HD6970 vs. GTX 570 vs. 6950(unlocked)

[OCX600RR]

I can confirm that 1GB just isn't enough to play most newer games at 1080p + with more than 4xAA applied. I like to play my games at 8xAA/16xAF, and even the 6870 1GB maxed out when running F1 2010 and Metro. For people who like to play games with lots of filters applied, I'd say the HD6950 2GB + unlock is the best way to go. Sure, with little or no AA applied, an overclocked GTX 560 will spank the 6950 but once lots of filters are applied, the 1GB on the 560 just can't cope with it.

[The Nemesis]

@SaFrOuT

Hello, I have GTX 570's and 6970's as well as a 24 " dell on testbed. What benchmarks would you like to see compared between the two cards? Also give me an Idea of gpu clocks you'd like to see in this comparison.

[sniper_sung]

@SaFrOuT

Hello, I have GTX 570's and 6970's as well as a 24 " dell on testbed. What benchmarks would you like to see compared between the two cards? Also give me an Idea of gpu clocks you'd like to see in this comparison.

Just run the official benchmark of metro 2033. Use MSAA 4X instead of AAA. Everything highest, except PhysX is off.

[kuroikenshi]

Clearly the best way is to go 6950 2GB and unlock it.
However i dont get people recommending to get 560 because it can overclock to 1ghz.
6950 can do that too people.First reviews werent getting there because there was no software.
6950 2GB has more power,consumes LESS power, overclocks the same, and can be unlocked to 6970 while costing like 20$ more.For me its a no brainer.
GTX 560 will be good too, but 1GB is starting to become bottleneck with high enough settings.And theres nothing to unlock.

which is exactly what I did, I don't recommend it because it would not be cool to have too many people being smart about what's good bang for buck, so please buy GTX 560's and run then on 2 way sli.... in the meantime I might get a 3rd or 4th 6950 and unlock it as well

[Breathless]

What about when we throw this puppy in the mix?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-099-_-Product

Palit NE5X56T01142-1041F GeForce GTX 560 Ti 2GB

[VoodooProphetII]

What about when we throw this puppy in the mix?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-099-_-Product

Palit NE5X56T01142-1041F GeForce GTX 560 Ti 2GB

Now this would be a nice little card. Pitty not everybody see things the same way. Thanks for the link.

[Breathless]

Now this would be a nice little card. Pitty not everybody see things the same way. Thanks for the link.

Palit GTX 560 Ti 2GB VS HD6950 2GB Unlocked.... which one wins for someone with a 2560X1600 Monitor?

[Johnny87au]

Palit GTX 560 Ti 2GB VS HD6950 2GB Unlocked.... which one wins for someone with a 2560X1600 Monitor?

Im not exactly sure on this one seeming as there both 2gb cards but if you unlocked it im betting the 6950 does..

[Okda]

Hello,

finally after 5 days suffering in Egypt the Internet is BACK, and Mubarak is going away (hopefully)

Thanks all for the replies. i think i will get the 6950

the one available here in Egypt are the Sapphire and the MSI, gonna check which of then can be unlocked and get it

Thanks again

[EzyRyder]

Nice one mate, good luck with getting rid of Mubarak - september is an awful long time to wait.

Stay safe, I heard there are riots at the moment!!!

[Okda]

things were very good till his ty announcement last night and what his troops are doing now to the protesters everywhere now

[tajoh111]

Unfortunately I have returned my 580 SLI for refund as they are still too hot and cannot overcome Metro 2033. I guess there will be no 40nm cards able to deal with it, just like there were no pre-40nm cards capable of dealing with Crysis.

I re-ran the benchmark with 5870 CF (1GB on each card), with PhysX off and DOF off. Even with 4AF I get unplayable fps as long as 4AA is used.



Generally we don't even need Metro 2033 to kill a card with just a little poor 1GB memory at the resolution of 1920x1200. Many other games will do, such like Napoleon Total War.

It is not even memory killing it so much as the game itself. With 4x AA 16, and max settings, your going to run into unplayable frame rates with a single card regardless depending on the level and environment, regardless of memory because you simply need more GPU power.

[japamd]

Then you must have used "AAA" instead of "MSAA 4X". Not even 580 1.5GB SLI has enough memory for "MSAA 4X" @ 1920 x 1200. Look at the min fps:



What's your spec to be able to handle "MSAA 4X"? Some alien technology to enable real-time compression into 1GB memory?

Even CFX 6950@6970 2GB is not enough for MSAA 4x on Metro 2033.

MSAA 4x and DOF enabled


MSAA 4x and DOF disabled

[Dacipher]

I recently installed an MSI 6950, and it ran perfect (36-37c idle, 58c load). I recently flashed my MSI 6950 with the MSI 6970 bios from techpowerup and it ran perfect (41c idle, 60c load). So yeah, try out the MSI 6950. By the way this is set with my fan profile in MSI Afterburner.

[Okda]

I recently installed an MSI 6950, and it ran perfect (36-37c idle, 58c load). I recently flashed my MSI 6950 with the MSI 6970 bios from techpowerup and it ran perfect (41c idle, 60c load). So yeah, try out the MSI 6950. By the way this is set with my fan profile in MSI Afterburner.

thanks alot for sharing your experinece with the MSI 6950

what was the speed of ram and gpu in the 6970 bios u used ???


and what is your room temp to have idle temps less than 40C

[Dacipher]

thanks alot for sharing your experinece with the MSI 6950

what was the speed of ram and gpu in the 6970 bios u used ???


and what is your room temp to have idle temps less than 40C

No problem, everyone should deserve an unlock. It was all default 6970 specifications. 1536 880/1375. Its been hot here in Southern California so my central a/c is always on and usually set to 60-65F so my room is about 15-17c. I also have to mention that my Lian-Li is great and helps much.

[[XC] hipno650]

i just finished two gaming builds for some customers on mine. both using 2600k's @4.8 and same mobo. one has a pair of 6950's (unlocked to 6970's) and the other with a pair of GTX 570's and i did some Direct benches compared to my GTX 480 SLI as well and between the two of them the GTX 570's were by far my fav. I had multiple driver issues with the 6950/6970's no to mention that the performance of the GTX 570's was quite a bit higher once everything was OCed and all said and done. one thing you will notice about the GTX 570's is that they OC like nothing you ever seen. i had them both up to 875 with a TINY bump in voltage and reasonable temps. at which they were a good bit faster then the AMD cards. PLEASE TAKE INTO ACCOUNT I noticed that unlocking the shadders on the 6950's gave totally worthless increases in perf. with the same clocks the average increase from the unlock as about 5%... big deal if you ask me...

also note that I noticed that the 6950's were louder and threw just as much heat as the GTX 570's so nothing to take into account there...

my vote is with the GTX 570, once OCed its a total BEAST (not that a 6970 or 6950 is not or anything) if your going to just the single 1080p res take the 570 because in the COUPLE of games that use more then the 1.28GB of RAM at that res (like all two of them) you can simply dial the AA back some... because I could challenge you to show me the difference between 16xQ AA and 8X or even good 4x for that matter.

however both are great performing cards... you won't be disappointed...

[OCBalmang]

The 6970 is the way to go, IF and ONLY IF you have the money and your not wanting to stay at stock, Because of the lack of power Connection to the 6950.

I've already tested the 560 TI , Its not worth it... Unless you really have a tight budget...

The Unlocked 6950 is Worthless If you want to take it further, It won't Overclock partically anywhere...

The 6970 Out performs the 570GTX, Most games Don't take advantage of what the cuda Cores have to offer now a days, Runs cooler and Out performs for less power than 570.

The 6950 unlock is something you can go for if you want to save 100$ and just buy a nice memory kit since there cheap at the moment...

But honestly if you say you can afford a 570 or a 6970... THE 6970 IS THE WAY TO GO, you wont regret it i have one i did the tests and asked the same questions.. If you wanted to go further you'd get a GTX 580<---- which isnt that big of an upgrade for the cost.

YOU CAN PRICE MATCH ANY 6970 FOR 349.99, Doubt me and i can Prove it!

[Ket]

Ok, to try and calm all the children down...

- If you can wait for the GTX560 to drop in price, it may be a viable option. Once its OC'd its about as fast as a 6950.
- 2GB onboard memory is very useful for high resolution, large textures games. Its not necessarily essential to have a 2GB card right now, but in a year or so deffinately
- GTX570 performance kinda falls between the 6950 and 6970. Fairly good all-rounder but has the lacking memory thing which will bite you in the not too distant future.

So, what would I do? Buy a HD6950 and try to flash it to a 6970. If it won't successfully unlock, exchange it for a proper 6970.

[Okda]

i want to get an AMD card honestly for now, the price difference between the 6950 and 6970 here in Egypt is around 80$, not the big deal but i will postpone my decision which one of them to buy till i buy the CPU and mobo and see their final cost, the only dealer who got the 2600k here is selling it for around 400$, while the one who has the P8P67 Deluxe is selling it only in a combo with a 2400
hope in few days the supply of SB components will increase here

again thanks all for sharing

[eXa]

Metro 2033
1920x1080* AAA, 16xAF, Very High, Tesselation on, DoF on, Advanced PhysX on.
Maximum memory usage: 835MB
Average memory usage: 755MB

Metro 2033
1920x1080* 4xMSAA, 16xAF, Very High, Tesselation on, DoF on, Advanced PhysX on.
Maximum memory usage: 1132MB
Average memory usage: 1107MB


Metro 2033
1920x1200 AAA, 16XAF, Very High, Tesselation on, DoF on, Advanced PhysX on.
Maximum memory usage: 1038MB
Average memory usage: 1021MB

Metro 2033
1920x1200 4xMSAA, 16XAF, Very High, Tesselation on, DoF on, Advanced PhysX on
Maximum memory usage: 1274MB
Average memory usage: 1263MB

[sniper_sung]

It is not even memory killing it so much as the game itself. With 4x AA 16, and max settings, your going to run into unplayable frame rates with a single card regardless depending on the level and environment, regardless of memory because you simply need more GPU power.

Then another good example of showing how 1GB is so small, is GTA4. Set everything on Very High at 1920 x 1200, then it will be impossible to set "View Distance" to 100, simply because there isn't enough video memory. Yeah I know it's console port sh1t but we have to accept the truth that 1GB is out-of-date.

[akula2]

Did you ever try to run Metro 2033 with 4xAA DX11 Very High @ 1920x1200 on any 1GB graphics card?

just one question pls: i never tried such a solution but what's the benefit of going such very high resolutions? i mean, pushing the card to limit by consuming all the memory and spiking up the power (presume it should be overclocked). just a thought about should i need such a setting to play on big lcd like say on a Samsung P2770hd? my question is not about asking why we shouldn't use the resource, it's about are such very high resolution a must to play

am quite satisfied going with 6950 2gb but i'll wait for sapphire to release the toxic edition. no unlocking or cfx. only a single card should be fine. i'll have a second thought if anyone suggests a better gtx card than 6950, which guzzles less power and churns less noise compared to 6950.

actually, how to better understand about graphics card resolution or gaming resolution table etc?

[akula2]

Then another good example of showing how 1GB is so small, is GTA4. Set everything on Very High at 1920 x 1200, then it will be impossible to set "View Distance" to 100, simply because there isn't enough video memory. Yeah I know it's console port sh1t but we have to accept the truth that 1GB is out-of-date.

not necessarily. i dunno anything about metro patches/updates but it's a possibility that game itself isn't optimized or has a bug? am not sure, just a thought.