xfx 7970 return or not?

786arslan · Jan 9, 2014

Just bought the xfx 7970 dd and it will arrive tomorrow, after reading many bad reviews and horror stories im thinking I should return it as I have a 7 day return policy if I dont open the item, no questions asked. Is it worth putting more money in and getting the r9 290, I'll have to get a better PSU for that as well as I bought a zalman 600watt 80+ but I have the return policy on that too... Will the xfx be really a that bad card or should I risk it and keep it. I have bought the AMD 8320 as my CPU with a 970 Gigabyte board and 8 gd G skill 1600mhz. Will be gaming on a 1080p monitor, my friends said the 290 is an overkill, but that cant be bad? I wouldn't mind future proofing or am I being silly? Thanks.

sincreator · Jan 9, 2014

Just make sure to register the card with XFX as soon as you get it. It should make returning the product much easier, if you need to do so.

laviniuc · Jan 9, 2014

what horror stories? the xfx 7970 isn't a bad card... you should wait for the custom cooler version of the 290/290x before picking the 290 now those are some horror stories.

Novuake · Jan 9, 2014

The XFX cards these days are really bad. At the very least get another manufacturers HD7970.

rolli59 · Jan 9, 2014

Bad reviews are written by people that are not happy, happy people usually do not bother writing reviews. Just my $0.02 on user reviews.
It is totally up to you but really I think the 7970 is one of the cards that is the sweat spot for 1080P gaming. I have 2 x XFX HD7950 DD cards both go up to high 70's while gaming but that is well within normal operating limits.

786arslan · Jan 9, 2014

It is supposed to overheat alot, I cant wait so long till the r9 290 non reference but im in two minds about keeping the 7970... would it be still as good card in a year/2 year? I see threads of people already upgrading from a 7970 to something else. .. over all is it a good build? Or should I swap out the 7970, I bought it since it was really cheap on a sale

sincreator · Jan 9, 2014

rolli59 :

Have you ever replaced the thermal paste on your 7950's? I replaced the paste on my TF III 7950 and the temps dropped drastically. Like 15 degrees under load. I was getting up to 80f on the stock paste, and afterwards I hit in the low 60's under load.

horaciopz · Jan 9, 2014

Well, i have a friend with that same GPU, XFX 7970 double D and it has been running flawlessly since june of the past year. Still if you have the budget and you can get the R9 290, you really should go ahead and get it as you will end up with better performance, you should note that card is really overkill for 1080p but you will also note that you will be gaming at the highest setting for some quite time.

BUT you really should go for the R9 card if it is an aftermarket desing, if it is the reference desing model you will end up with a card that runs hot, loud and mostly downlocked by itself.

What would be ideal for you is that you change your XFX card to another brand, let's say the Shappire one or the Asus one for your own peace.

rolli59 · Jan 9, 2014

sincreator :

rolli59 :

Have you ever replaced the thermal paste on your 7950's? I replaced the paste on my TF III 7950 and the temps dropped drastically. Like 15 degrees.

No never seen the need to forfeit my lifetime warranty!

Pr3di · Jan 9, 2014

In the worst case scenario return it and get a good R9 280x from one of the known manufacturers.

The R9 290 is overkill, but also a bit of future-proofing.
Just make sure to buy a non-refference one if you go this route. Gigabyte and Sapphire already have them prepared, just not sure if they hit the shelves yet.

AlexSmith96 · Jan 9, 2014

XFX's 7970 is a very good card capable of playing next gen titles at 1080p. However, planning to upgrade it to an R9 290(custom cooled) is not at all a bad idea.
Lets compare.
AMD R9 290 vs 7970
Acc. to game-debate experts, R9 290 is 24% better than the 7970 card in case of performance.
In terms of overall gaming performance, the graphical capabilities of the AMD Radeon R9 290 are noticeably better than the AMD Radeon HD 7970.The Radeon R9 290 has a 22 MHz higher core clock speed and 32 more Texture Mapping Units than the Radeon HD 7970. This results in the Radeon R9 290 providing 33.1 GTexel/s better texturing performance. The Radeon R9 290 was released over a year more recently than the Radeon HD 7970, and so the Radeon R9 290 is likely to have better driver support, meaning it will be more optimized for running the latest games. The Radeon R9 290 has 1024 MB more video memory than the Radeon HD 7970, so is likely to be much better at displaying game textures at higher resolutions.The Radeon R9 290 has 56 GB/sec greater memory bandwidth than the Radeon HD 7970, which means that the memory performance of the Radeon R9 290 is much better than the Radeon HD 7970.

If I were you, I'll surely buy the R9 290. But buy a custom cooled one. Reference designs have peak temperatures of around 94 degrees.

rolli59 · Jan 9, 2014

With the FX 8 core I would have gone with a better motherboard (high end 990FX) so the CPU can be overclocked to the max rather than burning cash on an overpriced 290 (mining price hike). It would be easy to upgrade a GPU in 2 years if not satisfactory.

houldendub · Jan 9, 2014

rolli59 :

Just out of curiosity, what are your thoughts on the noise from those cards? I had two XFX 7950s and after switching to two stock 760s, the noise difference was incredible, the 7950s were like rocket ships compared!

Just adding my own 2 cents, the noise from those XFX cards is unacceptable, and makes me wonder why I put up with it for so long!

sincreator · Jan 9, 2014

rolli59 :

LOL, Ya I guess. I asked in the MSI forums if my warranty would be voided by removing the heatsink, and a moderator told me as long as there was no physical damage I'd be fine. Different manufacturers, different policies I guess.

786arslan · Jan 9, 2014

I dont want to wait another month for the 290s after market to come out... who knows when they'll be out and since I'll already have the card by tomorrow is it really worth putting off the build for another week just because I have trust issues with
Xfx (lol) should I just go ahead and enjoy the beauty of gaming as my previous Pc has been dead for over 2 months

laviniuc · Jan 9, 2014

game on

i say! till you have a problem with the card, don't bother fixing it.

rolli59 · Jan 9, 2014

sincreator :

Well I clean my PC's every 3 months or so and I know that the max op temp is in the mid 90's°C so why worry if I do not hit 80°C and fans never run full speed.
Back to the user reviews some of them are based on people having the misconception that 70°C is hot, all we have to do is look at all reviews for 290 and 290X to see that it is not hot since those cards run into the 90's°C.

786arslan · Jan 9, 2014

What kind of overclocks would I be able to get on it? Xfx 7970

sincreator · Jan 9, 2014

houldendub :

I won't answer for him, but I wanted to tell you that is the reason why I replaced my thermal paste. My fans would get real loud after 65% fan speed, and the card at 80 degrees would go above that mark. There was enough paste to do 3 or 4 cards on there. lol, what a mess they had made of it. After I replaced the paste I never heard the whirring again unless I was manually setting it at 100% to overclock and run some benchmarks.

AlexSmith96 · Jan 9, 2014

The XFX 7970 Double Dissipation is a great card for 1080p gaming. You won't have any troubles. But try getting R9 280x. Its a rebadged 7970 with a lttle boost at a cheaper price. Also its non-reference variants are easily available.

sincreator · Jan 9, 2014

786arslan :

Every chip is different, but here is some overclocks to check out: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/51347-xfx-hd-7970-3gb-black-edition-double-dissipation-review-13.html

PS: Overclocking may void your warranty if it damages the card.

786arslan · Jan 9, 2014

Im in the uk and xfx was the cheapest and probably the only one I could find. I could add £30 to the price and wait a week to get the r9 280x but is it worth it??

sincreator · Jan 9, 2014

786arslan :

Well the 280x is a rebadged 7970ghz edition, so all you would need to do is match the clocks and save yourself the 30 euros. It's what I would do honestly. If you ever decide to get a second card for crossfire the 280x WILL work with a 7900 series anyway.

AlexSmith96 · Jan 9, 2014

If XFX 7970 is cheaper than the R9 280X ,go for it. Both are the same products. R9 280x is just a rebadged 7970, so no need to spend extra bucks.

rolli59 · Jan 9, 2014

I say keep your HD7970 instead of returning it. People recommending the 280X are probably missing the fact you already have it!

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