AMD Radeon HD 7990: Eight Games And A Beastly Card For $1,000

Page 5 - Seeking answers? Join the Tom's Hardware community: where nearly two million members share solutions and discuss the latest tech.
Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
Status
Not open for further replies.
Why did you not add a comparison to the "7990" cards out there already?. Those running at dual-7970 on 1 PCB sold as "7990"????

I have one of those cards, and would LOVE to see a comparison in both raw power and price.
 


It would be good to compare, but that would also require that they own those cards.
 
[citation][nom]dragonsqrrl[/nom]Unfortunately I'm really not sure the whining issue is something that can be fixed with a driver update. I think it has more to do with the hardware on the board than anything else. But it's good to see that AMD has finally recognized the frame time variance and micro-stutter problem, and are actively pursuing a solution. Although the test in the review was limited, I think it's telling that every gamer tested was able to recognize the difference between AMD and Nvidia cards, and even the difference brought by AMD's own prototype drivers.[/citation]
[citation][nom]hero1[/nom]I know and that's what I meant by hopping that they would have addressed the whining with this card. It happens to all their cards, well the ones that I have owned especially the XFX and if they knew what causes then they should have fixed it.Let's hope that the prototype driver will also translate to better drivers for all their GPUs and address the frame rate issues. Other than that, it is a good card but I think, for my personal use since I was waiting to see what this can offer, I will just get the GTX 680 or the GTX 780 next month and will definitely go back to AMD if they address those issues.[/citation]


relaly whats the issue against v-sync , all it does is match yoru rame rate output to your monitor';s refresh rate , besides any frame rate over your monitors refresh isn't seen any way since the monitor can't output frames that fast. get a 120hz monitor msot games wont render above that even with out vsync . so relaly turnign on v-sync shouldn't be a deal killer.
 
Certainly not trying to be a fanboy here, but I love how Chris Angelini still picks the Nvidia GTX 690 as a better card over the 7990. 6 of 8 tests AMD outshines and outperforms. Who really cares about power consumption at this price? If you're spending $1000, you're obviously buying a quality PSU with at least 84 amps on the 12v rail....Who really gives a crap about 375 watts vs 300 watts? Really? Hands down the AMD is outperforming Nvidia for a change and it pisses people off. Get over it. AMD has finally built a better GPU with its Tahiti line over Kepler. Not to mention the game bundle is pretty rediculous too.
 
[citation][nom]animalosity[/nom]Certainly not trying to be a fanboy here, but I love how Chris Angelini still picks the Nvidia GTX 690 as a better card over the 7990. 6 of 8 tests AMD outshines and outperforms. Who really cares about power consumption at this price? If you're spending $1000, you're obviously buying a quality PSU with at least 84 amps on the 12v rail....Who really gives a crap about 375 watts vs 300 watts? Really? Hands down the AMD is outperforming Nvidia for a change and it pisses people off. Get over it. AMD has finally built a better GPU with its Tahiti line over Kepler. Not to mention the game bundle is pretty rediculous too.[/citation]

You clearly didn't read the review very well. It showed the 690 winning 6 of 8 benchmarks in straight FPS, and it showed the 7990 losing in every single one on frame variation. It also showed their gamer panel all unanimously picked the 690 as being smoother in a blind test. Even with the prototype drivers, it lost in almost every way, but showed definite improvement. What review were you reading?

Hint: Read the black bars, and not the prototype drivers, those won't come for a few more months, and even then, they had much more frame variance than the 690.
 
Pricing bugs me too, when I started building my own pc's, mid level cards were $299-$399 and the flagship cards were $499.... Now flag ship cards are pushing 1k?

The funny thing about it is, as technology improves, it actually gets cheaper to build these things so one would expect the price to drop, and then when you figure the R&D cost, it would level out.... not double.

There are some greedy people out there screwing consumers.
 
Never lose sight of the simple laws of economics. The pricing has more to do with the manufacturer's supply and demand than the consumers' wishful thinking. Supply is low, and at that price, demand is low; but still high enough to cover the $1000 price level because apparently a lot of people like free games and don't read reviews. We'll see though, I would expect a price drop sooner, rather than later.
 
Very nice lots of GPU power but, it is unevenly matched with the ram. 3GB is plenty for a single monitor and would do quite nicely for most things on two monitors but, if your going to use 3-5 monitors it will fall short in many areas while the GPU's won't so much.

I would love to see a card like this with a total of 12GB so it would have an effective 6GBs for multi-monitor rendering/gaming.
 
The reviewer here definitely seems to be prejudicial in favor of the 690.

The 7990 really shines in GPU computing. Nvidia has stated that they have focused less on GPU computing with the 680/690's to improve and focus more on gaming and it shows. The 7990 absolutely blows the 690 away on these benchmarks and while the reviewer does discuss this he seems to place a very low overall importance on it.

The 7990 has better cooling and lower noise than the 690 yet the reviewer devotes almost two pages in total whining about the whine the 7990 makes complete with graphs and videos. One has to wonder about the level of importance assigned to this whine when compared to overall lower noise and better cooling.

The 690 has been out for a while and has had time to optimize their drivers whereas the first official AMD 7990 was just released and they will undoubtedly improve the issues that cause micro-stutter as is evidenced in the review with AMD's Prototype driver that will also undoubtedly be improved before its final release, yet a low level of importance was also placed on this.

How well the 7990 would do in Multi-monitor set ups of 3 or more monitors is anybody's guess. That was never touched on in the review but, I would imagine that with AMD's track record and the fact that it has more memory that is one area that the 7990 would shine but, one of AMD's greatest strengths was completely left out of the review and two pages of whining about the whine was included. Go figure.

When the 7990 scored well in games the reviewer said it was because the card was optimized for it. Like it was an excuse, like cheating or a bad thing. Quite frankly I hope AMD optimizes this card for as many things as possible. That should be the ultimate goal, shouldn't it?

To sum it up, the new AMD reference HD 7990 is an awesome card and it's better than the GTX 690 in almost all areas with the very real exception of micro-stutter. AMD is developing very promising drivers that employ the same characteristics that Nvidia has used to virtually eliminate micro-stutter in their GTX 690. I have personally seen AMD's drivers work wonders in eliminating micro-stutter on my CrossFire set ups and I see no reason to believe this will be any different, making the 7990 not only the best card for gaming but the best card over-all that money can buy.

Yet, I doubt anyone that didn't read between the lines would take that from this review.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not accusing the reviewer of intentionally misleading anyone. We all have our opinions. I just think the reviewers opinion is strongly colored with his own personal bias.



 
@Idonno
This is a gaming card, and they tested it primarily for gaming. 7990's have been out a while, so the drivers are not improving much, no more than any other card, this is just the first AMD spec'ed 7990.

The point about the driver being specifically written to help microstutter in a particular game, is if this is how microstutter is going to be fixed, on a game by game basis, then that means new releases and unpopular games will likely have microstutter issues. It would ultimately be best if the microstutter issue can be done as a general fix, rather than a game by game fix. Either way, the fix is a few months away.

I think the one being biased is you. You are over looking serious problems in the area these cards are designed for; gaming. If you bought the card for gaming, its primary intended use, you'd be unsatisfied with the results. In the future, with new drivers, it could change, but we can't see into the future. However, they did give you a hint on what is coming with the Prototype drivers. That is more than most other reviews do.
 
[citation][nom]bystander[/nom]This is a gaming card, and they tested it primarily for gaming. 7990's have been out a while, so the drivers are not improving much, no more than any other card, this is just the first AMD spec'ed 7990.[/citation]While the marketing strategy for the 690 and the 7990 is certainly aimed at gamers many people use powerful cards other than FirePro's and Quadro's to do a large number of non-game related things for a large number of reasons and the 7990 didn't sacrifice GPU computing for gaming making it a better all-around performer.

Since this is the first "AMD spec'ed 7990" this is the first time that AMD is writing drivers specifically with this card in mind. So I really don't see your point.

As far as your other comments on the drivers go: As I stated "AMD is developing very promising drivers that employ the same characteristics that Nvidia has used to virtually eliminate micro-stutter in their GTX 690" Neither I nor the reviewer said "specifically written to help microstutter in a particular game" but once the drivers are completed if they are lacking in any particular area I would hope AMD would address that issue, wouldn't you?

You said: " However, they did give you a hint on what is coming with the Prototype drivers. That is more than most other reviews do."

He kind of had to since AMD sent them to him with the card, unless he was trying to be purposely biased which is something I didn't accuse him of.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying the 7990 is a better gamer than the 690 at the moment but, its not just another un-official 7990 and AMD is just starting to develop drivers specifically for this card. Like a motherboard or any new hardware it still has some bugs that need to be worked out with driver updates. This card has the very real potential to be every bit as good or possibly better than a 690 in gaming and since AMD didn't have to compromise GPU computing it will almost certainly be the better all-around performer.

So like I said before "I doubt anyone that didn't read between the lines would take that from this review."
 
I think you may be surprised to learn that there is almost nothing special about a 7990 in terms of drivers. It is just 7970's in crossfire, and behave the same with with ever so slight changes. The 690 is nothing but two 680's and it doesn't perform better than 680's either.

Anyways, don't expect much other than the a microstutter fix in the near future and as far as the bias goes, if that is the case, every review site that used FCAT is biased as they all came to the same conclusion.
 

Actually "bystander" I am familiar with your posts and generally respect your opinion. About the only thing I find surprising is that so far on these comments, I'm not learning anything from you at all.

While this new 7990 is indeed basically two 7970's in CF one very important difference is that these two GPU's are connected via a "PEX 8747 switch—the same one Nvidia uses to enable inter-GPU communication on the GeForce GTX 690". Nvidia was able to get micro-stutter under control with the development of the same type of frame pacing driver that AMD is now developing for the 7990.
So yes it is important that for the 1st time this is an official AMD card and AMD is now (also for the first time) officially supporting and writing drivers for it instead of just relying on it's 7970 drivers.

The only unfortunate thing here is that we have to wait until June/July to get even beta drivers (see de5_Roy's post) But again it shouldn't be a big surprise that new hardware will benefit from maturing drivers.
I know your thinking "this isn't new hardware" but it is to AMD, the makers of the GPU's on that hardware and the arguably best developers of drivers for that particular configuration.
Good a micro-stutter fix is all this card needs to be the best gamer as well as the best all around graphics card on the market.

I think it was very good that FCAT was used in this review and wish it was used in more as it presents more accurate facts.

I also don't have a problem with anyone saying that at this moment in time the GTX 690 is the best gamer because that is in fact the truth.

I would also not have as much of a problem if this was a HD 7990 vs GTX 690 review but, it was supposed to be a review of the HD 7990 not just a somewhat biased shoot-out.

In short I have no problem with the facts that were presented in this review, just the way in which they were presented (as is clearly evidenced in my 2nd post).



 
I don't know what to say. Every new card launch is usually tested against other existing cards, so we know where it stands. The 690 is the logical card to test it against. You were calling the review biased, but this is a typical review, one of many, that said the same thing. I was just trying to help you realize that.

I'm sure this will be revisited when the prototype driver is released.
 

Yea, but come on almost two pages in total whining about the whine the 7990 makes complete with graphs and videos. When very little was said in comparison to overall lower noise and better cooling of the 7990.

That doesn't seem just a little biased to you?

I listened to the difference and while I liked the sound of the 680 better, I hardly think paying 10 times more attention to this fairly minor difference than the (IMO) more important differences of the overall lower noise and better cooling of the 7990 was fair and impartial reviewing.

Don't get me wrong I think the 690 is a great gaming card and until I read that Nvidia said they are focusing less on GPU computing with the 680/690's to improve and focus more on gaming, the 680 was a top contender for my next card. They have accomplished their goal quite nicely but at (again IMO) to high a price. Their GPU computing is now pretty abysmal when compared to a similar AMD offerings and I think it's a shame, that used to be one of Nvidia's strengths.

Even if the 7990 does get its micro-stutter issues completely under control it will not beat the 690 by much. they will both still be great gaming cards with similar gaming performance but the 7990 is and will be miles ahead of the 690 in computing which is important. In fact the 7990 did so well in that area it dusted cards like the Quadro and AMD's own FirePro. Very impressive!

But this is all stuff that should have held high importance in a review for the 7990. At least a higher importance than a not too audible whine, not the 1/10th importance it appears to have by the way the reviewer presented the facts.

This is a review of the new AMD 7990 after all and I understand that comparisons of similar offerings are necessary but in order for a review like this to be non-biased major strengths and weaknesses should share similar importance. :pfff:
 
I'm sorry, but the only bias I hear is from you. They did everything in their power to satisfy all the people who don't want to believe in AMD's problems with FCAT, audio, video and a gamer panel, yet you still aren't satisfied with the review.
 
That's funny I'm very aware of AMD's short comings and I have no problem posting about them both here and on other forums. I'm also aware of their strengths but, then I'm not just some fan boy that is to blind to see both sides of an issue.

Had you read my posts with your head and not your heart I'm certain you would have seen the validity of my points but, oh well such is life.

Ask your self this have you ever taken AMD's side on anything since you bought two 680's for sli?

I have taken Nvidia's side on numerous occasions. Had I not wanted a triple monitor set up, I would have bought a 580 instead of 2-6870's in 2010 and if Nvidia didn't move away from GPU computing, a top contender for my next card would be a 690. Even here I have said that at the moment the 690 is the better gamer. I could care less about brands. The most capable product is what's important to me.

On that note I think it's safe to say that we will never agree on the validity of this review so rather than beating a dead hoarse this will be my last response to you on this issue.
:pt1cable:


 
Its strange how easy it is to for people to play the "F Card" whenever it is proven the competitor did better. In May 2012 Kepler came out with fire and brimstone, beat AMD across the board, people proclaimed the end of AMD. AMD then delivered its drivers roll outs from 12.5 to 13.1 and not only did performance improve it started to beat Nvidia cards adn maintain it, sure some games favor nvidia and others AMD but on balance AMD scored victories on performance and for over a year on pricing before nvidia tried to play the game.
 
[citation][nom]Idonno[/nom]That's funny I'm very aware of AMD's short comings and I have no problem posting about them both here and on other forums. I'm also aware of their strengths but, then I'm not just some fan boy that is to blind to see both sides of an issue. Had you read my posts with your head and not your heart I'm certain you would have seen the validity of my points but, oh well such is life. Ask your self this have you ever taken AMD's side on anything since you bought two 680's for sli?I have taken Nvidia's side on numerous occasions. Had I not wanted a triple monitor set up, I would have bought a 580 instead of 2-6870's in 2010 and if Nvidia didn't move away from GPU computing, a top contender for my next card would be a 690. Even here I have said that at the moment the 690 is the better gamer. I could care less about brands. The most capable product is what's important to me. On that note I think it's safe to say that we will never agree on the validity of this review so rather than beating a dead hoarse this will be my last response to you on this issue.[/citation]
Just because I disagree with you, doesn't mean I don't want AMD to do well. I just don't know why you're upset about a review that is full of extremely useful information, just because they didn't give it praise even though it has a few major flaws.

I disagree with you about what is important in a gaming card. If you've read my past thoughts on a pair of 470's I once had, you'd understand how much I hated the cards due to noise. I also had a 5870 that I hated the noise of and got rid of it as a result (though not enough to talk about on the forums). To a gamer, micro-stutter and noise means a lot more to me than professional applications. It is a gaming card after all, why should professional applications be given all the attention?

You want them to focus on things it is not designed for, because it makes it look better. That really seems more biased than focusing on what does matter for its intended use. What is interesting is how few reviews gave them any compute review space at all. Don't you think that even including that stuff is biased towards AMD if anything? (I'm glad they show it, but most reviews do not).

I'm happy to help someone feel better about their cards, and help them fix issues they have, no matter the brand. I however won't try to paint a rosie picture about a card with flaws if they are contemplating buying it. If I were the author of this, I'd feel really bad if a bunch of people bought this card after a glowing review, knowing it had major flaws.
 
And what is the flaw, except the ones that official catalyst 13.5 haven't already fixed and improved, the only flaw is that 13.5 will only release in June before, then I know 13.6 is also in the piple targeting CFX and DG. Its the same old people that paint the picture that Nvidia has done so well this round when the rational world of reviews will catagorically hand this generation to AMD whom with hardware and software support have basically flushed Nvidia out. While SLI is the only attraction over current CFX but that as been stated many times is being worked on.

You can go to AMD's site and draw up the return report on beta tested 13.5 drivers and the aggregate of results see's more performance boost and CFX solutions across the SKU lineup. The 7790 is now even more tantilizing, the 7850 is again the king of budget, the 7870XT is around 5% slower than the 670 at $150 less and the 7970 remains the king of mainstream's high end. As for the Malta it extends dominance over the 690. So bar these few flaws it looks like AMD's software support is the only one that really gives a damn. Where are these all conquering Keplers of may/june last year? Instead you got a watered down 660 in 650ti boost colors, and a K20X pandering around as a GK110.
 
The 13.5 drivers are not the ones fixing the microstutter issue. There is a site that got that messed up, but other than that one, they are all calling the microstutter fix driver, the prototype driver. It doesn't have a name. Even this review uses 13.5 beta drivers as the standard drivers, and the prototype drivers as the ones with the fix.
 


The tests are on 13.5 beta, it is possible the prototypes will be merged with 13.5 and 13.6 in may/june this year, from those entrusted with the testing the results were termed "good" and CFX is hardly the limitation it was before the writes. As to performance and the gains slated on the 13.5 drivers. the 7990 is far and beyond the fastest GPU on the market and as we close this generation and move to the next its good enough to accept that this round the green boys got caught with their pants down. Perhaps AMD played the ruse well when Kepler released it was smashing GCN, less than a month later the outlook changed drastically on a single set of drivers, since then AMD software support has handed the biggest butt kicking more then hardware.



 


It certainly was an interesting generation. When Nvidia first came out with their cards, they were the performance champs in almost every way but compute. At the end of the 1st year, AMD caught up and passed them in performance. Then we learned that AMD did indeed have a real measurable stutter issue, even on single cards. AMD then started fixing that issue, and at least with the big titles, seems to be fixed. Then we learned they learned about the CrossfireX issue, and that is still being worked on, and not currently in the publics hands yet.

I'd hardly call this an AMD generation. Those with Nvidia cards have had a lot of time with better performance, even if it was not known until a year later. I feel thankful that I needed 3D Vision and got Nvidia, otherwise I'd still be dealing with micro-stutter. And even if it was fixed tomorrow, that was a year worth of time I would have had to deal with it.

Now perception throughout the generation has been a lot more up and down. AMD got their cards out first and had the crown, soon taken over by Nvidia, but they had a supply issue. Then after 9ish months, AMD caught up and was king, at least as far as what the public thought. Then they were in the dog house with the latency issue, they work on that only to see their microstutter issue, which they are currently working on.

Anyways, no AMD was not the winners this generation. At least not for those who purchased cards a year ago. Perhaps in a couple months that'll change, though Nvidia is coming out with the 700 refresh series this month.

 
Well regardless of everything previously posted. I have always been fond of Nvidia. The only reason I bought AMD last time is that I like Eyefinity with 3 monitors.

I now find it kind of sad that although Nvidia has improved with multi-monitor set-ups they have moved away from compute in their desktop cards. They used to be the undisputed king in this area.

Even after AMD did a great job of virtually eliminating micro-stutter on my two 6870's in CF I have envied the equivalent GTX 580 (the closest equivalent to two 6870's in CF IMO) for the Adobe Photoshop cuda support. For whatever reason Adobe Photoshop only supports openCL on Apple computers (which also pisses me off) and not PC's so a good Nvidia card was the card to buy. Now people that want to game and use Photoshop to the best of their ability's on the same PC are buying the older 500 series cards when they would rather have something more recent.

Compute used to be one of Nvidia's strong points. They say they moved away from it on their 600 series cards to focus more on gaming which I think is a mistake (and quite possibly a lie). Not everyone wants to buy two separate specialized computers to do everything they need to do and everything they want to do.

Now everyone that want's the best of both worlds has to buy an Apple for Photoshop or an AMD card for every thing else.

I think Nvidia has made an error and I hope they reconsider for their next series of cards.

I for one was planning to buy Nvidia for my next card if they improved how well they supported multi-monitors but, now my choices are limited again.

It's a shame. I can only hope that they lose enough customers like me that will never build another separate PC centered around an overpriced work station card that they will re-examine their direction.

The only benefit I can see is that maybe now more software engineers will write software to take greater advantage AMD cards and not just Nvidia cards as was the norm.

 
Status
Not open for further replies.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom