AMD Radeon HD 7970 Roundup: Contenders from ASUS, Sapphire and XFX

[siopao1984]

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All the boards in our roundup today feature the reference PCB design of the Radeon 'Tahiti XT' HD 7970, with differences only in the pre-programmed default clock speeds, cooling solution, bundled software/accessories, warranties and most crucially, price. We help our readers to make an informed choice...

[siopao1984]

ASUS Radeon HD 7970

A fiery looking box - with ASUS keen to emphasize their GPU Tweak software as a selling point



Back of Box



Bundled Accessories (1 x MiniDP and 1 x HDMI to DVI convertor, 2 x 6 pin PCIe to 8 pin PCIe, Crossfire bridge) and Documentation



ASUS's HD 7970 is based on the reference design by AMD, the only difference being an ASUS sticker pasted on the vapor chamber shroud



Like the reference design, it requires 8+6 pin PCIe power connectors and preferably a PCIe 3.0 compliant CPU (currently only Intel's SNB-E) for max link speed



Up to six-monitor Eyefinity 2.0 configurations from the mini-DP, HDMI and DVI-D ports



ASUS has bundled an updated version of GPU Tweak software, which allows independent monitoring and control of the GPU and memory clocks/voltage on its cards. Some other thoughtful features we liked were the ability to sync GPU clocks with appropiate voltages (good for novice users), 2D mode clocks removal. FRAPS-like video recording, and Live Update for vBios and drivers.



ASUS themed GPU-Z

[siopao1984]

Sapphire Radeon 7970

Sapphire has opted for a black box design with their latest mascot on it - a mysterious girl in military gear



At the back, list of 2500 awards Sapphire has picked up since 2002



Sapphire is very generous with accessories - providing the most mini-DP/HDMI/DVI-D display convertors in this roundup as well as a HDMI cable. The installation CD only included the December 20th drivers that we used in our reference card review. No sign of the popular Sapphire TriXX overclocking utility though, which could be included in upcoming overclocking SKUs or downloadable from their website



The card - not a surprise that it looks exactly like the reference AMD card that we used for our HD 7970 review with the exception of a sticker on the cooler, because Sapphire is one of the 1st party BBA (built by ATi) vendors and they probably made the cards for the paper launched review units

[siopao1984]

XFX's offering is different from the other two cards in our roundup and it already shows in its box design



Back of box



Accessories/Documentation - XFX has the least amount of display convertors (HDMI to DVI only) in our roundup



XFX Radeon HD 7970 Black Edition - clocked higher at a still conservative 1000/1425MHz on the core/memory and featuring twin axial fans instead of a centrifugal blower (more on that later)



Back of card - identical to the reference design except XFX uses bigger screws



Same story here on the outputs too - only difference is there is a XFX cutout at the exhaust grills which XFX claims will provide better airflow



Heatsink removed - exactly like AMD's reference board design



'HydroCell' Vapour Chamber





Appropiately spaced fins for acoustic and thermal dissipation



'Duratec' IP5X Twin PWM capable 0.55A@12v fans - claims to have protection from dust getting into its bearings and is rated for 10,000 hours of operation

[siopao1984]

Performance

We felt that it was pointless to run benchmarks on the cards since they are all based on the reference PCB design and no new drivers (Catalyst 11.12 with Tahiti XT support) have since been released by AMD.

Having said that, the XFX is actually clocked at 1000/1425MHz, which is still conservative but higher by 8% than the ASUS/Sapphire offerings. Thus if overclocking is not in the equation then XFX has the fastest card here.

For some reason like if you have been living under a rock, here are the links to our reviews:

Single HD 7970

3-Way CrossfireX HD 7970

4-Way CrossfireX HD 7970

A reminder of how good the HD7970 is:



Overclocking

On all our cards without modifications or voltage increase, we managed to push 1125MHz on the core which is the maximum that stock bios allows CCC Overdrive to be set to. For memory we had varied results from 1500MHz to 1575Mhz, which doesn't really tell us anything as RAM max frequency is usually dependent on luck even from the same batch.



On the ASUS card, we could go higher with the help of GPU Tweak which allows for voltage controls and higher clocks to be set. Heres what we managed:





Regular readers will have spotted these images before - it is exactly the same as those in our software voltage modification feature piece that we published on New Year's Day. Kudos to ASUS for bothering to bundle this with their boards to help board owners maximize the potential of the 28nm GCN architecture.


Temperature / Acoustics

In this section, we will attempt to find the thermal abilities of the reference cooler (ASUS and Sapphire) vs XFX's dual fan cooler by using OCCT GPU Burn In test (shader complexity which induces full loading.

For temperature testing, we set the fans to 100% manual speed and power control to +20% to mitigate the effects of any throttling



Reference Cooler result: Max 63 degree celcius



XFX cooler result: Max 74 degree celcius



Factually speaking, the XFX cooler has lost out here in absolute maximum cooling potential by about 10 degrees with the same load applied. However we must point out that the blower fan on the reference design makes a huge ruckus at 100% (6000RPM, imagine the sound of a grassblower) while the XFX was making a tolerable whoosh sound which should be drowned out when put in a case. On normal (BF3) gaming loads and using the default auto fan profiles, both types of coolers were reasonably silent, with the XFX edging out due to a more gentle fan ramping slope on its bios.

[siopao1984]

Conclusion



As we've mentioned before, AMD has a winner in its hands with the HD 7970 and they should be throwing parties to celebrate with their loyal followers. We also heard that the yields for the 28nm chip are good, which should help stock quantities and more importantly, push prices down.

The three cards we've featured today all have different selling points - ASUS for its GPU tweak overclocking utility which allows for higher clock speeds and voltages than the bios will allow in CCC Overdrive, Sapphire for its generous accessories and the fact that it is a 1st party BBA card, and lastly XFX for its out of the box overclock and relatively silent cooling solution.

For scoring, we're going to start by giving all the cards an base 8.0/10 score, and then letting the determinant of the final score/award (upwards moderated) to be the actual retail SRP price, warranty and availability in Singapore, 1 week after the publishing of this article. Our advice to our readers is elementary - get the cheapest model.

Very soon, we will also see non-reference/OC edition PCB designs from the the usual suspects like ASUS (DirectCU II or ROG editions), Sapphire (Atomic water cooling series) and MSI (Twin Frozr or Lightning editions), which should help meet additional power and thermal requirements during aggressive overclocks. The HD 7950 (Taihiti Pro) is also going to be announced and available next month in February, and it would be very enticing for mainstream users if it is priced below US$400 and more audaciously, let users have the capability to flash the bios to turn it into a HD 7970 (Tahiti XT) just like before.

Interim score for all cards in this roundup until 16/1/2012 :

[akomao]

XFX grbe ka nice!

[Lingaw-lingaw_sa_payag]

XFX wins?...

[Archfear]

yeah... nice man jud ang XFX labi na inig taud sa board... ang top side kay imba! makita jud dayon imong card which is more for bragging rights... not to mention the higher clocks...