Radeon HD 7990 And GeForce GTX 690: Bring Out The Big Guns

[nforce4max]

Drooling like a huge dog

I would love to have any out of those three cards T.T

 

[goodguy713]

i dont care personally i think that his 7990 is pretty sexy ..
as for the 690 .. ill pass

 

[spookyman]

I would not turn down a 7990. Its an impressive card.

But I wonder how it would fare against 2 7970 GHZ cards considering these cards are no more then 2 7970 one board.

 

[colson79]

The whole "uses less power" thing on high end video cards to me is a joke. We are talking the difference of about 1 dollar a month is savings. Not worth my time to even think about.

 

[Guest]

The GTX looks a lot better IMO. Also performs a bit faster than the 7990 while running cooler, and it overclocks like a monster. I got it for a pretty good price from http://computer-radar.com/shop.php?c=all&n=none&i=B008544ZIQ&x=EVGA_GeForce_GTX690_Signature_4096MB_GDDR5_512bit_Dual_GPU_2xDVI_I_DVI_D_mDisplayPort_Quad_SLI_Ready_Graphics_Cards_04G_P4_2692_KR since Newegg was out of stock at the time.

 

[Maximus_Delta]

where can I download RadeonPro 1.1.1.0

I can only find 1.1.0.6
http://www.radeonpro.info/en-US/Downloads/

1.1.0.6 is missing Dynamic Framerate Control

 

[grimworld]

[citation][nom]FormatC[/nom]1 kW/h in Germany: 0.25 Euro (approx. 0.34 USD)This IS an issue.[/citation]

1 kW/h in Iceland: 0.05 Euro (approx. 0.06 USD)
This is a NON issue

 

[techbaddie]

I want one

 

[Novuake]

[citation][nom]Dark OOpa[/nom]The radeon pro is saving AMD's buttBut In the end, 690 was slower than 7990 average framerate but with Radeon Pro, it is the 7990 which is slower right? So yes it's better than without, but the 690 is faster, as smooth, and use a built in technologyAMD really need to work on it's crossfire technology[/citation]

I am assuming you mean the architecture by Radeon pro? It is called Tahiti Pro.. And if Xfire was an issue, we would see very bad micro-stuttering. Its all about the games support for Xfire. Not the other way around.

 

[Novuake]

[citation][nom]merikafyeah[/nom]The GTX 690 is the clear winner in my eyes, especially since there is a two-slot water-cooled version."Just Because You're Fastest Doesn't Make You The Best" pretty much says it all.The Radeons make huge concessions for the sake of performance:1. Bigger size. Three slots vs two. Quad Crossfire with two cards becomes virtually infeasible.2. HUGE power draw: Equals more heat, hence more cooling necessary, hence bigger size.Exceeding PCI-E specs is very worrisome.I think TWO GTX 690s would consume about the same or maybe even less power.3. LOUD. +Coil whine which is even more annoying than just loud.4. LOTS of microstuttering (virtually unplayable without using third-party software).5. Price. Let's be real. $1300 is optimistic, and availability is a shot in the dark.Pros:1. More FPS. Doesn't matter though unless you're using multiple displays, but that comes with the HUGE downside of giant bezels in your face.2. Little to no microstuttering with third-party software. The only saving grace but doesn't add a whole lot since GTX 690 microstuttering isn't that bad.Calling these three-slot monstrosities "inelegant" is possibly the nicest thing you could say.[/citation]

You neglect to look back at the history of Duel Graphics cards, both these cards are huge leaps forward in multiple GPU's on one PCB.

Keep in mind the goal of these are BRUTE force, not elegance. I would not buy one of these but saying either is bad is idiotic.

 

[Anik8]

If you are that passionate to bench aftermarket dual gpu cards with a dual kepler,just wait for the ASUS MARS !

 

[maxinexus]

[citation][nom]FormatC[/nom]1 kW/h in Germany: 0.25 Euro (approx. 0.34 USD)This IS an issue.[/citation]

1kW/h in Boston,MA $0.06718/kWh (0.04411 Euro)= this is NOT an issue

 

[Novuake]

[citation][nom]blazorthon[/nom]Technically, HIS has a winner, not AMD because AMD didn't launch a 7990/7970X2 reference[/citation]

Fair... LOL! Shame AMD didn't do it, maybe this will press them, but I doubt.

 

[Novuake]

[citation][nom]Anik8[/nom]If you are that passionate to bench aftermarket dual gpu cards with a dual kepler,just wait for the ASUS MARS ![/citation]

It won;t ever release... The whole reason ASUS does it is because they do not underclock the each GPU as with normal Duel GPU's. THese reference GTX690 is not underclocked anyway, so what would be the pint of a new Asus ROG MARS??? They could just call it that. But it would not be special in any way except for the cooler. It would actually be a bad idea because its a Three slot, really long card.

 

[dscudella]

Some call me an AMD fanboy but I would have liked to seen Nvidia better represented with both 670 SLI and 680 SLI. From what I've seen they are a better choice for a better price.

Running the benchmarks with:
HiS 7990 $1000 (actual price unknown)
PowerColor 7990 $1000 (if you can find one)
GTX 690 $1000
7970 Ghz Edi XFire $820
7970 Xfire $780
GTX 680 SLI $914
GTX 670 SLI $720

(Prices are off of US PCPartPicker not using rebates and in stock items only)

Also with AMD 12.11 vs. Nvidia 310.33. Let's be fair on the drivers and representation.

 

[FormatC]

This review was done 4 weeks ago

If you can sleep better now:
The 310.33 does absolutely nothing. This has no effect on the results of this review

 

[gsxrme]

STOP USING AVP! Its to freaking old and nvidia and AMD no longer optimize it. COMON!

 

[FormatC]

STOP USING AVP! Its to freaking old and nvidia and AMD no longer optimize it. COMON!

This is not right. The Catalyst 12.11 beta is a little bit optimized
But you are right, we will kick this in 2013.

 

[clonazepam]

Overall, great article. I do feel that words like 'hot', 'big', and 'squeal' have been "hammered" into my brain... u like what I did there? haha

My upgrading probably doesn't become warranted until at least 2014. I think I'll still be sporting a 27" 1080p monitor too, due to a lack of room for anything larger, or just more of them. I don't think a 3D Vision Ready 2560x1600 is even technically possible, but that's what I'd want to build around if it were, cuz I could squeeze in a 30" monitor, but just barely.

 

[tirvon]

Great article. Love seeing these top-end cards and what they can do (wish they would have thrown in dual-670s for comparison though). ALMOST makes me want one, but then I remember my little GTX 670 can handle my 5760x1080 setup just fine and say: $600 could get me what else?

PS- 1 kwh in NY ~$.06, but I'd still rather be green than not. ^^

 

[mousseng]

1kW/h in Boston,MA $0.06718/kWh (0.04411 Euro)= this is NOT an issue for me

There, I fixed it for you. Just because energy prices aren't relevant to you doesn't mean they're irrelevant to everyone.

 

[g-unit1111]

What's with the gigantic coolers on these video cards? Do they really need that much cooling? Why don't they just go liquid?

 

[Marcus52]

I always say "build to suit your apps". This is a clear case where people should do just that.

While I play more than just one game, there is typically one that takes up the majority of my time, and that's what I build for. So, for me, looking at an average or overall result isn't all that important. If World of Warcraft, my former main game, runs better on the GTX 690, then clearly it makes no sense for me to buy a Radeon 7990. Nvidia cards have always performed better running WoW, especially SLI vs Crossfire.

And - what about PhysX?

 

[chechak]

in first picture .... is that JORDANIAN crown ?
btw FTW GTX690

 

[larkspur]

[citation][nom]blazorthon[/nom]2GB isn't limiting much at all per GPU right now... Even at triple 1080p or triple 1920x1200, there are only a handful of situations where 2GB per GPU becomes a problem and even then, simply using a less memory capacity-reliant setting and more GPU-reliant setting solves that issue just fine.[/citation]
This is true, I'm not arguing with you. But when you spend $1000 on a card that has a vram bottleneck on ultra at 4xMSAA in BF3 multiplayer, you start to wonder why you didn't just get 2 x 680 4gb (and note how much the radeons are trying to use at those settings, yikes!). Regardless of that bottleneck, however, the 690 is still better for BF3 multi with triple monitors: http://hardocp.com/article/2012/03/28/nvidia_kepler_geforce_gtx_680_sli_video_card_review/5