What do we pay that bit extra?

[chivs688]

So I'm on the verge of pulling the trigger on the Asus 7970 Matrix Plat on sale at the moment, and it got me thinking.

What is it that the higher priced versions of the same card have over the cheaper ones?

I understand certain brands being more reliable and in general offering better build quality, (and obviously some cards have extra VRAM), but what is it that give these cards an advantage that can't be simply matched through increasing clock speeds?

Can you not just get the 'basic' version of the card, and just overclock it to the same rates as what the higher priced cards are at? Or are those higher priced cards physically better in some way that allows them to be overclocked further than the lesser ones? Or is there some other advantage?

I guess the quality of fan on it would be a reason to..

Specifically in terms of my situation, why would I pay £240 for the Asus 7970 Matrix Plat, over say getting the Sapphire Radeon R9 280X Dual-X and just bumping up the clocks to the same as the 7970? Surely it's not just for the convenience of it being pre-overclocked?

Just interested to learn how it all works

 

[MDPlatts]

some companies will speed-bin their chips for their top cards. All the chips are notionally the same, but some (like in cpu's) work better - lower volts or higher clocks.

So they buy 1000 chips, test them all (costs money) and the best ones go into their best cards, 2nd best into a 2nd tier card and so on. Same with the other components like the memory.

Shipping clock speeds will always be conservative, but the best ones (if they have the best chips) will probably have more room for overclocking.

Also its in the bundle, some you will only get the card and maybe a dvi-vga adaptor. My last 7970 from sapphire came with the dvi-vga adaptor, and the following cables - hdmi-hdmi, hdmi-displayport, hdmi-minidisplayport, displayport-minidisplayport, molex-6pin, molex-8pin and crossfire-bridge. Sometimes you get some free software or games - other than those from AMD/Nvidia.

Some have longer warranties too - 3yrs vs 2yrs

 

[Panos]

MDPlatts is spot on.

Don't forget also the cooler and "brand" price tag. And the Matrix Platinum is coming with LN2 gadgetry I believe.

And a good explanation of the last, look the price of the Nvidia cards up to last week.

Also I could have put "gift t-shirt" but those days are gone.
(still have the BFG t-shirt from the 8800GTX)


But if you look to get a 7970 atm, consider to have a look for a 280X Toxic for bit extra.

 

[chivs688]

Thanks for the replies.

But if you look to get a 7970 atm, consider to have a look for a 280X Toxic for bit extra.

Honestly I'm stretching my budget with the £240 for the 7970.

But going along with the theme of this thread, comparing the Asus 7970 Matrix Platinum to the Sapphire Radeon R9 280X Toxic, what benefit am I getting from the 280X card over the 7970? What makes it worth that £40 more?

 

[arc@css]

If you want to spend a bit less than a 7970 / 280, then I'd get this in a heart beat. Overclock it for 7970+ speeds. Cool and quiet, too.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-065-HS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1673

 

[chivs688]

If you want to spend a bit less than a 7970 / 280, then I'd get this in a heart beat. Overclock it for 7970+ speeds. Cool and quiet, too.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-065-HS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1673

I don't necessarily want to spend less, although obviously want to get the best deal, but the £240 for the 7970 is definitely very near the absolute limit.