Five Radeon HD 7970 3 GB Cards, Overclocked And Benchmarked

[Guest]

I was routing for that little Giga since it would fit nicely in my Antec 200, then I saw the noise chart. Sad Panda. Valiant effort Giga, you gave the bigger boys a good run.

 

[tmk221]

I think that 7970 is better deal than gtx680 at the moment.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]tmk221[/nom]I think that 7970 is better deal than gtx680 at the moment.[/citation]

Only if the 2GB of VRAM on the 680 is too little for you (IE with Eyefinity triple 1080p or higher pixel counts), you want great compute performance, or play the specific titles that favor the 7970 is the 7970 the better deal. However, the 7970 and 680 are fairly close, so it's more of a personal preference thing right now. Maybe a 680 has better connectivity options for you or is smaller and the 7970s don't fit in your case or some other situation like that could happen.

 

[chumly]

Is Tom's ever going to start doing GPGPU comparisons? I am quite interested in the M/hash rates of these cards with underclocked memory and higher clocked cores. I'm a gamer, for sure, but I believe it's reasonable to assume that some of us will be folding or mining and will take that into consideration.

Get with the times, Tom's.

 

[cangelini]

[citation][nom]chumly[/nom]Is Tom's ever going to start doing GPGPU comparisons? I am quite interested in the M/hash rates of these cards with underclocked memory and higher clocked cores. I'm a gamer, for sure, but I believe it's reasonable to assume that some of us will be folding or mining and will take that into consideration.Get with the times, Tom's.[/citation]
That information is included in each and every launch piece we do =)

 

[buzznut]

I would pay the extra for the twin frozer. Not only does it top the charts for American cards, but it has the best cooler, is quiet, and the backplate. For modder's looking at the bare circuit board on the back of the card is just too boring. Of course we like modding our own backplates, but that would still be pretty sweet.
I think its worth an extra $50.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]bigmack70[/nom]Well at the moment the 680 isn't available at $500... so at the moment the 7970 is a better deal practically. I agree that theoretically, neither is a cold-cut "better deal", but until Nvidia can fix supply issues, the 680 isn't looking all that great.[/citation]

The 680's poor supply has no effect on it's value or whether or not it's a better deal. It's not a very available deal do to it's low supply, but that has no bearing on whether or not it's a good deal.

 

[maxinexus]

680 for reference would be nice but we all know where it would end up ...on the top
Anyway great comparison ...I wonder why V's memories overclocked so well.

 

[chumly]

[citation][nom]cangelini[/nom]That information is included in each and every launch piece we do =)[/citation]

Nonetheless, you are basing those results on clock speeds that are optimal for gaming and not for mining. For instance, an HD 6850 @ 300/1150 will outperform an HD 6850 @ 850/1150, and with multiple profile settings on programs like MSI Afterburner, making the change for different software is easy and can save your readers some money. Furthermore it would be nice to know what kind of power efficiency is associated with those different clocks.

 

[g-unit1111]

I really wanted a 7970 but I couldn't justify the price although I'm glad I didn't go with the Sapphire model - I don't like cards that take up three slots. But I do have a Sapphire 7870 and it's a fantastic card for the price - if you can't afford a 7970 I highly recommend picking one up.

 

[JamesSneed]

To me the MSI R7970 Lightning is the stand out card. Running cooler, quieter and usually better performing. Thanks for the review I would not have guessed the MSI card was the quieter card of the bunch.

 

[KT_WASP]

Call me old-school or what ever, but the one I like the most in the looks department out of these five cards is the Visiontek reference. The is nothing like cracking open the side panel of a PC and seeing that unmistakable AMD red and black "Brick".

I owned a Visiontek HD4850 a while back, great card (still probably one of my best GPU purchases for value and money spent). Lifetime warranty is nothing to shake a stick at either.

I wish one of these companies would keep the overall look of the reference shroud, but change the cooling.. that way you get best of both worlds.. the black and red striped AMD "Brick" looks with the better and quieter cooling!

 

[halcyon]

One of the things I like about the (reference) is that it exhausts it's heat out of the chassis. It seems like two of any of the other card's heat being added into my Corsair 800D would really raise temps.

 

[TeraMedia]

It was difficult to tell from the backside pic, but did one of those cards have air slots in the PCB behind one of the two fans? If so, that could be a help for cooling the upper card in a crossfire config when only 2 slots away.

I too wish that 680 numbers were on the charts for comparison purposes. Assuming you have the numbers, then why not?

 

[RADIO_ACTIVE]

680s are availible, yes it is very limited but both times I have looked for one I have found one availible and in stock. Tigerdirect has an EVGA SC 680 right now in stock. Toms you can use the word availible lol

 

[RADIO_ACTIVE]

lol New egg has plenty in stock right now to lol

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]RADIO_ACTIVE[/nom]lol New egg has plenty in stock right now to lol[/citation]

Only one model (Galaxy) is in stock at newegg as of 5:17 PM (USA Central time zone) and it only came out today, from the looks of it. Tigerdirect only has the one EVGA model in stock.

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]yobobjm[/nom]Why u no do Diamond, that's the one they sell at Frys[/citation]

Tom's just used the cards that were sent to them by the manufacturers. If a card isn't sent, then they can't test it because they don't have it.

 

[twztechman]

hey - I was gonna say that. A reference 680 comparison is what many of us are looking for. After back and forth (I actually had the Sapphire card in my cart at the Egg the other day) I held out for a reference 680 (Galaxy - arrives tomorrow) I must say my 5870 and most recently 6950 (Sapphire Toxic) are still really good cards.

 

[vakuma5000]

Anyone notice that the GTX 680 is not included for comparison? Is that because the 7979 is now beating the GTX680?
Compare the numbers for Crysis 2 from the origional GTX 680 review and this one. You will notice that the test hardware is the same and has the same OC. Even the slowest 7970 in this comparison beats the gtx 680 from the launch review.
I'm glad it's not too one-sided.
With AMDs AM3+ lineup being the joke that it is, it is good to see they can at least do something right.

From all the benchmarks I have seen, I think the 7970 and the GTX680 are a pretty even matchup performance-wise.
I can't wait to see what the gtx 680 can do in non-reference format.
The gtx 680 lightning vs the 7970 lightning???? That's gonna be a helluva war.

 

[zeratul600]

[citation][nom]cknobman[/nom]Love the review. Would have been cool to see one or two charts with all the cards overclocked vs a ref 680 just to see if highly overclocked 7970's can just about even the performance delta.[/citation]
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-gtx-680-sli-overclock-surround,3162-15.html

 

[blazorthon]

[citation][nom]twztechman[/nom]hey - I was gonna say that. A reference 680 comparison is what many of us are looking for. After back and forth (I actually had the Sapphire card in my cart at the Egg the other day) I held out for a reference 680 (Galaxy - arrives tomorrow) I must say my 5870 and most recently 6950 (Sapphire Toxic) are still really good cards.[/citation]

If they're all reference, then their performance will all be almost identical (not a chance in hell of someone being able to tell the difference).

[citation][nom]vakuma5000[/nom]Anyone notice that the GTX 680 is not included for comparison? Is that because the 7979 is now beating the GTX680? Compare the numbers for Crysis 2 from the origional GTX 680 review and this one. You will notice that the test hardware is the same and has the same OC. Even the slowest 7970 in this comparison beats the gtx 680 from the launch review. I'm glad it's not too one-sided. With AMDs AM3+ lineup being the joke that it is, it is good to see they can at least do something right. From all the benchmarks I have seen, I think the 7970 and the GTX680 are a pretty even matchup performance-wise.I can't wait to see what the gtx 680 can do in non-reference format. The gtx 680 lightning vs the 7970 lightning???? That's gonna be a helluva war.[/citation]

The 7970 doesn't quite match the reference 680 until the 7970 is overclocked to at least 1200MHz or 1250MHz GPU clock. In order to beat the reference 680, it would need to be clocked at 1300MHz to 1400MHz, at a minimum. Memory clock increases should also help, but not as much as increasing that GPU clock frequency.

 

[dreadlokz]

I was expecting the Lightning to win! That HIS is a beast on AIR!!! But I bet the Lightning would win on water and the blue pcb and that ugly cooler on the HIS coudn't be worse! =s

 

[Guest]

I bought the Sapphire 7970 OC for $459 on Amazon.com! Unfortunately they have bumped the price up an additional $20. Just wait if you can, it will drop soon enough. Looking forward to setting it up!

 

[twztechman]

If they're all reference, then their performance will all be almost identical (not a chance in hell of someone being able to tell the difference).

Exactly - that's why is would have been nice to see these cards compared to a reference 680. From what I have seen, in most games it takes a pretty serious overclock for a 7970 to overtake a reference 680. Not to mention how much more power they are using and how much more noise they make.

The real selling point for me on the 680 is the adaptive v-sync. My 30in monitor runs at 60Hz, so with these more powerful cards, this should give me a better all round gaming experience. My last card (Sapphire 6950 Toxic) was a beast of a card - I have it flashed to a 6970 bios and have it overclocked beyond the 6970 specs - but at the resolution I run (2560x1600) tearing just is not an issue. With these more powerful cards, it very likely will be an issue.