7970 GHz edition incoming!

[Tempered81]

To be fair the 680 leads big in some titles, Batman: AC, skyrim, very small lead in Saints Row 3 (slight lead, wins by about 5 fps in average) and LA Noire, GTA IV. This is with both setups OC'ed and sli/xfired as far as I can make them both go. 7970 wins big in crysis 1, 2, warhead, metro 2033, Alan Wake, and witcher 2. I play at 2560 resolution with everything at ultra, the biggest lopsided victory was the 7970 in metro/crysis, there are areas where the 7970 is 15-20 fps faster (probably due to VRAM? Not sure). While the 680 has a lopsided victory in Batman: AC.

As far as nvidia advantages, the features are all great, the control panel has a lot of cool stuff. Adaptive AA is pretty neat, but honestly I didn't care for it too much. It doesn't smooth games out as much as I was hoping with vsync off (didn't notice much difference). TXAA is unsupported so far, it has to be supported by software. The driver has FXAA (!!) - I *love* this feature. I've been begging for this a long time and its finally here. Disadvantages of the 680 - overclock scaling is not as good as I had hoped, and GPU boost depends on the quality of your ASIC ( I believe -- not 100% sure)

Overall, the 680 is a killer card. It definitely doesn't overwhelm the 7970 like some here suggest, because in xfire or overclocked its pretty much dead even -- or the 7970 leads in some titles as well. But for a new purchaser - hands down the 680 is a better buy since it is cheaper and works better "out of the box". If you're a hardcore overclocker and already own a 7970 the 680 is a sidegrade at best, though.

I haven't messed much with FRAPs lately but I can give it a shot. Doesn't it slow your framerate down substantially? Last time I tried it, it really screwed with my fps.

Thanks a bunch for an insightful post! Would like to know what setup you plan to keep after you test them some more. That's 256bit choking. 1080P goes to the 680, clearly. It wins in the majority of 30" too. Multi-card on 30" or eyefinity/surround is where you get to situations that can choke out the 680 SLI and not the 7970 CFX.

I play on 1080P if I had to chose now, I'd go with 1 680 over 1 7970 party because I'll never be running such enormous resolutions, and partly for Nvidia's features. Your post is a great read for people with highend rigs like Adam & Groove

 

[shaynoa]

Thanks blackened23
i think you have helped me to make my mind up
AMD drop your prices and ill bye 2 gigabyte 7970's oc as soon as you take $75 to $100 off but not before
shaynoa

 

[blackened23]

Thanks blackened23
i think you have helped me to make my mind up
AMD drop your prices and ill bye 2 gigabyte 7970's oc as soon as you take $75 to $100 off but not before
shaynoa

Hmm, I think the 680 is definitely the better buy for a new purchaser....better in every way. I woudln't get a 7970 unless its 450$ if not cheaper.. Overclocking isn't guaranteed, my mindset is more towards the pre-existing 7970 owner (who should hold on to what they have an oc the crap out of it , balla style ) D:

 

[ShadowOfMyself]

Yeah looking at those Xbit benchs, some people definitely jumped the gun... Other than a pure enthusiast who wants to bench all the cards etc like blackened, there is no reason at all you should switch from a 7970 to a 680, since it might actually be a downgrade in quite a few games... Unless you care that much about the smaller power consumption and noise, of course

 

[shaynoa]

Trainz TS12 is the game i play most of 90% gaming time and quite a few people believe that Trainz is one of if not the most graphicly demanding
games out of all of them even thou the game engine is an older type,

i would really like to see both the NV 680 and AMD's 7970 go head to head in this game ,

nobody does benchmarks for this game, this game would really be the big test
Trainz may not be as popular as a few other games but it surely would set the graphic card standards for the other game
shaynoa

 

[Magic Carpet]

Pretty sure that the clock speed would have to 1050Mhz just to equal the performance of the GTX 680. So if they want the crown back in any meanigful way, they are going to have to clock it at 1200Mhz, IMO.

So you thought the 1.26 GHz core - 6.30 GHz memory feat was quite something, considering that Sapphire already has a card in the works that does 1.33 GHz core 5.73 GHz memory out of the box? Wait till you see the numbers an overclocker for the MyDrivers community achieved. With the right voltage assistance, coupled with the right kind of cooling (liquid nitrogen), the overclocker achieved a Radeon HD 7970 overclocked speed as high as 1700 MHz core, and 2000 MHz (actual) or 8.00 GHz effective GDDR5 memory speed, churning out memory bandwidth of exactly 384 GB/s. The best part is that this wasn't a hit-and-run feat, the setup was able to run 3DMark 11 and 3DMark Vantage. The scores are pictured below. Details of the volt-mod can be found at the source. Original.

It is clear, that 7970 has got some serious clock headroom, and with the sound approach, it should easily smoke 680 available in any form and shape. But then again, this was to be expected, against a mid-range design. Smart move, AMD. Nvidia had taken the bait, now you can unleash the full power. Brilliant tactics :thumbsup:

 

[Will Robinson]

I think its clear enough that the HD7970 when overclocked is a worthy competitor for the GTX680.
It certainly needs a price drop tho,$450 max.
Dual core New Zealand arrives soon and will end any further arguments about "Fastest Card" anyway

 

[Lepton87]

I think its clear enough that the HD7970 when overclocked is a worthy competitor for the GTX680.
It certainly needs a price drop tho,$450 max.
Dual core New Zealand arrives soon and will end any further arguments about "Fastest Card" anyway

I don't think so, almost everyone just ignores GTX590/6990 and goes ahead and says that GTX680 is the fastest card out there.

 

[cmdrdredd]

I don't think so, almost everyone just ignores GTX590/6990 and goes ahead and says that GTX680 is the fastest card out there.

This again?

Go on newegg and tell me if you can even buy those cards. You can't.

 

[Lepton87]

This again?

Go on newegg and tell me if you can even buy those cards. You can't.

I don't care about newegg. In my country 6990 is cheaper than both 7970 and gtx680. GTX590 is unfortunately way more expensive

 

[f1sherman]

The driver has FXAA (!!) - I *love* this feature. I've been begging for this a long time and its finally here.

New driver FXAA is superior to both ingame(Skyrim, Red Orchestra 2) or injected FXAA.

I sh1t you not.

Blurriness has been dealt with, and it's on par if not better then SMAA.
SMAA is still a bit less aliased, though at heavier GPU cost.

TXAA will be a real game changer

 

[bryanW1995]

This smacks of 9800 gtx+++Black Edition(tm) all over again, only from the AMD camp this time...sigh...

 

[SirPauly]

New driver FXAA is superior to both ingame(Skyrim, Red Orchestra 2) or injected FXAA.

I sh1t you not.

Blurriness has been dealt with, and it's on par if not better then SMAA.
SMAA is still a bit less aliased, though at heavier GPU cost.

TXAA will be a real game changer

I believe features like FXAA may improve. Timothy seems to really like the potential of TXAA and really enjoy when companies, individuals, gamers, anyone , hehe, really explains how important movement is with-in the the environment -- to establish quality.


On Topic:

Can see AMD offering a HD 7970 XT or XTX edition.

 

[bryanW1995]

From the hardocp review:

"We found out quickly that the GTX 680 could hold its own and sometimes dominate the Radeon HD 7970 at 2560x1600"



You'll get over it, i'm sure. We don't USUALLY move the goalpoasts with OC'd cards. And believe me, adding 75mhz to the core doesnt make that card faster.

Maybe you can start your own review site and refute all the reviews proclaiming the 680 the top single gpu.

FTFY.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/3987/amds-radeon-6870-6850-renewing-competition-in-the-midrange-market

Anandtech, HardOCP, Guru3D etc all review overclocked cards at times too. They compare those to the stock reference cards and give you an idea of how much faster it is. They don't ever go back and say "due to this card's overclock it makes card brand X the fastest". It doesn't happen.

You need to do more research. I'm still pissed that AT did that. Fortunately, they seem to have learned their lesson.

Except they don't always. When the HD 6870 came practically every site compared it to a highly overclocked GTX 460. Anand didn't even have a stock clocked GTX 460 in their review of Barts.

The excuse was that GTX 460 was conservatively clocked to allow vendors to differentiate better, and that the card had been out a lot longer than Barts.

You can apply the exact same argument to Tahiti and GK104.

Now, I do actually think that you should compare stock to stock, but the fact that this rule only seems to be applied to one side of the equation quite frankly upsets me.

This is Ryan Smith reaping what he sowed 18 mos ago. 7970 has an excellent overclocking reputation, especially for a high end card. AT was set up for criticism the minute they put that FTW into the 68x0 review. Of course, it was also another example of what a good marketing dept (nvidia) does to combat release of a good competitor. Since AMD's marketing dept is too busy focusing on viral mumbo jumbo BS, they don't have time to call Anand and say "remember when 68x0 came out...well, now it's time to pay us back..."

 

[bryanW1995]

Why? If you can buy them they DO count. PERIOD.



it's not 75mhz it's 145mhz an increase of 15%.

You realize this is a spurious agrument, right? At stock clocks, gtx 680 is faster than 7970. Some places say by 1%, some places say 10%, but I haven't found any that say 7970 is faster. At the likely OC settings of both cards, it's reasonable to expect that gtx 680 will continue to be ahead, albeit by a very slim margin. Also, gtx 680 is smaller, consumes less power, is quieter, etc etc etc. By every metric that any reasonable person would use, gtx 680 is a better card. Why is this so important to you that 7970 somehow eek out some sort of minor victory here? Wouldn't it be better for all of us if they simply just lowered 7970 prices?

 

[Lepton87]

At the likely OC settings of both cards, it's reasonable to expect that gtx 680 will continue to be ahead, albeit by a very slim margin. Also, gtx 680 is smaller, consumes less power, is quieter, etc etc etc. By every metric that any reasonable person would use, gtx 680 is a better card. Why is this so important to you that 7970 somehow eek out some sort of minor victory here? Wouldn't it be better for all of us if they simply just lowered 7970 prices?

680 doesn't gain much after OC so OC7970 is usually faster. Personally I don't care about such minor victories because anything under 10% is not noticeable anyway. I just don't like that anand has no reservations about calling gtx680 the new king of the hill yet he didn't explicitly call 7950 faster than GTX580 while in actuality its lead over 580 is similar to 680 lead over 7970. nVidia flopped with its high-end chip and didn't release it and it's midrange chip can't claim convincing and meaningful victory at 2560. I want to see at the very least lead similar to GTX280/GTX285 over 4870/4890 or even gtx480 over Cypress or GTX580 over 6970. OC or stock nvidia cards were indisputably faster than AMDs but that's not the case now.

 

[SirPauly]

What was surprising, to me, was areas I thought AMD would be able to showcase over the GTX 680: 1600p, x4 and x8 AA, multi-monitor resolutions and over-clocking.

AMD closed the gap but really didn't separate with their strengths.

In any case, they're both nice choices to consider.

 

[bryanW1995]

Thats quite a bold claim. What I am seeing is a 30W (stock)~100W(overclocked) difference when comparing power consumption of the HD7970 to a GTX680 from different reviews. This number varies depending on what cooler your using because keeping the temperature low can reduce power consumption. With the reference cooler, Id think youd see more than 10W difference if clocked at those levels.

What does the cooler type have to do with power draw?

Ah, nvm.

 

[Guovssohas]

This review compares a stock 680 with a 7970 lightning;

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1881/6/

The lightning is 100dollars more i believe and it's clock is 1070.

 

[Lepton87]

What does the cooler type have to do with power draw??

It has, as temperature increases so does the static power draw of the chip.

 

[bryanW1995]

yeah it's strange. I always thought that power consumption goes up linearly with clock-rate. Maybe he bumped up against cpu bottleneck with that overclock but stock card wasn't fast enough to do that. Hard to say without knowing how he tested power consumption,

Power consumption does go up linearly with clock rate, but it goes up exponentially with voltages. A hypothetical 7975 or whatever they end up calling it could have identical or nearly so power consumption by using slightly lower vcore to get to 1150-1200 mhz. An easier move would be to just drop prices, of course.

I thought power increased by the square of voltage, but linearly compared to clock? There are other parts to a GPU than core (memory, and maybe fans though they tend to speed up as temperatures increase) but I would expect that a 21% increase in core speed would result in more than a marginal increase in wattage... like 18% even if it's not 21% Or am I missing something?

I just pm'd IdontCare, he has some good explanations with charts/graphs/tables, hopefully he'll weigh in here in a little while.

 

[Lepton87]

This review compares a stock 680 with a 7970 lightning;

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1881/6/

The lightning is 100dollars more i believe and it's clock is 1070.

It was already linked and at 2560 it's 3:3, but its game selection is LAME.

Power consumption does go up linearly with clock rate, but it goes up exponentially with voltages. A hypothetical 7975 or whatever they end up calling it could have identical or nearly so power consumption by using slightly lower vcore to get to 1150-1200 mhz. An easier move would be to just drop prices, of course.

I don't think increasing clocks while decreasing voltage at the same time is possible without major rework like RV770>RV790

 

[SirPauly]

That review does offer a bit of insight though.

 

[Guovssohas]

Then what games do u want to see tested?

 

[bryanW1995]

Is this GHz Edition going to be some new reference card or something the AIBs are cooking up? That name is so lame. I might be alone in thinking this but it needs to be a 7971 or something. What's even the point of having numbers in the name if they're just going to keep adding random monikers?

Yeah, that sounds kinda silly to me, too. Of course, other than the fact that Nvidia had the 9800 gtx+, the 9800gtx+ BE, plus a whole plethora of renamed g80-based cards a few years ago. And AMD marketing has heard for years about how much better Nvidia is at marketing than they are, so why shouldn't they copy the masters?