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gsxrme
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- Mar 31, 2009
- 253
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- 18,780
AMD really needs to hire some professionals to write some drivers. The throughput on the cards for non gaming so much damn higher than when it comes to games. Very disappointed in AMD for not optimizing the drivers and only throwing cards at the market.
technical specs that 7990 should out right destroy any card on the market, but due to poor drivers it doesn't come close.
Also the 375w pull using 2x 8pins should be illegal
technical specs that 7990 should out right destroy any card on the market, but due to poor drivers it doesn't come close.
Also the 375w pull using 2x 8pins should be illegal
- Jul 4, 2008
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[citation][nom]TheCapulet[/nom]I disagree with this. Crossfire gaming has it's place in lower resolutions too. Sure, a card half as expensive can run the games just fine. But you can ALWAYS cripple a single card config with AA, no matter what resolution you're playing it at. Some people buy dual GPU solutions to max their graphics rather than their resolution. And considering your target audience... there's probably quite a few of them reading your articles. tl;dr - Know your target audience Chris. One of the most important rules of journalism.[/citation]
If you're buying a $1,000 graphics card to play at 1920x1080, you're spending more than you need to. We're not talking about CrossFire vs. single-card, we're talking about Radeon HD 7990. The platform bottlenecks at 2560x1440 are palpable in this story...and that's with graphics settings maximized.
If you're buying a $1,000 graphics card to play at 1920x1080, you're spending more than you need to. We're not talking about CrossFire vs. single-card, we're talking about Radeon HD 7990. The platform bottlenecks at 2560x1440 are palpable in this story...and that's with graphics settings maximized.
ojas
Distinguished
- Feb 25, 2011
- 2,924
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Very in-depth review, great read! Good to see FCAT finally being used.
On the bundle: Haven't finished DE:HR, but spent around 20 hours on it already, Sleeping Dogs was great, FC3 was a lot of fun (though story was crap), not interested in Hitman and haven't played the rest.
On the other hand, don't have the money or the need or the CPU to drive this card, so whatever
But it's a good deal, if they can get their drivers together. Though from the bundle, four games did have driver optimization and Deus Ex should run just fine anyway, if they can improve FC3 then that's a solid choice of games to complement the card.
On the bundle: Haven't finished DE:HR, but spent around 20 hours on it already, Sleeping Dogs was great, FC3 was a lot of fun (though story was crap), not interested in Hitman and haven't played the rest.
On the other hand, don't have the money or the need or the CPU to drive this card, so whatever
But it's a good deal, if they can get their drivers together. Though from the bundle, four games did have driver optimization and Deus Ex should run just fine anyway, if they can improve FC3 then that's a solid choice of games to complement the card.
MANOFKRYPTONAK
Distinguished
- Feb 1, 2012
- 952
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- 19,060
This card looks good, it has good compute and graphics. The added games bundle are a great value too, as those are good games not just crap. You could sell them unopened I bet for 20 apiece? That would bring the card down to 840. I'd like to see the card at $900 with the bundle though. The prototype drivers look great too But...
But to be completely honest this card came out way late. Like when people complained about nvidias 600 series coming out late. I don't know how to say this without sounding harsh, but I'll try. The people working at AMD are not very intelligent, they have had quite a while to get this card fine tuned. AMD is losing money because of its higher up employees. Lets face it these drivers should not be prototypes at this point, they should have them completely up and functioning. I feel like if AMD had more competent people working for them, the kind who can get drivers ready in a year for a major product launch, that they would have more business. If they could I would gladly give them my business. I want to give them my business, great company overall. Lets face it people buy Apple at higher prices because they run with very little problems, they're a highly polished product.
But...But to be completely honest this card came out way late. Like when people complained about nvidias 600 series coming out late. I don't know how to say this without sounding harsh, but I'll try. The people working at AMD are not very intelligent, they have had quite a while to get this card fine tuned. AMD is losing money because of its higher up employees. Lets face it these drivers should not be prototypes at this point, they should have them completely up and functioning. I feel like if AMD had more competent people working for them, the kind who can get drivers ready in a year for a major product launch, that they would have more business. If they could I would gladly give them my business. I want to give them my business, great company overall. Lets face it people buy Apple at higher prices because they run with very little problems, they're a highly polished product.
Nice read and thanks for taking up the challenge of analyzing the data on "smoothness". It is not perfect but it is helpful. I do hope you can get a larger sample size and I hope you dont have the testes in the same room at the same time doing the test.
I'd like to see them rate the smoothness of a benchmark viewing and then rate actual play.
As for the conclusion, I would tend to agree that the price is high and the bundle is good.
I'd like to see them rate the smoothness of a benchmark viewing and then rate actual play.
As for the conclusion, I would tend to agree that the price is high and the bundle is good.
17seconds
Champion
- Jul 27, 2010
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AMD only just found out about the frame latency issue as recently as January 2013. It's clear there is a major hurdle to addressing this issue requiring basically to start all over from scratch.
The big issue that is likely keeping them from releasing the frame latency fix is the conundrum that comes with it: decreased performance. The key is metering out the frames by slowing them down, without decreasing the FPS beyond an acceptable limit. This has been the takeaway from FCAT testing, when you clean up the frames, the Crossfire option is rarely better than just a single card.
Unfortunately for AMD, shortly after the 7990 is finally available for purchase, and long before the driver issues are sorted out, Nvidia will have its GTX 780 out, running at just about Titan speeds for much less money and on a single GPU. The 7990, as irrelevant as it is now, without a major price drop, will be resigned to a mere curio at just the point when it is finally able to deliver on its performance potential.
The big issue that is likely keeping them from releasing the frame latency fix is the conundrum that comes with it: decreased performance. The key is metering out the frames by slowing them down, without decreasing the FPS beyond an acceptable limit. This has been the takeaway from FCAT testing, when you clean up the frames, the Crossfire option is rarely better than just a single card.
Unfortunately for AMD, shortly after the 7990 is finally available for purchase, and long before the driver issues are sorted out, Nvidia will have its GTX 780 out, running at just about Titan speeds for much less money and on a single GPU. The 7990, as irrelevant as it is now, without a major price drop, will be resigned to a mere curio at just the point when it is finally able to deliver on its performance potential.
MANOFKRYPTONAK
Distinguished
- Feb 1, 2012
- 952
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Thanks for the info, I agree though that AMD is late to the game on this one. The 780 looks promising, and should have been the 680 IMHO. The 7970 is a great card though, and with the compute I feel as if it is a more complete card than a 680 is.
griptwister
Distinguished
- Oct 7, 2012
- 1,437
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[citation][nom]ericjohn004[/nom]Wow, another great article by Tom's Hardware. It sure seems like Nvidia has the higher quality parts here, or at least the drivers.And for anyone who thinks this article is useless or has any complaints.. what's your problem? Are you such a fan of AMD graphics that you hate on an article just because you don't like facts? Either way, AMD seemed to fix some of these problems with the driver update, although still not as good as Nvidia.[/citation]
I've seen other benchmarks that show more of a frame difference between the HD 7990 and GTX Titan. Something just doesn't seem right about these benchmarks...
I've seen other benchmarks that show more of a frame difference between the HD 7990 and GTX Titan. Something just doesn't seem right about these benchmarks...
[citation][nom]griptwister[/nom]I've seen other benchmarks that show more of a frame difference between the HD 7990 and GTX Titan. Something just doesn't seem right about these benchmarks...[/citation]
Do you mind posting a link?
I think you may be misunderstanding this review compared to what others have tested. They didn't show frame time differences, they showed frame variances. The difference is about how long on average it takes to render a frame vs. how consistent frame rendering time is between frames.
Here is another review that shows the same thing: http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphics-Cards/AMD-Radeon-HD-7990-6GB-Review-Malta-Gets-Frame-Rated
Do you mind posting a link?
I think you may be misunderstanding this review compared to what others have tested. They didn't show frame time differences, they showed frame variances. The difference is about how long on average it takes to render a frame vs. how consistent frame rendering time is between frames.
Here is another review that shows the same thing: http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphics-Cards/AMD-Radeon-HD-7990-6GB-Review-Malta-Gets-Frame-Rated
godfather666
Distinguished
- Aug 10, 2011
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- 18,680
This is an epic review, the best I've ever read on any website. Well done, and keep up the great work.
I'm actually more of an AMD buyer (my current card is a Radeon HD 7950), but it seems they have a lot of work to do on their drivers.
I'm actually more of an AMD buyer (my current card is a Radeon HD 7950), but it seems they have a lot of work to do on their drivers.
Wow, fantastic review. Congratulations on moving the state of the art of video card reporting forward in three important areas at once: more illuminating frame rate data, subjective gamer feel and acoustics. These are all very valuable. It would've been a different report without them and a gamer who bought knowing only average fps would have paid the price. Thanks!
To the folks (appropriately) suggesting a lower price, my guess is AMD feels it would be self-defeating. The entire point of a flagship card is to suggest your overall brand & tech is superior. Pricing it lower than the competition's flagship would be about the same as saying, yep we're not as good (unless you wanted your primary brand message to be "we're less expensive" but that's not what they're going for.) They can't do it, won't do it. The closest they could come was probably overspending on the game bundle, which I'd guess is how they lined up so many great titles.
I cry foul on providing prototype drivers that are so far out they can only be dated as "2nd half 2013." That is a very long time in the graphics card cycle, so long that by the time they ship there may be a new crop of relevant video cards. I've heard rumors of a Nvidia refresh as soon as next month.
It's one thing to use late beta stage software in a review under the belief that its a few more tests/days from going out the door. Its quite another to use software that purchasers of the product may not be seeing for up to 8 months. And any schedule that is that long, can go longer.
Readers got all the data they needed so this one specific case may not be a huge deal, but at some point I think consumers/readers are not well served by the inclusion of very future / vaporware software in the context of a current product review. Maybe run an analysis separately as a future technology preview.
It's one thing to use late beta stage software in a review under the belief that its a few more tests/days from going out the door. Its quite another to use software that purchasers of the product may not be seeing for up to 8 months. And any schedule that is that long, can go longer.
Readers got all the data they needed so this one specific case may not be a huge deal, but at some point I think consumers/readers are not well served by the inclusion of very future / vaporware software in the context of a current product review. Maybe run an analysis separately as a future technology preview.
DiddlyDoo23
Honorable
- Apr 24, 2013
- 4
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- 10,510
As much as I want to believe in this card AMD has just continuallly disappointed. And every time I have gone with Radeon or Crossfire setups, I am always disappointed in some way. Hope their driver support becomes more extensive in the future. They are a good company but their always seems to be software issues with their cards, if not hardware issues. I got a liquid cooled SLI gtx 680 setup from ironsidecomputers.com and have not had a single problem to date (7 months later) contrast that with my crossfire 7850 setup I had before that almost every game had errors with.
DiddlyDoo23
Honorable
- Apr 24, 2013
- 4
- 0
- 10,510
As much as I want to believe in this card AMD has just continuallly disappointed. And every time I have gone with Radeon or Crossfire setups, I am always disappointed in some way. Hope their driver support becomes more extensive in the future. They are a good company but their always seems to be software issues with their cards, if not hardware issues. I got a liquid cooled SLI gtx 680 setup from ironsidecomputers.com and have not had a single problem to date (7 months later) contrast that with my crossfire 7850 setup I had before that almost every game had errors with.
- Jul 4, 2008
- 1,878
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[citation][nom]brucek3[/nom]I cry foul on providing prototype drivers that are so far out they can only be dated as "2nd half 2013." That is a very long time in the graphics card cycle, so long that by the time they ship there may be a new crop of relevant video cards. I've heard rumors of a Nvidia refresh as soon as next month.It's one thing to use late beta stage software in a review under the belief that its a few more tests/days from going out the door. Its quite another to use software that purchasers of the product may not be seeing for up to 8 months. And any schedule that is that long, can go longer.Readers got all the data they needed so this one specific case may not be a huge deal, but at some point I think consumers/readers are not well served by the inclusion of very future / vaporware software in the context of a current product review. Maybe run an analysis separately as a future technology preview.[/citation]
The feedback is appreciated, and was something I considered. In this case, the prototype data is being presented alongside the "shipping" beta, and clear time frames are being given. The prototype isn't being given any influence on the conclusion I draw, other than to say AMD is making progress. This is really a one-off situation.
The feedback is appreciated, and was something I considered. In this case, the prototype data is being presented alongside the "shipping" beta, and clear time frames are being given. The prototype isn't being given any influence on the conclusion I draw, other than to say AMD is making progress. This is really a one-off situation.
[citation][nom]brucek3[/nom]I cry foul on providing prototype drivers that are so far out they can only be dated as "2nd half 2013." That is a very long time in the graphics card cycle, so long that by the time they ship there may be a new crop of relevant video cards. I've heard rumors of a Nvidia refresh as soon as next month.It's one thing to use late beta stage software in a review under the belief that its a few more tests/days from going out the door. Its quite another to use software that purchasers of the product may not be seeing for up to 8 months. And any schedule that is that long, can go longer.Readers got all the data they needed so this one specific case may not be a huge deal, but at some point I think consumers/readers are not well served by the inclusion of very future / vaporware software in the context of a current product review. Maybe run an analysis separately as a future technology preview.[/citation]
There is a reason they showed both the most recent beta drivers and the prototype drivers. One shows you what you currently get, the other shows what AMD is working on getting out. Neither one is as good as the SLI drivers, but it shows them moving in the right direction at least.
There is a reason they showed both the most recent beta drivers and the prototype drivers. One shows you what you currently get, the other shows what AMD is working on getting out. Neither one is as good as the SLI drivers, but it shows them moving in the right direction at least.
[citation][nom]cangelini[/nom]The feedback is appreciated, and was something I considered. In this case, the prototype data is being presented alongside the "shipping" beta, and clear time frames are being given. The prototype isn't being given any influence on the conclusion I draw, other than to say AMD is making progress. This is really a one-off situation.[/citation]
Have you guys considered playing with a different definition of what a runt frame is? 20 lines is 2% of the screen. That is really tiny. Pcper had a decent setup, though it might be less favorable, but covers possible problems as well as being more realistic on what constitutes a frame. They are defining a runt frame as a frame that is 20% the average of the last 10 frames. This allows for extreme FPS, as the more FPS you get, the smaller frames are on average, and is more realistic on what you might consider useful.
Have you guys considered playing with a different definition of what a runt frame is? 20 lines is 2% of the screen. That is really tiny. Pcper had a decent setup, though it might be less favorable, but covers possible problems as well as being more realistic on what constitutes a frame. They are defining a runt frame as a frame that is 20% the average of the last 10 frames. This allows for extreme FPS, as the more FPS you get, the smaller frames are on average, and is more realistic on what you might consider useful.
The fact that this card is $1 dollar over $799 blows my mind. A 7970
costs $399 bucks. The 6990 costs $699. Where did they come up with this pricing. As a owner of a
5970 trifire (the 5970 cost $600 bucks) i think you'd have to be
insane to purchase this card. Not to mentions is obselete at the end
of the year. Thanks but no thanks. I'd rather buy two 7970's and keep the $200 dollars in my pocket.
costs $399 bucks. The 6990 costs $699. Where did they come up with this pricing. As a owner of a
5970 trifire (the 5970 cost $600 bucks) i think you'd have to be
insane to purchase this card. Not to mentions is obselete at the end
of the year. Thanks but no thanks. I'd rather buy two 7970's and keep the $200 dollars in my pocket.
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