7950 vs 7970

tigersty1e

Golden Member
Dec 13, 2004
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At the same same clocks, they are both within ~5% of each other. This is the same story for the 5870/5850 and 6970/6950 cards.

But the difference is the overclocking prowess. How high can most of the cards clock up to?

And does the 7950 reference card come with memory voltage tweaking?
 
Feb 19, 2009
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Without vcore mods (during launch reviews) 7950s OC pretty low but its the same potential as 7970s with vcore.

The difference is ~3% clock for clock. Even less.
 

Concillian

Diamond Member
May 26, 2004
3,751
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Should be the same story as the 7850 on voltage, which was no voltage adjustment until you load the ASUS util, then you could unlock for both ASUS and MSI Afterburner.

With voltage it's the silicon lottery vs. the 7970. Same chips. There is some chance that 7950s are more likely to be "low quality" silicon, I suppose, but even the dud 7850s are hitting over 1100 core. I'd be surprised if the same isn't true for 7950. 1100 core is what, a 37% OC. lol.
 
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aaksheytalwar

Diamond Member
Feb 17, 2012
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Most 7970s would do 1200-1250 with 100% with the stock cooler if not better and with water cooling most will easily touch 1300 or so. That high with a 7950 seems a bit less likely besides lower ipc, you should expect to forgo at least 10-15% of the performance of an Oced 7970 even if you oc
 

Haserath

Senior member
Sep 12, 2010
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It's been best to go for the 50 card over the 70 card for AMD these past few gens. The 50 usually has higher efficiency($ & W wise) since the extra hardware hardly adds performance to the chip. The 7970 may overclock higher on average, but it is not by much.
 

aaksheytalwar

Diamond Member
Feb 17, 2012
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It depends. If you want Performance/$ then go for 7950. If you want performance and the relative value of $ is irrelevant and the absolute difference in $ is affordable for you, get 7970. As simple as that :)