HD 7950 Decision time

I've always had Sapphire and Gigabyte cards. They've always been good cards. I've also heard good things about MSI and XFX cards. I don't know much in the way of details on them though.

I've gone with Sapphire since the 2k series.

Very solid performers since then. I've had friends use the others and they are all solid. Out of the current 7950's people have been listing ASUS with issues on some versions. With out OC look to Sapphires 7950 with the 950mhz factory oc. I currently have that card is its been nothing but a beast in any game i've thrown at it. You just need to be ready because its on a 7970 PCB which requires a 8pin and a 6pin power connection.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

If I go with the non OC card from sapphire, could it be OC to 950Mhz without any problems?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Yeah easily.

I went with it because its on the 7970 PCB and a couple people who have this same card have gotten it to run stable at 1300mhz on the core, which is something I'm looking at doing once when this isn't enough to run games.

Great! I'll be getting the non OC version and see where it gets me. Thanks for your help.

Not a problem. You will enjoy it, I know I have enjoyed mine.

Well from experience, I would never buy a Asus product.
BUT it depends on your configuration.
If you want high quality video, you must have at least a quad core processor.
AND I recommend PCIe X16.

I have gigabyte 7950 oc windforce. Great overclocker. heres the reveiw just in case
http://www.pureoverclock.com/Review-detail/gigabyte-795...

You can't go wrong with Sapphire/Gigabyte, always had good experience with these brands. XFX on the other hand... loudest and less reliable cards I ever owned were XFX

Asus have released in June or July a new revision of their 7950 Direct CUII TOP card.

Although not stated as the reason, I believe the new cooler with 6 heatpipes instead of 5 fixes the issue a few users had with the cooler's retention screws not applying enough pressure - this used to, in rare cases, cause the heatsink (after an hour or so of gaming once the TIM had heated up) come partially away from the GPU core causing crashes.

This card combines the coolest and quietest (have a listen here in this Tom's 7950 roundup) mix of cooling out atm along with excellent OCing abilities - I just ordered one a few days back and am waiting for it to arrive ^^

In general 7950 cards can reach 1050 MHz at least and 1150 is not uncommon.
Some of the luckier people reach 1200MHz with higher voltages reaching about 1.285v
1300MHz I have Only seen on watercooling or better after reading a LOT of threads on many forums. I am sure someone somewhere with a golden sample will get that, but expect Not to reach that on the standard non reference cooler.

Also do not expect to reach 1200MHz on any reference card.

And I will also throw in another +1 for that Sapphire 950MHz card, it is an excellent example of the 7950 achieving some of the best OC's I have seen
(The Sapphire VaporX version is a great card as it comes - but is I believe voltage locked - so maybe avoid is if OCing is your thing)