Difference between 880 and 900mhz 6970 card

[rds1220]

I had a qucik question for you guys. For gaming how much of a difference does core memory clock and effective memory clock if it close. For example I'm looking at the Radeon 6970 graphics card and within the 6970 there are two different cards. All 6970's have a streaming process of 1536 but the cheaper cards have a core clock of 880 and an effective clock of 1375. The more expensive 6970 cards start out at a 900 core clock and 1400 mhz effective clock. So how much of a difference does the 20mhz core clock and 25mhz effective clock make for gaming? Also is it worth it to spend an extra 30+ dollars for 20 and 25mhz more power.

 

[bystander]

You are talking about 2-3%. 20 divide by 880. That said, the non overclocked ones can generally be overclocked just fine, as long as they have decent coolers on them.

 

[rds1220]

Yea but I've read that people got the 880 mhz cards up in the range of 920mhz. That sounds great but the other cards start out at 900 and overclocked should push them well past 920mhz. The 880mhz cards are starting to push their limits at around 920mhz the more expensive 6970's are starting out around that speed and again should be able to push well beyond that.

 

[bystander]

It's all a luck. They are the same chips, and some chips are just better than others. Some 880mhz chips can hit 1000mhz, and others struggle at 900mhz. The advantage of the preoverclocked cards is you know they can reach their shipped clocks, but that doesn't guaranty that it'll overclock any higher.

 

[rds1220]

Does anyone even make pre-overclocked 6970's. I haven't seen any from Saphire, Diamond or HIS.

 

[bystander]

The MSI Lightning is, I believe.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127581

 

[ilysaml]

most of the manufacturers make Factory overclocked cards
Powercolor http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131394
Gigabyte http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125371
and you can still easily overclock and achieve the 900-940 easily with any other brand HIS, Sapphire but ensure that you're away from reference designed GPUs, the non-reference designed GPUs have a better cooling and gives more room for overclocking while being at a good temp as well....

If you're getting the HD 6970, you can get the Sapphire Toxic HD 6950 this article claims it's faster than HD 6970 with a little pure overclock
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/sapphire-radeon-hd-6950-toxic.html

 

[rds1220]

Thanks I'll take a look at that card. This is the card I was thinking of getting. I don't know much about Saphire but when looking around this card has gotten good reviews.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102918

How important is stream processing in a gpu. I understad you can flash the bios in that 6950 card and get it to start at 880mhz and you can overclock it but still the stream processing is only 1408 and the 6970 is 1536

 

[bystander]

The stream processors are how many computing units exist in the GPU. The more, the faster. Most cards can no longer unlock those stream processing units, but I have seen people able to unlock them on the HIS 6950 IceQ Turbo's recently, but it's not done the way most people know of from the past. http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/316974-33-radeon-6950-shader-unlock-instructions#t2368661

As far as the card you linked, I'm not a fan. I'd rather have an aftermarket cooler. That one typically doesn't cool as well and is louder than other aftermarket coolers.

 

[rds1220]

Now if it has a different cooler does that mean it is or is not a reference card?

 

[ilysaml]

stream processors also known as shaders are a generic shadesr that can be turned into a specific shaders on demand. shaders, transistors, GPU clock are the most determinant factors of a GPU strength.

flashing HD 6950 Bios was guaranteed with reference designed cards, but it's more a bottleneck with non reference designed cards

Sapphire is the best partner of AMD as i think, i had their products since the Radeon X1900 series, but the one you linked doesn;t have a proper cooling, like for eg this one
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102945&Tpk=HD%206950%20dirt%203

 

[ilysaml]

Now if it has a different cooler does that mean it is or is not a reference card?

EDIT: the one you linked is very similar to reference design cards, non-reference one will have a dual or triple fans, or one big fan in the middle

 

[rds1220]

O ok I always wondered how you could tell the difference since it doens't outright say if it is a reference or not. Also back to bystander. I understand that so what I'm asking is how is that 6950 toxic faster then a 6970 if it has less streaming prosscers?

 

[ilysaml]

as i know, i might be wrong... all the Toxic Edition cards are equipped with The Vapor-X Cooling Chamber that helps keep the TOXIC slightly cooler than the Reference card.

 

[rds1220]

O ok. So something like this would be a non reference card. I like this card too.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125371
There that should work now

 

[ilysaml]

link not working

 

[rds1220]

OK fixed it.

 

[ilysaml]

yea sounds perfect, and it has good reviews

 

[rds1220]

awsome thanks for the help. O one more thing that card says 2.1 16x but the mobo I was looking at also made by gigabyte says it has a 2.0 16X slot. Does that matter? Will there be any type of compatablity issues?

 

[ilysaml]

PCIe x16 2.1 is the same as PCIe 2.0, from wikipedia
" PCI Express 2.1 supports a large proportion of the management, support, and troubleshooting systems planned for full implementation in PCI Express 3.0. However, the speed is the same as PCI Express 2.0 "

just ensure you have a good quality PSU

 

[rds1220]

Yea already done. I have a Corsair 850x Gold 850 watt psu. That should be enough to run everything.

 

[ilysaml]

it's more than enough, anyway will be a good idea for future upgrades or in case of CF
good luck with gaming mode... i'm going to sleeeeeeeeeeep... LOL

 

[bystander]

As I mentioned before, the HIS 6950 IceQ Turbo has been unlockable recently, while even reference designs often aren't anymore. However, you must use the link I posted above, or one with similar steps. You aren't flashing it with a 6970 bios, but altering the existing bios.

However, if you want a 6970, and don't want to have a chance of failure, just buy a 6970.