GIGABYTE Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition Video Card GV-R797TO-3GD
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- 3GB 384-Bit GDDR5
- Core Clock 1050 MHz
- Boost Clock 1100MHz
- 1 x DVI 1 x HDMI 2 x Mini DisplayPort
- 2048 Stream Processors
- PCI Express 3.0 x16
Overview
Specs
Reviews
Ultra Durable VGA™
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Patented «Triangle Cool» Technology
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OC Guru ll
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Brand-new instinctive user interface makes it easier to monitor and adjust all important settings.  Users can set up MONITORING, GPU CLOCK, MEMORY CLOCK, FAN, GPU VOLTAGE, Memory VOLTAGE, OSD, and ONLINE SUPPORT as well as update driver and BIOS directly. |
Gold-Plated HDMI
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AMD Eyefinity
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AMD EyeSpeed
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CrossFireX™
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Avivo™ HD
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Avivo™ technology easily allows a PC to become a digital home media center by its compelling video pipeline design that comprises the latest high definition video hardware acceleration, including H.264 and WMV9.
Microsoft Windows 7
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RoHS Compliant
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We give the whole Earth a promise that our products do not contain any of the restricted substances in concentrations and applications banned by the RoHS Directive, and are capable of being worked on at the higher temperatures required for lead-free solder. One Earth and GIGABYTE Cares!
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*The entire materials provided herein are for reference only. GIGABYTE reserves the right to modify or revise the content at anytime without prior notice. -
*Advertised performance is based on maximum theoretical interface values from respective Chipset vendors or organization who defined the interface specification. Actual performance may vary by system configuration. -
*All trademarks and logos are the properties of their respective holders. -
*Due to standard PC architecture, a certain amount of memory is reserved for system usage and therefore the actual memory size is less than the stated amount.
Warranty, Returns, And Additional Information
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SAPPHIRE Vapor-X Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition Video Card 100351VXSR
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- 3GB 384-Bit GDDR5
- 2 x DVI (1 Single Link, 1 Dual Link) 1 x HDMI 1 x DisplayPort
- 2048 Stream Processors
- PCI Express 3.0 x16
Overview
Specs
Reviews
Step up to the SAPPHIRE Vapor-X Radeon HD 7970 VGA card for a new level of gaming experience in the latest FPS, RTS, MMORGP and RACING titles. It’s based on the cutting-edge 28nm GCN architecture and built around 2048 Stream Processors and 3GB/384-bit GDDR5 memory that deliver reality-redefining visuals with stunning picture quality and environmental interaction. This card has latest GDDR5 memory clocked at 6000MHz effective, and runs with a core clock speed of 1000 MHz which with PowerTune Dynamic Boost rises to 1050 MHz on the engine.
Vapor-X cooler is based on a new vapor chamber design and delivers exceptional thermal performance you can rely on even during extreme load condition. Versatile output configuration of DVI-I, DVI-D, HDMI and DisplayPort offers flexible connection to one or multiple displays.
- GHz EditionThe gigahertz barrier has been broken. Armed with a stunning 1GHz GPU based on the revolutionary GCN Architecture, the AMD Radeon HD 7000 GHz Edition (Selected model) is quite simply engineered to annihilate.
- Vapor-X TechnologySAPPHIRE’s innovative Vapor-X cooling technology allows products to run not only cooler but also much quieter. A Vapor-X product means a virtually silent gaming experience and more headroom to explore performance tweaking!
- Dual-XFamous for SAPPHIRE’s exclusive cooling solutions like the award winning Vapor Chamber Cooling technology — Vapor-X, SAPPHIRE’s reputation for innovative excellence continues to grow with the introduction of the new dual-extractor technology — Dual-X.
Dual-X is a highly efficient multi-heatpipe cooler with dual fans that provide quiet and very cool operation during normal operating conditions, and superb cooling performance even under extreme load. - TriXX UtilityTriXX helps users to get the optimum performance from compatible SAPPHIRE graphics cards in any application by allowing them to monitor, tune and save different settings of key parameters for the card.
- AMD Eyefinity 2.0The next generation of AMD Eyefinity technology is here, featuring all-new support for stereo 3D, universal bezel compensation and brand new display configurations. The enhancements for AMD Radeon HD7000 series include: Stereo 3D-multi-display stereoscopic 3D support via DisplayPort 16K X 16K maximum display group resolution-output up to 268 megapixels per GPU.
- AMD App AccelerationAMD App Acceleration is a set of technologies designed to improve video quality and enhance application performance. Full enablement of some features requires support for OpenCL, DirectCompute or DirectX Video Acceleration (DXVA).
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Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition: Finishing Touches / Graphics Cards
⇡#Introduction
The original Radeon HD 7970 was the biggest success for AMD/ATI in years. All the time when the company used VLIW5 / VLIW4 as the main architecture (that is, since the HD 2000 series), Radeon cards in the High-End sector have only tried to catch up with the top GeForce, but have never caught up with them within the same generation of GPUs . Yes, AMD was repeatedly the first to master thinner technical processes and released a new series of adapters before, but then another NVIDIA flagship appeared and seized the lead.
It happened this time too. The Radeon HD 7970, released in December last year, until the April release of the GeForce GTX 680 did not have full-fledged competitors from NVIDIA, but the GTX 680, a belated representative of the Kepler architecture, turned out to be faster again.
However, this year the situation is different. Contrary to expectations, the GTX 680 GPU is not the «big Kepler» GK110, but the simpler GK104 core. In order to beat the Radeon HD 7970 in all its might, NVIDIA had to squeeze all the juice out of the GTX 680: the stock GPU frequency leaves only a small margin for overclocking, and the last remaining megahertz is collected by the GPU Boost dynamic overclocking function. As a result, the GTX 680 manages to outperform the Radeon HD 7970 in benchmarks by 10% of the strength, and in some games the HD 7970 is still in the lead (mainly due to the higher memory bandwidth).
In fact, AMD’s flagship lacked quite a bit to keep the lead. With all this, the reference versions of the HD 7970 have fairly conservative clock frequencies. From stock 925 MHz, most cards easily overclock to 1150 MHz or more. Therefore, all that was required from AMD for revenge was just to move the sliders a little.
This is how the Radeon HD 79 was born70 GHz Edition.
Actually, the name of the model speaks for itself. Physically, this is the same card, only the clock speeds of the GPU and memory are increased from 925 and 5500 MHz to 1000 and 6000 MHz, respectively. The suggested retail price is $499. The regular Radeon HD 7970 had exactly the same amount at the time of release and (surprise, surprise) the GeForce GTX 680.
All other specifications remained unchanged. Everything, including TDP. And here the fun begins — the features of the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition firmware, which made it possible to increase the frequencies without sacrificing maximum power consumption.
This AMD slide has an error. Try to find it
⇡#Power Tune with Boost
The secret is in the technology similar to GPU Boost in GeForce 670-690. Recall how GPU Boost works in NVIDIA cards. The GPU has a base frequency at which it is guaranteed to be stable even in the most power-heavy applications. And on top there is a ladder of 8-14 (depending on the model) steps of 13 MHz, each of which has its own supply voltage.
The sensors on the graphics card continuously analyze the power consumption and temperature of the GPU, and if TDP and stable operating conditions allow, the processor moves to one of the top steps. In practice, the GPU in the GeForce GTX 670-690 rarely rolls back to the base frequency, which allows NVIDIA to additionally specify Boost Clock in the specifications — the average GPU frequency at which a typical instance of the card runs in most applications.
AMD has been using dynamic frequency control technology in its cards for a long time. At first it was Power Play technology (starting with the Radeon HD 3000 and up to the Radeon HD 6000), which provided for three nominal GPU frequencies. Under excessive load (for example, as a result of overclocking), the processor rolled back from the maximum frequency mode to the intermediate one. In the HD 7000 series, a further development of the idea was presented — Power Tune. Between the upper and intermediate frequencies, AMD has added a few more steps.
The GPU can quickly move between them depending on the current power consumption of the card.
The point is that Power Tune doesn’t rely on analog sensors to calculate power (like the GeForce 600 does), but instead uses a rough estimate of current power consumption based on GPU usage patterns. As a result, a relatively light load is run at maximum frequency, and in heavier applications, the frequency is reset to ensure that the card does not go beyond its TDP. Thus, Power Tune is already analogous to NVIDIA’s GPU Boost. Only NVIDIA reports the low frequency and the expected average frequency in the specifications, while AMD only reports the high frequency. As a result, GPU Boost in operation looks like overclocking, and Power Tune looks like throttling.
In the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition, Power Tune has been significantly improved. First, a few more steps were added to the clock frequency ladder. Now, if you do not take into account the minimum frequency at which the GPU operates in 2D mode, it has three main states: Intermediate P-State (the very bottom of throttling), High P-State (standard frequency in 3D) and Boost P-State — the maximum frequency that the GPU can reach.
The HD 7970 GHz Edition has 1050 MHz. If we take only this innovation, then, in fact, AMD simply extended the frequency scale — and, like NVIDIA, specifies two clock frequencies from the entire range in the specifications: some high and maximum.
But the changes don’t stop there. Now, in the intermediate steps between High P-State and Boost P-State, the processor receives a different supply voltage. The base voltage in 3D is 1.162 V (against 1.175 for the regular Radeon HD 7970), and the maximum is 1.218 V. Finally, not only power consumption, but also GPU temperature appears in the Power Tune algorithm. As with power consumption estimates, Power Tune does not use analog sensors for temperature, but makes a rough estimate based on GPU usage patterns and cooling system properties. According to AMD, in previous cards, Power Tune worked under the assumption of worst-case thermal conditions, and heuristics for temperature allow for a 3-4% increase in card performance.
In general, the fact that Power Tune does not rely on analog sensors makes it possible to switch clock speeds at a fast rate and is unlikely to have a significant effect on the power consumption of a powerful discrete video adapter.
But another advantage follows from this: AMD guarantees that each of the reference cards in practice reaches 1050 MHz, even in poorly ventilated cases.
What does Power Tune with boost look like in practice? Almost imperceptibly. In utilities for overclocking and monitoring video cards (GPU-Z, MSI Afterburner), only Boost Clock — 1050 MHz is displayed as the GPU frequency. The frequency at which the GPU actually works is not yet available. But voltage fluctuations are recorded.
In general, the increased clock speed and upgrade of Power Tune technology is a good addition to the software part of the Radeon HD 7970. I wonder how important the properties of Tahiti XT crystals, which are used to produce the new flagship, are for this. It may be that for the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition AMD will start selecting the best chips that have hitherto been included in the regular version of the HD 7970. Then the new batches of regular HD 7970s will use worse crystals. And vice versa, perhaps, the release of the HD 7970 GHz Edition was facilitated by the 22-nm process technology debugged over the past six months at TSMC, and the crystals in both versions of the card are equally good.
And what about the memory chips and the power system? Let’s take a look at the new product in order to make sure that physically it is exactly the same device as the regular Radeon HD 7970.
⇡#Design
In appearance and design of the cooler, the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition is no different from the regular HD 7970 version. production versions of the HD 7970. Here, the components of one of the six phases of the GPU power supply are also missing (in the first test samples of the HD 7970, all six phases were in place). The processor power is controlled by the CHiL CHL8228G controller.
The memory chips are dual-powered, with internal circuits powered by the remaining phase of the CHiL controller and I/O buffers powered by a separate single-phase controller.
Only the marking of memory chips has changed (H5GQ2h34AFR-R0C instead of H5GQ2h34MFR-R0C), but the standard effective frequency is the same 6 GHz.
⇡#Test Method
| Test Bench Configuration | |
|---|---|
| CPU | Intel Core i7-3960X @ 4. 6 GHz (100×46) |
| Motherboard | ASUS P9X79 Pro |
| RAM | DDR3 Kingston HyperX 4×2 GB @ 1600 MHz, 9-9-9 |
| ROM | Intel SSD 520 240 GB |
| Power supply | IKONIK Vulcan, 1200W |
| CPU cooler | Thermalright Silver Arrow |
| Housing | CoolerMaster Test Bench V1.0 |
| Operating system | Windows 7 Ultimate X64 Service Pack 1 |
| AMD card software | Catalyst 12.7 Beta + Catalyst Application Profiles 12.6 Beta CAP1 |
| NVIDIA card software | 304.48 Beta |
| AMD Catalyst Control Center Settings | |
|---|---|
| Antialiasing | Use application settings |
| Anisotropic Filtering | Use application settings |
| Tesselation | Use application settings |
Catalyst A. I., Texture Filtering Quality |
Quality, Enable Surface Format Optimization |
| Mipmap Detail Level | Quality |
| Wait for V-Sync | Off, unless application specifies |
| Anti-Aliasing Mode | Multi-sample AA |
| Direct3D Settings, Enable Geomery Instancing | On |
| Triple buffernig | Off |
| NVIDIA Control Panel Settings | |
| Ambient Occlusion | Off |
| Anisotropic Filtering | Application-controlled |
| Antialiasing — Gamma correction | On |
| Antialiasing — Mode | Application-controlled |
| Antialiasing — Settings | Application-controlled |
| Antialiasing — Transparency | Off |
| CUDA-GPUs | All |
| Maximum pre-rendered frames | 3 |
| Multi-display/mixed-GPU acceleration | Multiple display performance mode |
| Power management mode | Adaptive |
| Texture filtering — Anisitropic sample optimization | Off |
| Texture filtering — Negative LOD bias | Allow |
| Texture filtering — Quality | Quality |
| Texture filtering — Trilinear optimization | On |
| Threaded optimization | Auto |
| Triple buffering | Off |
| Vertical sync | Use the 3D application settings |
| Benchmark set | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Program | API | Settings | Test mode | Approval |
| 3DMark 2011 | DirectX 11 | Profiles Performance, Extreme | ||
| Unigine Heaven 2 | DirectX 11 | Max. quality, DirectX 11, Extreme 9 tessellation0062
| AF 16x, MSAA 4x | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
| Crysis Warhead + Framebuffer Crysis Warhead Benchmarking Tool | DirectX 10 | Frost flythrough. Max. settings, DirectX 10. | AF 16x, MSAA 4x | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
| Metro 2033 + Metro 2033 Benchmark | DirectX 11 | Max. settings, DirectX 11, DOF, tessellation, NVIDIA PhysX off | AF 16x, MSAA 4x | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
| DiRT 3 + Adrenaline Racing Benchmark Tool | DirectX 11 | Aspen, 8 cars. Max. quality, DirectX 11 | AF, AA 4x | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
| Crysis 2 + Adrenaline Crysis 2 Benchmark Tool | DirectX 11 | Central Park. Max. quality, DirectX 11, high resolution textures |
AF 16x, Post MSAA + Edge AA | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
| Battlefield 3 + FRAPS | DirectX 11 | Beginning of the Going Hunting mission. Max. quality | AF 16x, MSAA 4x | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
| Batman: Arkham City. Built-in benchmark | DirectX 11 | Max. quality | AF, MSAA 4x | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
| The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim + FRAPS | DirectX9 | City of Whiterun. Max. quality | AF 16x, MSAA 4x | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
| Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 + FRAPS | DirectX9 | Mission Return to Sender. Max. quality |
AF, MSAA 4x | 1920×1080 / 2560×1440 |
The following video cards took part in testing as rivals to Radeon HD 7970 GHz Editon:
- AMD Radeon HD 7970 (925/5500 MHz, 3 GB)
- NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 (1006/6008MHz, 2GB)
- NVIDIA GeForce GTX 670 (915/6008MHz, 2GB)
- NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 (607/3414MHz, 3GB)
- AMD Radeon HD 6990 (880/5000MHz, 4GB)
In order for both participants of today’s intrigue, Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition and GeForce GTX 680, to be fully armed, the latest beta drivers from NVIDIA (304.48 Beta) and AMD (Catalyst 12.7 Beta) were used in testing. In addition, PCI-E 3.0 mode was activated for the GTX 680, which is not officially supported on the Intel X79 platform..
⇡ # Overclocking, temperature, power consumption
Since PowerTune does not show itself at the observed clock frequencies, the starting point for overclocking was the Boost Clock frequency — 1050 MHz.
With GPU voltage, things are not so simple. The fact is that the voltage setting in MSI Afterburner (it is possible that the same thing happens with other utilities, we have not tried it) no longer has any effect on the observed voltage. To increase it, you need to try to set a higher constant voltage with the appropriate option. But, no matter how strange it may look, this does not stop the voltage from fluctuating, it just shifts the observed values upward. Thus, we cannot fix the voltage, but we can shift the range within which it changes. As a result, if you manually set the voltage to 1.3 V, then the fluctuation range will be about 1.227 — 1.252 V.
then, apparently, Power Tune went crazy, and strong artifacts appeared on the screen in 3D, regardless of the frequency of the GPU. It doesn’t look like it’s worth trying to beat Power Tune, especially since she’s doing her job so well.
If we consider the Boost Clock of the new adapter as the standard GPU frequency in other Radeons (and in terms of the principles of Power Tune, it is), the HD 7970 GHz Edition overclocked even better than the regular HD 7970: up to 1240 MHz for the processor and 7320 (1830) MHz from memory.
If we subtract the 50 MHz Power Tune Boost range from 1240 MHz, we get the frequency that many instances of the standard HD 7970 reach. Apparently, a longer frequency table allows the overclocked GPU to reach higher peak values, while rolling back to the previous lower threshold in heavy tasks. However, it is not a fact that the card actually ever reaches these 1240 MHz, and is not constantly in throttling. Until monitoring utilities gain access to the innards of Power Tune, this will remain a mystery.
But the fantastic memory overclocking is just a merit of the excellent controllers of the Tahiti chip and memory chips, apparently slightly superior to those that are bundled with the standard HD 7970. GeForce GTX 680. The cooling system, turned on at full speed, allows you to maintain the same temperatures during strong overclocking as in normal mode, but only at the cost of colossal noise. We acknowledge that even with automatic fan control HD 79The 70 GHz Edition is noticeably louder than the GeForce GTX 680.
The maximum recorded power consumption of the card, as expected, still slightly increased compared to that of the regular HD 7970. We do not think that AMD is deceiving, claiming that the TDP of both versions The HD 7970 is no different. Apparently, the HD 7970 GHz Edition is simply mastering it more actively. During overclocking, of course, power consumption shoots up at the ceiling. A powerful power supply will not interfere.
⇡#Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition vs GeForce GTX 680
These are the results for which everything was started. So, did AMD manage to regain the lost leadership?
3DMark 2011
The unoverclocked GeForce GTX 680 still outperforms the HD 7970, but is faster among overclocked Radeon cards.
Gaming benchmarks + Unigine Heaven
At 1920×1080 in three out of nine gaming benchmarks (Crysis Warhead, DiRT 3, Metro 2033) Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition is ahead.
In the other three, the GeForce GTX 680 wins (Unigine Heaven 2, Battlefield 3, Skyrim). In other games, there are no significant differences between the opponents. Perfect draw. In the 2560×1440 mode the situation outweighs in favor of the HD 7970. Only in CoD 3 and Unigine Heaven does the GTX 680 retain its superiority.
Overclocking is better for the AMD card than for the GTX 680: the performance gain is noticeably higher, and as a result, the HD 7970 GHz Edition takes revenge even at 1920×1080.
⇡#Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition against all
3DMark 2011
- It’s unfortunate for AMD, but in 3DMark 2011 the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition is inferior not only to the GeForce GTX 680, but also to the GTX 670.
- The advantage of the GHz Edition over the standard version is noticeable.
Unigine Heaven 2
- GHz Edition gained some FPS over the regular HD 7970.
- In 2560×1440 mode, the GeForce GTX 670 and GTX 680 have a minimal advantage, but at 19The 20×1080 HD 7970 GHz Edition is already noticeably behind.
- Overclocked GHz Edition beats Radeon HD 6990 and compares to GTX 670 and GTZ 680.
Crysis Warhead (DirectX 10)
- In this test, even the regular HD 7970 easily beats the GeForce GTX 680 due to its higher memory bandwidth.
- HD 7970 GHz Edition is even slightly worse than the GeForce GTX 590, and the overclocked GHz Edition is on par with the Radeon HD 6990.
The
Metro 2033 (DirectX 11)
- The advantage of the HD 7970 GHz Edition over the regular version is small.
- HD 7970 GHz Edition is noticeably faster than the GeForce GTX 680.
- Overclocked GHz Edition reaches the level of GeForce GTX 590 and Radeon HD 6990.
The
DiRT 3 (DirectX 11)
- The HD 7970 GHz Edition is vastly superior to the standard edition.
- GHz Edition is also noticeably faster than the GTX 680, comparable in performance to the Radeon HD 6990 and GeForce GTX 590.
The
Crysis 2 (DirectX 11)
- There is a noticeable performance increase in 2560×1440 mode compared to the regular HD 7970.
- At 2560×1440, the HD 7970 GHz Edition is also ahead of the GeForce GTX 680, and the overclocked card left the GTX 590 behind and caught up with the Radeon HD 6990.
- In the 1920×1080 mode, test participants hit the 100 FPS limit set in Crysis 2.
Battlefield 3 (DirectX 11)
- Once again, the HD 7970 GHz Edition has significantly improved FPS compared to the standard HD 7970.
- The new product is about on par with the GTX 670 and GTX 680.
- The overclocked HD 7970 GHz Edition is too tough even for the GTX 590.
Batman: Arkham City (DirectX 11)
- The magic phrase GHz Edition once again gives the HD 7970 a nice FPS boost.
- At 1920×1080 the card is on par with the GTX 680, and at 2560×1440 it surpasses it.
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim (DirectX 9)
- There is no significant difference between the HD 7970, HD 7970 GHz Edition and GeForce GTX 680 in this game: after a certain limit, the Skyrim engine can no longer use additional computing power.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (DirectX 9)
- Compared to the regular version of the HD 7970, the GHz Edition has a big increase in frame rate.
- However, only the GeForce GTX 670, not the GTX 680, is an equal competitor for the new product.
⇡#Conclusions
For AMD, for the first time since the bygone days of the Radeon X1950 XTX, the moment has come when the top video card is at least as good as the NVIDIA flagship of the same generation. The HD 7970 GHz Edition is even slightly faster than the GeForce GTX 680 in heavy graphics modes (such as 2560×1440) overall thanks to the 384-bit memory bus. In addition, after factory overclocking, it still has a significant margin of frequencies.
The updated Power Tune technology has a beneficial effect on the overclocking potential of the GPU, and the memory began to overclock much better. In future cards from both NVIDIA and AMD, we are sure to see a flourishing dynamic frequency and voltage control technologies, as it has already happened with the CPU.
In fact, in the original version, the HD 7970 is a very powerful card, and most copies easily reach such frequencies at which you can catch up and overtake the GeForce GTX 680. The GHz Edition is mostly a fashion product for both the owner and for the manufacturer. AMD overclocked the HD 7970 just enough to match the GTX 680 and still stay within the same TDP. Our power consumption tests clearly show what would have happened if the developers had set as their goal an unconditional victory over the NVIDIA flagship.
Alas, AMD has already lost a special advantage over NVIDIA cards in the High-End segment, which it has enjoyed in recent years — power consumption.
If earlier the top Radeons could not beat the GeForce GTX 480 and GTX 580 in terms of performance, but they consumed and heated up much less, now there is a draw in the benchmarks, but the TDP of the Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition is as much as 55 W higher than that of the GTX 680.
And one more question. The existence of two physically identical cards with different software in the Radeon line already looks ugly. What HD 79 Buyers Pay For70 GHz Edition, if almost the same can be achieved by easily overclocking the standard HD 7970, and why didn’t the owners of the latter get a new firmware? Since the BIOS of video cards cannot be updated as easily as drivers, it would be better if the HD 7970 GHz Edition completely replaced its predecessor. Well, purely from the point of view of world harmony.
AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition GPU Review and Test GECID.com. Page 1
::>Video cards
>2012
> AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition
09/10/2012
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Our regular readers will no doubt remember that AMD managed to introduce the latest generation of Radeon HD graphics adapters based on the Graphics Core Next architecture and 28 nm chips a few months ahead of the announcement of products based on NVIDIA Kepler.
At the same time, the first high-level video cards from the NVDIA GeForce GTX 600 line turned out to be more successful in comparison with similarly priced and positioned solutions from the AMD camp. This situation as a whole did not come as a surprise, because Californian engineers had more time to develop and improve their solutions, however, be that as it may, new products based on the NVIDIA Kepler microarchitecture really provided higher performance in modern applications using the DirectX 11 API, while also demonstrating the lowest power consumption for a high-end gaming graphics card. AMD’s response to this situation has been a predictable price cut for high-end Radeon HD 79 adapters.70 and Radeon HD 7950 to $430 and $350, respectively, to keep them attractive to consumers. In addition, for those users who care about the maximum performance of a graphics accelerator (including in normal operation), a new model of the AMD Radeon HD 7970 video card was announced with the prefix GHz Edition in the name and a recommended cost of $500.
Today we have the opportunity to take a closer look at this improved flagship product and find out if it can influence the balance of power in the upper market segment.
In the official presentation dedicated to the announcement of the graphics accelerator AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition , first of all, it is noted that the new revision of the flagship of the Radeon HD line is designed to once again return to AMD the title of developer of the most productive single-chip graphics adapter for gaming PCs and work stations.
In addition, the document paid a lot of attention to the competitive advantages of the AMD Graphics Core Next architecture and the development of cooperation between the Canadian giant and various developers of games and general-purpose software (General Purpose).
AMD representatives also emphasize that the new versions of AMD Catalyst drivers provide a noticeable performance boost in modern applications for video card models of all levels.
The specifications of the AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition graphics card have undergone a number of changes compared to the first revision of the AMD Radeon HD 7970, presented at the very beginning of 2012, but the improvements did not affect the architectural features of the Tahiti XT GPU, PCB design, volume and type used memory. As conceived by AMD engineers, a noticeable increase in performance of the novelty, in comparison with its predecessor, is provided thanks to the new frequency formula and AMD PowerTune with Boost technology.
To demonstrate that the new flagship of the Radeon family sets a new level of performance, and the GCN architecture is well optimized for computing, AMD marketers announced that the AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition graphics card is the first among discrete single-chip adapters to break the 1 Tflops milestone in operations with double precision numbers.
Importantly, AMD has not changed its PSU wattage recommendations to fully power a system with an AMD Radeon HD 79 graphics processor installed.
70 GHz Edition, however, based on the specifications, the peak power consumption of the novelty can reach 250 W, which is 25 W more than its predecessor. The graphics core of the AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition of the «reference» sample has a base frequency of 1000 MHz, which automatically increases to 1050 MHz in turbo mode, and the memory chips operate at the same frequency as that of the main competitor (NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680) — 6000 MHz. In percentage terms, the increase in frequencies relative to the «regular» AMD Radeon HD 7970 was 8.1% and 10%, which allows us to hope for a noticeable increase in performance in normal operation. At the same time, it is worth noting that for the vast majority of AMD Radeon HD 7970 adapters, overclocking to the recommended frequencies of the new flagship did not present any problems. In the table below, we compared the specifications of the AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition with its predecessor and main competitor, the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680:
|
AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition |
AMD Radeon HD 7970 |
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 |
|
|
Codename |
Tahiti XT |
Tahiti XT |
GK104 |
|
Number of stream processors |
2048 |
2048 |
1536 |
|
Texture blocks |
128 |
128 |
128 |
|
ROPs |
32 |
32 |
32 |
|
GPU frequency, MHz |
1000 |
925 |
1006 |
|
Maximum GPU frequency in turbo mode, MHz |
1050 |
— |
1058 |
|
Shader frequency, MHz |
1000 |
925 |
1006 |
|
Video memory frequency, MHz |
1500 |
1375 |
1502 |
|
GDDR5 memory, MB |
3072 |
3072 |
2048 |
|
Video memory interface, bit |
384 |
384 |
256 |
|
Power Connectors |
1 x 6-pin, 1 x 8-pin |
1 x 6-pin, 1 x 8-pin |
2 x 6-pin |
|
Recommended power supply, W |
500 |
500 |
550 |
Recall that we have already considered the features of the Graphics Core Next architecture and the Tahiti XT graphics core in the review of the AMD Radeon HD 7970 video card, so we will not repeat ourselves, but only dwell on the main differences of the novelty.
AMD PowerTune with Boost Technology
As we mentioned above, in addition to increasing the nominal frequencies of the graphics core and memory chips, the AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition video card also received support for AMD PowerTune with Boost technology . The AMD PowerTune functionality update has brought the ability to automatically change the voltage and frequency of the GPU from 1000 to 1050 MHz at high loads, which should also increase the performance of the video card as a whole. We also note the statement about improved algorithms for determining the readings of thermal sensors and a more accurate measurement of energy consumption.
|
Model |
AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition |
|
Graphics core |
AMD Tahiti XT |
|
Number of stream processors |
2048 |
|
Supported APIs |
DirectX 11. |
|
Graphics core frequency, MHz |
1000 (1050 turbo) |
|
Memory frequency (effective), MHz |
1500 (6000) |
|
Memory size, MB |
3072 |
|
Memory type |
GDDR5 |
|
Memory bus width, bits |
384 |
|
Tire type |
PCI-E 3.0 x16 |
|
Maximum resolution |
Up to 4 displays of 1920×1200 each Up to 2560×1600 Dual-link DVI or 1920×1200 Single-link DVI Up to 2048×1536 VGA (via DVI-to-VGA adapter) Up to 1920×1200 HDMI 1.4 Up to 2560×1600 DisplayPort |
|
Image output interfaces |
1xSingle-Link DVI 1xDual-Link DVI 1xHDMI 1. 2xMini-DisplayPort 1.2 |
|
Support for HDCP and HD video decoding |
Yes |
|
MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX, WMV9 decoding, VC-1 and H.264/AVC |
|
|
Minimum power supply requirement, W |
500 |
|
Dimensions, mm |
285 x 111 |
|
Drivers |
Fresh drivers can be downloaded: |
|
Manufacturer website |
http://www.amd.com/ |
1 (Shader Model 5.0), OpenGL 4.2 
4 graphics processor AMD Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition, provided by AMD, on the graphics card AMD Radeon HD 7970. Again, this is possible due to the fact that there are no hardware differences between this graphics adapter and the new model, and the table with specifications above is still times it confirms.