I want to know where I can get $450 HD7970 with an after market cooler that doesn't have a 50% chance of
coil whine?
What's next?
HIS $485 is the cheapest 7970 with a quiet fan, that can hit
> 1.2ghz and no reviewer that I am aware of has complained that it has coil whine like the Sapphire Dual-X card. So it looks like there is an $80+ delta not $50.
Regardless, AMD should release a fresh batch of > 1ghz 7970 cards. When that happens, people can revisit this discussion. Right now there is about an $80-100 delta between a GTX670 and a good version of the 7970.
What I disagree with is the main discussion is around the wrong cards. A person who was looking to buy HD7870 for $330-350 or HD7950 $400 might just as well get a 670. Going from $330-350 to $400 670 for a huge performance boost might be manageable. Going from $330-350 7870 to $450-500 HD7970 for that buyer likely means going way over of his/her budget.
This is exactly where GTX670 shines. GTX670 is the perfect upsell from people who were on the fence thinking of getting HD7870 or even 7950. It made both of those cards irrelevant.
Essentially the market is now a 3-horse race:
$140 6870
$250 7850
$400 670
GTX670 is
28% and 17% faster than 7870 and 7950, respectively, making both of them overpriced. The 2% of the market who want the best can fight over 680/7970 but it changes nothing about 670 making 2 other AMD cards irrelevant imo.
I think GTX670 is like the 6800GT of X800Pro/X800XT/6800U generation. That card sold like hot cakes.