Powercolor 6870X2 or Powercolor Devil 13 6970?

[smokecrysis]

The Powercolor 6870X2 is a 900MHz Core Clocked Dual GPU design like the ASUS MARS cards. The Powercolor Devil 13 6970 is a stock 880MHz Core Clocked 6970 with a Turbo Functioning Core Clock of 960MHz.

Powercolor 6870X2:
Core Clock: 900MHz
Effective Memory Clock: 1050MHz (4.2Gbps)
Video Memory: 2GB
Memory Interface: 2 X 256bit (256bit)
Memory Type: GDDR5

Powercolor Devil 13 6970:
Core Clock: 880MHz/960MHz Turbo Mode
Effective Memory Clock: 1375MHz (5.5Gbps) / 1425MHz (5.7Gbps) Turbo Mode
Video Memory: 2GB
Memory Interface: 256bit
Memory Type: GDDR5

1.A. The 6870X2 can OC to 965Mhz @stock voltage. WITHOUT an OC, will the DUAL 900Mhz Core Clocks of the 6870X2 outdo the SINGLE 960Mhz Turbo Function Core Clock of the Devil 13 6970?

1.B. And likewise with the two cards' Effective Memory Clocks? Will the DUAL 1050MHz (4.2Gbps) Effective Memory Clocks of the 6870X2 outdo the SINGLE 1425MHz (5.7Gbps) Effective Memory Clock of the Devil 13 6970?

2. Can the Devil 13 6970's Turbo Function OC pass 960Mhz? I ask this because I do not consider Turbo Mode an OC, but an energy saver.

Other details:

Resolution I will be playing at is 1920X1080p 60Hz. Mostly Crysis 2 DX11 on Ultra, Crysis DX10 on Very high, and I wish I could play BF3 on Ultra but I've heard that Ultra requires at least 2 GTX 580's in SLI.

PC Specs:
CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1055T @2.8GHz
RAM: 8GB 1333MHz DDR3

 

[dharmenparikh]

Don't get either of them because the new 7000 series cards release in 1 week. Spend $400-$500 on a 7950/7970 so you can play bf3 at 60fps on ultra...you will need to overclock them but they overclock very nicely.

Another deal is to get radeon 6950 2gb x2 for crossfire. They should cost around $450 and will let you play bf3 on ultra 1080P at 60fps. I have 2X6970s in crossfire and I get minimum 60fps no matter what. My bro has 1 X 6970 and he gets 55-60fps on ultra...only MSAA is off and it really makes no difference to picture quality.

My main point is both cards you listed are over priced. Yes the 6870X2 is far better than 6970. The 6870X2 is on par or better than GTX 580. And no you don't need GTX 580 SLI for ultra BF3 @ 1080P....6950crossfire is enough for 60fps.

You need to move away from your CPU because it will bottleneck performance..the 2500k from intel is light years better than any AMD processor when overclocked to 4.5ghz.

 

[hellfire24]

6870x2 is faster cause it has 2 video cards on single board.6970 is a very good single gpu.i would suggest going with 6970 2GB.it has more VRAM.you mentioned that you want to play crysis 2,crysis and BF3,all of them are VRAM hungry on 1080p.a single 6970 2GB is enough to run them at max settings maintaining 40+ FPS.960mhz on a 6970 is a good overclcock,but you can also try to go 40mhz more to get a stable 1GHz.crossfire 6970 in near future will destroy any game even at resolutions higher than 1080p.6000 series prices will fall(hopefully )after the release of 7000 series cards.grab a good and cheap to crossfire.
6870x2 will cause multi-gpu setup problems-heat ups,micro-stuttering,more power consumption, etc.here's a benchmark comparison-
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/4212/powercolor_radeon_hd_6870x2_2gb_overclocked_video_card_review/index3.html

 

[smokecrysis]

Wow okay had no idea the 7000 series was coming out in a week but the thing is my budget is 400 bucks max so unless any of those 7000 series cards are 400 bucks or under and are up to par with the two cards I mentioned above, then I'll probably go with the 6870X2. @hellfire24 the 6870X2 also has 2GB VRAM just like the 6970.

 

[hellfire24]

oh!really! 6870x2 has 1GB of usable VRAM.Sli or crossfire does not adds more VRAM loll.7970 is priced $500+.so i guewss it's not your deal.i would suggest going with 6870x2.

 

[smokecrysis]

Yes I understand that if you SLI or Xfire cards they only use half the combined VRAM, but the 6870X2 is a Dual GPU, not two single cards in Xfire. That's like saying the 6990 4GB will only utilize 2GB of it's VRAM.

See the Powercolor 6870X2 for yourself:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131446

And the 6870X2 is also my only choice here. After looking at this benchmark the Devil 13 6970 from Powercolor doesn't even come close to reaching 60 FPS in Crysis 2 on DX11 Ultra:
http://www.overclock3d.net/reviews/gpu_displays/powercolor_hd6970_devil_13_review/9

And yeah can't get the 7970 since it's $500+ and if AMD does release a 7000 series GPU for $400 the 6870X2 would still outdo it. Thanks for the input guys. Going with the Powercolor 6870X2 2GB.

 

[pharoahhalfdead]

I don't know if my negative comment might help you, but I would go with the 6970 or wait for the 7000 series. I have the 6870x2, and it was a regrettable buy. I'm the third review on the link you posted.

M 6870x2 just crapped out on me two nights ago, so I'm gonna have to RMA it. It powers on, but no video output in any port. When it worked I got so fed up with the microstuttering (fps fluctuations) I completely disabled crossfire a few weeks ago just so games would run smooth. Im talking about 40fps flucuations. I was gonna buy a single 6870 for tri-fire but didn't want to waste my money. In so many games I got smooth gameplay with xfire disabled.

The choice is yours. After I get mine back I'm gonna sell it when the 7970's are in stock.