed with several personal attacks.
Everybody was expecting that 6970 would beat/match 580, that was the plan. At least every AMD-fan thought and believed. But it turned out to beat the 480 after release.
But lets hope the "new" 6990 plan works.

Sam, youre mistaking some guys on a forums overhyping a product they know little about with a corporate roadmap and planning.
That was and is AMD roadmap as soon AMD learned the 32nm at TSMC was scrapped:
http://news.softpedia.com/images/new...icos-Too-3.jpg

I dont get you, whats with this "new" ?
As in flames and personal attacks, i dont care if anyone attacks me in any way, its internetz nothing more :-).
No more OT from me too.Awaiting more info, like solid pricing and unlockability

[Sam_oslo]

Yeah, we don't need to be afraid of anybody. These kids are good kids mostly, but they just got a tendency to get carried away sometimes. No biggy anyways, we all got the same interest, and are friends across our different tastes for HW.

Back to topic. Yeah pricing is our common concern and interest. These 1GB are not a total waste anyways, they may reduce the 570-prices, or result in a cheap 565 (or something similar, who knows?).

If AMD is going for changes, I would rather see something that could add performance and challenge the 580-prices tho.

[cegras]

High res with AA in crossfire had huge gains with 2GB cards. Its the 5870 2GB, btw.

Quite a specific scenario there, considering turning AA on high res tends to lead to wholesale slaughtering of FPS.

[STEvil]

Quite a specific scenario there, considering turning AA on high res tends to lead to wholesale slaughtering of FPS.

Who cares as long as it performs?

http://benchmarkextreme.com/Articles...%202GB/P1.html

Today we will look at a certain aspect of high end GPUs which is either not touched in the mainstream media at all, or if it is, it is mostly misrepresented due to the testing methods applied. We will look at the benefits that a current high end GPU equipped with 2GB of video RAM has to offer over its 1GB counterpart, when tested at extreme image quality settings in Single card, CrossfireX and Trifire modes.

I think that guy should add eyefinity numbers to that review.

[zalbard]

Quite a specific scenario there, considering turning AA on high res tends to lead to wholesale slaughtering of FPS.

Most people are trying to use AA as long as FPS is acceptable, I think. So nothing specific about that.
High resolutions, yes... I agree. Then again we are discussing high-end cards, and CFX / SLI combinations of them, so using big monitors (or multi-monitor configs, sometimes) is not such a rare occasion.

[3NZ0]

Quite a specific scenario there, considering turning AA on high res tends to lead to wholesale slaughtering of FPS.

So are we not allowed to turn aa on at a high res then?

I'm going to throw a personal experience into the mix here. I used to have a pair of 5870 1 gig cards in cfx, performance was good at high res trusting I kept the aa reasonably low. With eyefinity or a 24"+ panel I saw huge drops in performance (from 60 to barely 1fps) once certain settings were applied in a few games. In some cases this was before going near aa.

On switching to a pair of 5870 2 gig cards, most of the fps problems were solved on the triple and all on the single. I noticed fps were far smoother with the 2gb cards as well.
The same goes for the 480 sli setup that replaced the 2gig 5870's. It's possible to hit the vram limit before you hit the total power output of the gpu's.

The more the better I say. These cards are best used in single card operation. Leaving the 2gb versions to stretch their legs at the settings they will be used at when put in cfx.

[cegras]

Er, I'm not arguing against using high res. I'm arguing that a $50 or more cheaper 1 gb card has a lot of relevance for many people, unlike what Oslo is claiming.

[Manicdan]

the transition to 2GB is taking quite some time, i think it wont be needed unless you have a ultra beefy xfire setup with massive resolution, or until new consoles come out and 512MB wont cut it anymore. i kept telling myself i wont upgrade until 2GB becomes standard, and ive yet to see that, its currently only recommended for future proofing.

providing a card with better perf/price ratio is always a plus, no question about it.

[STEvil]

Er, I'm not arguing against using high res. I'm arguing that a $50 or more cheaper 1 gb card has a lot of relevance for many people, unlike what Oslo is claiming.

Then say that, dont say that extra memory is worthless.

[445533]

Quite a specific scenario there, considering turning AA on high res tends to lead to wholesale slaughtering of FPS.

This is why some of us buy higher end gpus.

[Sesto Sento]

Who cares as long as it performs?

http://benchmarkextreme.com/Articles...%202GB/P1.html



I think that guy should add eyefinity numbers to that review.

That's quite an amazing review you found.
I knew, that the 2gb cards had influence @ high res+AA, but i never even dreamed about those HUGE performance improvements in Crossfire and TriFire...

1575% improvement in Lost Planet 2 on trifire that's something AMAZING.... (1GB vs 2GB cards)

[cegras]

Then say that, dont say that extra memory is worthless.

It's been shown to only be useful in crossfire and higher res / higher res with AA. What do you think the $250 segment is targeted at?

[crash5s]

Then say that, dont say that extra memory is worthless.

When something shows it's legs under multi-monitor, ultra high resolution, multi gpu situations then it is worthless to the majority of people.

Besides future proofing has historically been rather BS on the PC anyways. By the time games could use the benefit of 256 vram on my 9800pro vs 128 both those cards were obsolete and you'd need an upgrade to crank things anyways. Those 512mb 6800's for SLI, well by the time you could use the 512 the 6800 wasn't a good GPU anymore.

[Sesto Sento]

When something shows it's legs under multi-monitor, ultra high resolution, multi gpu situations then it is worthless to the majority of people.

Besides future proofing has historically been rather BS on the PC anyways. By the time games could use the benefit of 256 vram on my 9800pro vs 128 both those cards were obsolete and you'd need an upgrade to crank things anyways. Those 512mb 6800's for SLI, well by the time you could use the 512 the 6800 wasn't a good GPU anymore.

I have to agree with you in this, but that only aplies to single card... (In my opinion there is no single card that can give you proper performance @ 2560x1600 with AA, even GTX580...) If you're looking to buy a crossfire for High res + AA it is indeed an improvement... (30% improvement on average (1gb card vs 2gb cards @ 2560x1600 @ either 4x AA or 8x AA - http://benchmarkextreme.com/Articles...202GB/P12.html))

[RaZz!]

When something shows it's legs under multi-monitor, ultra high resolution, multi gpu situations then it is worthless to the majority of people.

Besides future proofing has historically been rather BS on the PC anyways. By the time games could use the benefit of 256 vram on my 9800pro vs 128 both those cards were obsolete and you'd need an upgrade to crank things anyways. Those 512mb 6800's for SLI, well by the time you could use the 512 the 6800 wasn't a good GPU anymore.

agreed.

it's the same with buying a crossfire/sli-ready mainboard with the intention to maybe buy a 2nd graphics card in the future.

i did that with my a8n-sli and 7800gt. my plan was to get a 2nd, cheap 7800gt (since it was last generation) when one would become too slow.
when that time came sli scaling with these cards was horrible in newer games, plus since the 7800gt wasn't manufactured anymore getting a new 7800gt was almost impossible and people on ebay sold their used ones for horribly high prices.

the money i could have saved when buying a regular, non-sli mainboard would have been better invested in more ram...

[Sam_oslo]

When something shows it's legs under multi-monitor, ultra high resolution, multi gpu situations then it is worthless to the majority of people.

Besides future proofing has historically been rather BS on the PC anyways. By the time games could use the benefit of 256 vram on my 9800pro vs 128 both those cards were obsolete and you'd need an upgrade to crank things anyways. Those 512mb 6800's for SLI, well by the time you could use the 512 the 6800 wasn't a good GPU anymore.

Yeah, and LOL, because it reminds me about good old days of Pentium-III. Then I got a double-socket Tyan MB with one CPU, and plans for future double-CPU upgrade. Then it would become the uber high-end, but never happed, LOL. All other later-doubling-plans has failed too, science then.

These kind of later-doubling-plans is even more tricky for GPU. Because we get new generation almost every year, with re-brand/re-fresh almost every day in these days.

[[XC] hipno650]

this card might be ok for a single card setup but the idea of using them in CFX is a bad one considering even at 1080p if you play with AA 1GB is not enough. I have seen the V-RAM usage on my 480's go above 1400MB in Crysis with 16XQ AA. Same story in Civ V. TBH I find it hard to recommend even a 570 considering future games will eat the RAM even more.

IMO even if you game at 1080p the extra cash would be well spent on a 2GB 6950

[Levish]

Id pay 50 for more vram :p

[ohnoitseddy]

You are new to this forum, but when i said something similar to your line (for a while ago, before the release of 6970) I got flamed with several personal attacks.

Everybody was expecting that 6970 would beat/match 580, that was the plan. At least every AMD-fan thought and believed. But it turned out to beat the 480 after release.

But lets hope the "new" 6990 plan works.

I find this remark rather strange... So, what people were expecting determines what AMD's plan is? That's ridiculous of course - why should there be any relationship between the two?

It wasn't everyone that expected that. Anyone could have noticed that for the previous two generations it hasn't been AMD's intention to match nVidia's high end, at least, not with a single GPU. It's called "small die strategy", and it worked out pretty well. Why would they change it?

Besides, what we have now is a HD6970 that is at roughly the GTX570's level for roughly the same price. Seems absolutely fine to me! "It's all about the single GPU crown" really is the old way of thinking, one AMD put away about two years ago, when they introduced the HD4870...

I think the 1 Gb HD6950 is most important to AMD, since it should neatly fill the gap between the 2 Gb version and the HD6870. AMD must have learned about gaps when nVidia came with their GTX460... I guess they're trying to prevent again ending up in such a situation.

[Lanek]

In reality i think AMD plan was to release a different Cayman series, they had allready plan the VLIW 5 > 4 change, but what they had not expect during the 1-1/2 - 2 years of developpement was to need use 40nm for this cards ( they was plan on 32nm, i don't learn anything to someone) .... they have need aim their card a bit lower ( maybe too much ) it's not hard to imagine what will have be the performance just with more SP ( 28-30SMID maybe). But i don't contest the fact AMD look more the value and benefit they can do with their high end gpu's, instead of just aiming for the faster card on market.

[Sam_oslo]

I find this remark rather strange... So, what people were expecting determines what AMD's plan is? That's ridiculous of course - why should there be any relationship between the two?

It wasn't everyone that expected that. Anyone could have noticed that for the previous two generations it hasn't been AMD's intention to match nVidia's high end, at least, not with a single GPU. It's called "small die strategy", and it worked out pretty well. Why would they change it?

Besides, what we have now is a HD6970 that is at roughly the GTX570's level for roughly the same price. Seems absolutely fine to me! "It's all about the single GPU crown" really is the old way of thinking, one AMD put away about two years ago, when they introduced the HD4870...

I think the 1 Gb HD6950 is most important to AMD, since it should neatly fill the gap between the 2 Gb version and the HD6870. AMD must have learned about gaps when nVidia came with their GTX460... I guess they're trying to prevent again ending up in such a situation.

What AMD-fans were expecting, as you express it, was actually more like fighting and attacking to prove that 6970 would match/beat the 580. Just ask hard-core AMD-fan in this forum, many of them will confirm it.

What we got after release, was disappointing for many AMD-fans. But it's understandable if they wouldn't admit it publicly. Because many of them have been emotionally involved in fighting for 6970.

AMD or nvidia, doesn't matter which, the high-end is all about performance-crown. Make no mistake!

[Lanek]

What AMD-fans were expecting, as you express it, was actually more like fighting and attacking to prove that 6970 would match/beat the 580. Just ask hard-core AMD-fan in this forum, many of them will confirm it.

What we got after release, was disappointing for many AMD-fans. But it's understandable if they wouldn't admit it publicly. Because many of them have been emotionally involved in fighting for 6970.

AMD or nvidia, doesn't matter which, the high-end is all about performance-crown. Make no mistake!

I think AMD boys have just forget, AMD was not able to deliver what they have wanted to do initially in 32nm ... the cards spec and perf was offcourse sadly lowered from their initial plan, i think the big thing, is finally they have got maybe only 7 months for change their plan, redesign the product and complete the launch etc... and this is quite a nice exploit from them.

The initial 32nm Cayman will surely have give a good run for his money to the GTX580 ( well it will have been a good match, but thing don't allways goes as it should ), now im really curious to see what it will happend with the next generation in 28nm....

[RaV666]

Yea, Cayman based on a 32nm process was supposed to have 1920SPs, it has 1536, and still is in the spitting distance of the 580.
Many tend to forget the simplest of things, Cayman is 380mm2, GF110 is a 520mm2 monstrosity with wider bus.
AMD would have to pull a miracle to get faster.Some people were expecting a bigger die tho.

[cegras]

What AMD-fans were expecting, as you express it, was actually more like fighting and attacking to prove that 6970 would match/beat the 580. Just ask hard-core AMD-fan in this forum, many of them will confirm it.

What we got after release, was disappointing for many AMD-fans. But it's understandable if they wouldn't admit it publicly. Because many of them have been emotionally involved in fighting for 6970.

AMD or nvidia, doesn't matter which, the high-end is all about performance-crown. Make no mistake!

Are you confusing that with a bunch of posts quoted from other forums that said the 6970 would beat the 580?

Why do you keep trying to flamebait the "AMD-fans"? Can't you exhibit a little of that much vaunted impartiality you keep preaching about?

Besides, what we have now is a HD6970 that is at roughly the GTX570's level for roughly the same price. Seems absolutely fine to me! "It's all about the single GPU crown" really is the old way of thinking, one AMD put away about two years ago, when they introduced the HD4870...

And if a 1 gb version is released that is cheaper than the GTX570, by god I'll probably buy it.

[LightSpeed]

AMD or nvidia, doesn't matter which, the high-end is all about performance-crown. Make no mistake!

Really? 4870/4850?