for real, dave

Thanks
A


Your the sheets man, the sheets!!!!


Does dave get to use the card after the benchies? Or is it only gonna be used for ABT evaluations? Dave wouldnt you love a 7970 for your own pleasure in between ABT articles?

Regardless.......
It is a much needed addition to abt!!!

Cant wait for the 7970 articles. There is soooo much you can do with this bad boy poppin! So so so much

Thanks Dave

Actually, Dave doesn't even have a desktop.


He make this investment for ABT. It is an important card to have. This is the second time that he has done this for us.


The last time was two years ago when the GTX 480 launched and Dave purchased a Diamond HD 5870 for $400. We were in a similar position with AMD and they only sent us an overclocked PowerColor HD 5870 when they learned we were reviewing the GTX 480. So i had two of them for CrossFire.

i doubt that AMD will send us anything unless somehow they want us to feature a very highly overclocked version of HD 7970. Why would they want us to do that?

because duh:
the 680 is only 10% faster than the 7970 in some test, 10% slower in others. just like the 6990 vs 590.

Whoa!!!!!



What's real interesting about it is that most games show such a massive difference between HD 7770 and HD 6870.

HD 7770 only comes remotely close to it (within 10%) in 3 games (where HD 6850 -not benched here- would've obviously lost out at), while in the rest, it's more like 40-50% behind!!! HD 7770 is such a terrible card for its price against both HD 6850 and 6870.

Some other reviews out there made HD 7770 seem a tad bit more powerful than this chart, by about 10%.

I noticed a couple of errors: For HD 6770 in Wolfenstein and Call of Pripyat, it seems like the numbers need to be flipped for the resolutions - the same for HD 7770 (3 versions) in Crysis - also

Sometimes, HD 7770 is barely ahead of HD 6770, and trades punches with GTX 550 Ti (still coming out ahead overall by about 10%).

However, have you tried to observe GTX 550 Ti's behavior to see if there are any stuttering issues, despite the solid frame rate numbers? I really hope you didn't forget to observe it!!!!!!!

Now I'm gonna look at my Voodoopower ratings and see how your chart affects the ratings.

Thanks, great benchmark - it's so good to see you back in action again!

And thanks Dave for helping to keep ABT going strong!!!

Yes, i did make a few errors with flipping resolutions. Usually i put the higher resolution above the lower one in my charts and i will return to that for the next review. And i'll fix them for the article.


Thanks for your comments. Your have anticipated my own conclusion. HD 7770 is not a great value when you consider the midrange HD 6870 (and 6850 which is probably close in performance). However, as a replacement for the HD 5770/HD6770, it affords a decent level of performance and - especially in the case of the overclocked Sapphire - overclocking is its saving grace (and that is true with the entire 7000 series). And the Sapphire offers a guaranteed optimum overclock for $10 more than the stock HD 7770.

When the HD 68X0 series goes away and the price drops, it think it will be a decent choice. But then of course, we have to see what Nvidia's brings to the table with Mini-Kepler

There were no stuttering issues with the GTX 550 Ti except where the card is really loaded down. If you lighten the load, the issues go away. It is an underpowered card compared to the GTX 460/GTX 560 and barely deserving of the GTX designation. i preferred the old GTS designation (as in GTS 450) but then there is only one card in this category.

HD 6870 is only $10 more than HD 7770 (Newegg).. yet offers about 30% more performance.

HD 6850 is $20 cheaper than 7770 also, and is more than 10% faster.

Still plenty of stock of these cards on Newegg.

I do not think AMD is really selling any 28nm cards - it's hardly affecting the marketshare vs Nvidia. Maybe 5000 people got the high-end Pitcairn/Tahiti.. that's nothing compared to 1% of the marketshare.

I haven't looked at the results, but it sounds to me like the 7770 is struggling to outperform even a GTX 460-SE, which is fairly pathetic, really given the 7770's newness and pricing.

Go Premiums!



For now

i were sort of surprised once i really started analyzing the results. but then again maybe not. the 7770 has the chance to be a killer card, but it needs a litttle adjustment in pricing.