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What's the real difference between video card brands?

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I also have to disagree with the pcb discrimination 🙂. I'm sure there are some bad blue designs, but I KNOW there are some very excellent blue PCB models. IMO, this is the sleakest 6850 : Saphire Vaopr X 6850 : It has dual 6 pin connector (very unique) EE (external exhaust). A mount plate that cools the ram and VRM's much like the 'new' Fermi models, it functions as a large heat sink (slick). IMO the best engineered card out of the new 68xx I have seen , and YIKES its blue ! 🙂
http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/sapphire_hd6850_toxic/2.htm
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Ben90 said:
That is the exact case on non-reference cards. Believe it or not, even the GPU can be different. You used to be able to buy a 5970 that used two 5870 GPUs. I don't remember which vendor because I never cared about the 5970, but it was out there.
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All 5970 use two 5870 GPU.

If you mean clocked @ 850MHz, like the 5870, there's the Asus Ares, Sapphire Toxic, and XFX 4Gig black edition. There's no difference in the GPU from those and any other 5970 though, except for possibly binning for lowest power usage.

Edit: Actually, thinking about it the Toxic is 900MHz, IIRC.
 
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Ahh, its the Asus Ares that uses two 5870s. I am wrong though as I thought the card was marketed under the 5970 name even though it wasn't a Hemlock. Every retailer has it listed correctly as a 5870 variant however. So scratch my comment about that. That will teach me to post things without completely researching them first.

Anyways, the main point of non-reference GPUs using different capacitors/PCB designs/mosfets/stuff still stands as the AIBs use this as a way to differentiate their products.
All 5970 use two 5870 GPU.
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Actually, as I found out, they use 5970 GPUs. While I agree that the 5870 and a 5970 Cypress GPU is essentially the same thing, legally there is a difference.
 
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tweakboy said:
Its the truth IMO. People can be with me or against. 😱
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I'm not the gpu guru that a lot of other people here are, but it seems if something is the TRUTH, opinion would not factor in. This doesn't seem like something open to an "IMO" statement--it's either true or false. Anyone have a source that either proves or disproves this statement that PCB color directly correlates to quality? Seems like something I should know about, if it is true...
 
I got into the 5870 deal too early. I got mine for $249 AR when it went on sale initially. Unfortunately, Newegg sent me a restocked card which didn't work. So in the two weeks of turnaround time, the price went down to $215 AR. When I did get my new card up and running, I found it does not overclock at all. It is maxed out at 850/1200 Mhz. Once I put any setting above stock, I get tearing and artifacts. Maybe that's why they are so cheap compared to other 5870s? Granted my sample size is only one card but that would be my guess.
 
I read this a while ago and this came to mind, and maybe it ties to what Tweak (I keep picturing Twitch from South Park when I read his posts haha, no offense Tweaks) is that lower tier manufacturers (ECS, Biostar, Jetway, etc) tend to use pff-colored PCB boards.

I can't count how many ECS boards I've had to replace because a customer refuses to pay a little extra. And having an ECS board and an MSI board on the table at the same time, the ECS board is more of a washed-out red-pink if you will versus the MSI which is a deep strawberry red.

Jetway use a little/lime green versus say Intel who use a dark green. I'm not sure if that is what he means, but in that retrospect I would agree with him. ASRock for example uses a more yellow PCB versus ASUS who use a more Gold and having used both the ASrock tends to feel flimsier on in some spots.

EDIT: Not sure how PCB get their color, but I wonder if number of layers would affect this, as more red layers would produce the darker color on the MSI and less layers the more pink on the lower tier vendor.
 
Doggiedog said:
I got into the 5870 deal too early. I got mine for $249 AR when it went on sale initially. Unfortunately, Newegg sent me a restocked card which didn't work. So in the two weeks of turnaround time, the price went down to $215 AR. When I did get my new card up and running, I found it does not overclock at all. It is maxed out at 850/1200 Mhz. Once I put any setting above stock, I get tearing and artifacts. Maybe that's why they are so cheap compared to other 5870s? Granted my sample size is only one card but that would be my guess.
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It could very well be a number of things limiting the clocks on your 5870. Possibly something not relating to the card at all, such as the PSU (unlikely in your case) or something on the card itself. You could either have a 5870 binned on the edge of stability, or the power circuitry on the card might not be able to handle more. By buying cheap non-reference cards, you dramatically increase the chances of the last two options with emphasis on the last one.

If the vendor re-bins their 5870 GPUs, the best overclockers are going to be going on their premium cards which leaves the leftovers for the budget cards. I don't know which vendors do re-bin their chips but I do know it happens.


And for the color of the PCB discussion, it directly has nothing to do with performance of the board. Cheap boards use less dye, or lower quality dye, and the colors look more washed out.
I'm curious as to what an uncolored PCB looks like? It must look terrible as even the cheapest of the cheap use some sort of dye.
 
tweakboy said:
Its the truth IMO. People can be with me or against. 😱
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You are right. These people just don't understand that they are wrong. I only use high quality green PCBs in my PC. Less distortion on my soundcard for crystal clear sounds kthnx gl

Additional account for Ben90 who will be taking a little break from posting.
Admin allisolm
 
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tweakgirl said:
You are right. These people just don't understand that they are wrong. I only use high quality green PCBs in my PC. Less distortion on my soundcard for crystal clear sounds kthnx gl
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Seriously, I laughed so hard. :thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:
 
tweakgirl said:
You are right. These people just don't understand that they are wrong. I only use high quality green PCBs in my PC. Less distortion on my soundcard for crystal clear sounds kthnx gl
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similar name, one post, supporting the most ridiculously false notions about technology that only tweakboy can invent, identical misspelling (more like atrocities towards the english language), identical nonsense ending (kthnx gl)...
Is tweakgirl just tweakboy in a dress? (answer: yes)
 
betasub said:
Taltamir: did you miss the joke? A caricature.
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it is possible that someone made this simply to make fun of him, although I find it less plausible then him making a second account to "confirm" his own claims.
EITHER action is a bannable offense IIRC.
 
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