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7970 After one day

wodgah

wodgah

wodgah

Associate
Joined
12 Jan 2012
Posts
285
Location
Kent
So i did take the plunge and change my SLI 570 setup for a single 7970 i know some people will think im crazy but wanted to say a couple of things that may or may not help anyone else in a similar situation.

GTX 570 SLI score 2031

7970 Single card score 1925

As you can see the difference is low at just over 100 points which is about a 5% difference.

So something else that a lot of people will think I am nuts about , but my 2 570's didnt match one was a PALIT and other a MSI. The PALIT is about 20mm longer in length and the cards look very different. This bothered me as i really like making my system look nice and this took away from it.

Toms videos showed the 7970s to have different coloured PCB , I myself went with ASUS because theirs was black as well as their cards being very reliable for me in the past and all round liking them.

Ok so heres the part that will either have people agreeing or calling me nuts, i never intended to get 2 x 570s but a second one came my way at a price I couldn't say no to. The fact they don't match bugged me and when you add on to that, that I am planning on putting my system underwater in the next month or 2 and wanted to make it a project with pictures and video the fact they were very different and also the fact it would mean another 70 pounds for another block plus needed more radiator real estate it made my mind up.
The other factor was I was able to effectivly just swap my cards for the single gpu solution.

Anyways enough about my madness or strangeness.

The things I wanted to put in here which may help other people.

1. The ASUS 7970 has a BLACK PCB.

2. On the same system and settings the ASUS 7970 Overclocked to max settings in CCC benches nearly the same as 570s Overclocked in SLI.

3. The price for buying either of these is pretty much the same.

Thats pretty much it , I should state I am a fanboy of neither and really dont have a preference either way. I did go from a 5850 which was fine for a long time but driver issues were annoying at times, the 570s I didnt have any issues with.

I will also say i play both Battlefield 3 and Star Wars The Old Republic, and I cannot notice a difference in quality when playing with everything maxed on both games.

I will also point out I play on a single 23 inch IPS dell ultrasharp and this isnt saying whats best just merely my observations.
 
Well you could also consider the cost in power savings over a year compared to running 2 570s ... wonder how one would figure that out.

IMO its a good upgrade - can also xfire them if you get bored in the future ... but most likely you wont have a need
 
I think you have sold me on to the 7970, time for me to give up my 4870x2!

On a seperate note, have you sold your 570's or still got them, I know someone who might buy them at a good price.
 
djxput said:
Well you could also consider the cost in power savings over a year compared to running 2 570s ... wonder how one would figure that out.

IMO its a good upgrade - can also xfire them if you get bored in the future ... but most likely you wont have a need
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Not really worth worrying about as if you are happy to drop that amount on money on a GFX card a few quid on the elec will be nothing :)

But to answer your question

watts x amount used in a day(in hours)/ 1000

times this by the days in the year used

then times the whole lot by .13p

As an example 50w x 6 = 300watts

300/1000 = 0.3kW's

0.3kW's x 360 = 108kW's

108kWs x .13p = £14.04p a year for 50watts of energy a day used for 360 days a year!
 
i have my 7970 doing 2220 in heaven at 1200/1575 on stock volts in trixx with the custom fan profile.

Sure you can beat that 570sli score yet fella
 
Wodgah: A 100 points is nothing in my opinion.

With Catalyst 12.1 here hopefully by the end of next week, & 12.2 on the horizon, you might just get a boost in performance.

I want a 7970, but I'm going to wait a month & see what non reference cards appear.
 
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old gamer said:
ive found the big difference is eyefinity, my 7970 is pretty much beating my old 6970 xfire in everything, benhmarks and games
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It can't be, there are people on this forum that flat out insist the 7970 is no more than 30% faster than a single 6970.........

people be stupid ;)

Only thing holding me back is cost, I don't absolutely hate the fact that AMD are cashing in on early supplies, but when the 7950 hits, and 7870 and prices further down the range react, then you'll get pricing changes at the high end as well.

Take a 7870 for instance, if AMD can sell one for £200 that is 10-20% slower than a 580gtx...... then Nvidia has to drop price, but at the same time if the Nvidia prices and lower AMD prices drop, then the 7970 starts being way more than twice the cost, for no where near twice the performance, so the 7970(and the 7950) will have to "come inline" .

You'd really have to be mad to buy a 580gtx over a 7970 right now, while Nvidia could have adjusted their pricing already, which would have bought hte 7970 down, I think they are going for every last 580gtx sale at normal pricing they can get off the guys who simply won't buy AMD, and they'll react when the cheaper cards come out. Oh well.

a 7950 at £300 or less and I'll be very interested, at £450+ I see a GREAT card, but not the value I want...... yet.
 
stuartw_b said:
To be honest the fact that the card is competing against sli 570's, in themselves still a solid single card, is more impressive than most the numbers that get thrown around.
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Again its because this card is HEAVILY underclocked at stock.

I say it in reply to every fanboy statement, take a 580gtx, whack a weird(I give AMD zero credit for going with a low TDP limit and dropping the clocks) TDP on it, underclock it by 30% and then see how fast it is. Infact if you underclocked the 580gtx by the same amount as a 7970...... then compared a underclocked 580gtx with a stock(underclocked) 7970 and you'd see similar results again 50-60% performance difference.

AMD would have looked a WHOLE lot better if they simply released this card as a 300-325W 1150Mhz card WITH a low power setting in drivers that went to 225W, lower clocks and so on...... essentially had a low power mode for when you don't need that performance..... there are plenty of games out there that don't need the performance and plenty that do.

It's essentially like if Intel released the Sandybridge at 2.5Ghz for no apparent reason, but it easily did 3.3Ghz on stock and 3.9Ghz turbo..... same chip, just different clocks and odd benchmark results in reviews. The "real" speed of a Sandybridge wouldn't have changed. It really is terrible marketing/plan by AMD.
 
Freddie1980 said:
And I remember certain people saying before the card was launched the 7970 was going to be 50% faster then the GTX580.
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It also is that much faster, lucky that isn't it ;)

For the record, I said 70-80% faster over the 6970, not 50% faster than the 580gtx.

Take a reference 7970, overclock to max, take a reference 6970, overclock to max.......... what do you get, between 70 and 100% faster depending on the game, with the 100% being a rare case the average is likely somewhere around the high 70% mark.

Again, as with every other thread, if the 6970 was released but arbitrarily set to a 180w TDP with 30% slower clocks..... then the stock 7970 would have been 70-80% faster than the "underclocked" 6970.

The 7970, the CORE, the speed it can reach, the actual difference in games at the ONLY comparible settings, it IS around 80% faster than a 6970.
 
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Nightglow said:
DM: If a 7950 is £300 or less, then I'm getting a pair of them, & trying crossfire.
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hehe, I'd be tempted, for now a 7950 will be more than enough for me, though I like gaming with 120hz screen, less fussed about eyefinity/3d as I "love" neither.

Personally I have no issue moving my mouse left a bit to see left, rather than move my head left to see a different screen better, but that's just me. 3d, gimmicky, nice in some situations but even in best case scenario it has both downsides and isn't much more than marginally better than 2d.

For now 120hz 1920x1080 is where its at, I might need more juice if/when we get a nice higher res 27" panel at 120hz....... AND I can afford it ;)
 
Getting back to the OP..

I am just curious as to you're thought process when you bought the Asus 7970 which cost you 560 pounds based on OCuk pricing.
Did you know the performance scores roughly before you're bought it? It seems like a lot of money to put into your system for very little, if not lower performance (your figures)
However I can see method in you're madness when you're planning to intergrate it into your watercooled project. I'm sure it will "look" nicer and be less complex build.

I'm in no way critising you, its you're cash at the end of the day and I'm all for the latest and greatest. I'm just curious as to the reasoning. I wonder whether some other component in your system would have benefited more from you're hard earned cash?

I'm currently considering an eyfinity setup btw, there's a total money sink ! ;)
 
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