Asus Direct CU II 7970 Incoming

jacktesterson

Diamond Member
Sep 28, 2001
5,493
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81
Picked up an Asus 7970 for $400.00 shipped.

Convinced my wife to let me keep it.

Made a few mistakes in the past week, hopefully this works out!
 
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spinejam

Diamond Member
Feb 17, 2005
3,503
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I've had three Asus 7970 DCII TOPs and one hit 1200c / the other two hit 1175c w/ reasonable mV. Is your's a TOP? If not, no voltage control from what I've read. Good price for a fast card nonetheless.
 

tornadog

Golden Member
Aug 6, 2003
1,222
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The card would be refurbished for sure. I RMAed my Asus motherboard and they sent me a refurb.

I guess we are in the same boat. I went from Asus 7850 Direct CU II to Sapphire Dual -X 7970. Driver issues with HDMI audio and now "Driver stopped responding" errors. So on to MSI N670 Power Edition :)
 
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lopri

Elite Member
Jul 27, 2002
13,209
594
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I did look at that card and heard that ASUS locked the voltage control due to RMAs. See if you can adjust the voltage, if not you're limited to stock voltage (1.175V?). I don't think I've seen anyone reaching 1200 MHz with stock voltage. Most common voltage I've seen for 1200 MHz is 1.25V. (or maybe I'm wrong - I've not read through the 7970 OC thread.)

Still that is a hell of a deal assuming the card isn't defective.
 

spinejam

Diamond Member
Feb 17, 2005
3,503
1
81
Even w/ stock 1175mV, you might get a good clocker. That link I posted for 1200c 1700m was run @ 1137mV. The card didn't respond to add'l voltage.
 

jacktesterson

Diamond Member
Sep 28, 2001
5,493
3
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Card looks brand new. Came with everything a new card does except the box. (Came in a white box that was fitted to hold it though)

Its a RMA Replacement from Asus.

Powering it up tonight when I get home. Hope for a good clocker!

I also have a Diamond 7970 in my pocession. (Reference Card). I'd prefer to keep the Asus Model though as I use a HTPC Case and the cooling is stronger on the Asus, and the Diamond is almost a full inch longer, which makes it very tight.

This thing is huge.

I will now have a HTPC with this card and a huge Noctua fan inside. Not bad! (Heatsink clears case by 3-4mm , Case supports 11 inch video cards and the Asus is 10.3 inches long).

Here is a Pic of it. My first 3 Slot card.
7970.png
 

RussianSensation

Elite Member
Sep 5, 2003
19,458
765
126
Adam, congrats on the new card!!

I think to answer what kind of overclock you should expect, it depends on your ASIC and also the type of workload you run.

I don't believe in 3 min run of 3dMark11 as stability testing. The program is not enough to stress the GPU. It's evident in the GPU usage and in the temperatures at load it generates. Not all games are going to be as easy to pass as 3dMark11 either. I think even Unigine Heaven 3.0 with Extreme Tessellation + 8AA and Metro 2033 with 4xMSAA, DOF + tessellation are more stressful.

Here is 24 hours at 99% GPU usage:

hd7970computeworkload.jpg


If you notice there is a slight undervolt on my card from MSI Afterburner vs. GPU-Z. That's common for 7970 style cards. My Asic is a low 71%. I think on 1.174-1.175V, a reasonable overclock is 1150-1185mhz. 1200-1250mhz generally requires 1.25V but could be lower if all you do is run games which almost never use up 99% of GPU for 5 hours at a time.

I find my VRMs exceed 100*C easily at 1.25V and 1220mhz clocks, and power consumption goes up almost 50W. Not worth it to me.

I use HWinFO64 to monitor VRM temperatures.

If you'll be using this for gaming only I'd say 1185 is probably realistic with stock voltage. The amazing 1250-1300mhz overclocks on air we read about are actually very rare on these cards, and most of those require 1.3V. Power consumption skyrockets 100W over 1.175V. I think 1.175-1.2 Ghz with a slight voltage bump is probably a reasonable average for air cooled 7970s for actual real world usage and not just benchmarking.
 
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jacktesterson

Diamond Member
Sep 28, 2001
5,493
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81
Got it installed! Asiq is 79.9%

Seem to be stable at 1180/1475 with initial testing. I can't do 1200 core.

I see techpowerup has a unlocked testing bios for Asus 7970s. Anyone try it?
 

lavaheadache

Diamond Member
Jan 28, 2005
6,893
14
81
nice card you got there. For whatever reason, It seems as people haven't been getting too high of overclocks with those cards. Anyways, 1180 is good enough and the cooler is awesome.
 

jacktesterson

Diamond Member
Sep 28, 2001
5,493
3
81
At 1180/1600, max after hour of gaming was 49 degrees at 35% fan speed which cant be heard over case fans. (Quiet) Cool Air conditioned room.

This card is much quieter than my 7850 DCII, especially over 40% Fan speed. No comparison
 

lopri

Elite Member
Jul 27, 2002
13,209
594
126
What are the average 3DMark11 graphics scores of the following cards? And how much impact does CPU have on graphics score? (not the "combined" score)

GTX 580
HD 5870

Out of curiosity. I haven't touched 3DMarks like forever.