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Would you upgrade from a 6970?

Associate
Joined
22 Jun 2011
Posts
112
To be fair 6970 to 7970 is a fair jump.

For BF3 @ 1080p I would feel justified upgrading from a 6970. There's no NEED at all though :p
 

233

233

Soldato
Joined
21 Nov 2004
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13,500
Location
Wishaw
overclock your 6970 and keep it for another year,

throw the money in the bank and wait for a 8xxx :)

still love my 6970 and it is more than capable of any game at 1080p
 
Caporegime
Joined
17 Mar 2012
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47,382
Location
ARC-L1, Stanton System
You must be imagining it then as all the graphs suggest the 7870 is barely faster than an overclock 6970

I said 6950, not 6970 and i certainly did not say "overclocked 6970" which is a pointless argument anyway given that the 7870's overclock even higher than the 6970.

The fact is i moved from a 6950 to a 7870 and noticed a big improvement from stock, overclocked vs overclocked that gain is even bigger, it is and feels like a completely different card, its a vastly better card almost doubling the performance in some games.

You know; i could barley maintain 40+FPS on BF3 Ultra Preset, now i'm pushing 70 Avg...

If he gets a 7870 he will notice the difference, with a 7950 his world will be lit up like a christmas tree in comparison.
 
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C64

C64

Soldato
Joined
16 Mar 2007
Posts
12,884
Location
London
I said 6950, not 6970 and i certainly did not say "overclocked 6970" which is a pointless argument anyway given that the 7870's overclock even higher than the 6970.

The fact is i moved from a 6950 to a 7870 and noticed a big improvement from stock, overclocked vs overclocked that gain is even bigger, it is and feels like a completely different card, its a vastly better card almost doubling the performance in some games.

You know; i could barley maintain 40+FPS on BF3 Ultra Preset, now i'm pushing 70 Avg...

If he gets a 7870 he will notice the difference, with a 7950 his world will be lit up like a christmas tree in comparison.

I presumed youd have been running the 6950 as a 6970 as most did but i new bf3 would be brought up well thats one game and special drivers to make it run fast for that one game 95% of the rest it's not much better tbh thus i dont consider it a worthy upgrade it would be like going from a 7850 to a 7870 an upgrade but not a very big one.He would be better off sourcing a second hand 6970 for xfire which is faster than a 7970 you have the board and the power supply to do it so that's what I would do if you can source a 6970 for around £100 ish.
 
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Caporegime
Joined
17 Mar 2012
Posts
47,382
Location
ARC-L1, Stanton System
I presumed youd have been running the 6950 as a 6970 as most did but i new bf3 would be brought up well thats one game and special drivers to make it run fast for that one game 95% of the rest it's not much better tbh thus i dont consider it a worthy upgrade it would be like going from a 7850 to a 7870 an upgrade but not a very big one.He would be better off sourcing a second hand 6970 for xfire which is faster than a 7970 you have the board and the power supply to do it so that's what I would do if you can source a 6970 for around £100 ish.

Actualy i haven't as mine would not unlock.

Its not just BF3 where the difference is significant, http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/548?vs=510 <- and that before any of the 7### Drivers reached anywhere near what they are today, you can add anything from 10% - 30% to those comparisons, and then there is the overclocking diffrance...


He asked "would you upgrade from a 6970" my awnser having upgradeded from a 6950 is absolutley yes: reason; less power, less heat, much higher performance, higher overclocking and performance upgrades from the drivers is dead on the 6### series cards.

Yes he could add another 6970 for £100 but that would add another 200 Watts to his system and that much heat, and then you have the xFire game lottery, so why not sell the 6970 take that £100 he would have spent on the other 6970 add £30 to it and get him self a 7950?

No for those games where xFire works well in its not going to be as fast as x2 6970's but still 40 / 50% faster than what he has now.

Going xFire is one solution if he does not mind the extra power and heat in his case, but what he will end up with by the time he upgrades again is pretty old and unwanted tech.

PS: the 8### series cards could be a year away.
 
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C64

C64

Soldato
Joined
16 Mar 2007
Posts
12,884
Location
London
Less power less heat isn't a good reason to upgrade it's silly to upgrade at cost just for 10 fps more and 45 watts less power all I can say is if I were in his boat I'd get another 6970 if he can bag one for around £100 ish it's a no brainer any decent case will cope with xfire and sli just fine and tbh you are probably looking at about 100-150 watts more full load than a 7970 overall system loads according to anandtech.Just makes sense to me especially as he has the corsair hx1000.

£100 ish outlay for £310+ 7970 beating performance is not to be sneezed at for the sake of saving 100-150 watts power draw pretty sure sli and xfire support and performance is way better these days too with profiles out fast for games and working well.

Now if he were to sell his 6970 say for £100 ish he'd have to fork out £210+ for a 7970 and £120+ for a 7950 so to me the best options are another 6970 or sell current 6970 and get a 7950.
 
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Associate
Joined
30 Mar 2007
Posts
1,546
Location
Leeds
I took delivery of a 7970 Windforce x3 Ghz today to replace my 6970 and have already submitted an RMA request to return under DSR. It's just not powerful enough for what I need (2560x1440). I know there's no single GPU card that will really cut it at that res on max settings but as a £370 upgrade I am hugely disappointed. I expect a 680 will be exactly the same underwhelming performance.

I expect I'm just going to keep my 6970 until the next gen come out and forsake gaming at 2560x1440. So as an upgrade for me, it's not worth it.

For 1080p then it might be worth upgrading, but not for higher res.
 
Associate
Joined
10 Apr 2008
Posts
2,487
I took delivery of a 7970 Windforce x3 Ghz today to replace my 6970 and have already submitted an RMA request to return under DSR. It's just not powerful enough for what I need (2560x1440). I know there's no single GPU card that will really cut it at that res on max settings but as a £370 upgrade I am hugely disappointed. I expect a 680 will be exactly the same underwhelming performance.

I expect I'm just going to keep my 6970 until the next gen come out and forsake gaming at 2560x1440. So as an upgrade for me, it's not worth it.

For 1080p then it might be worth upgrading, but not for higher res.

That's disappointing to read, because I myself was thinking of upgrading to a 7970 due to having recently bought a 1440p monitor. I've heard other people say the 7970 runs great at 1440p. Is that not the case then?
 
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