AMD's CEO used both terms. Now it appears that their only "prey" is their unwitting customers and fans.

Do you think the early adopters of the HD 7970 will get anything from AMD - other than a screwing? Two price drops within a month would embarrass any other company, yet somehow their fans and employees at VC&G will try to turn it into a plus.

The only thing AMD is preying on is their fanbase.


$280 8150, and $560 7970...


Not that Nvidia is a saint, but sh!t, the 7970 was going for $560-$620 when the 680 released, if they were as horrible as the AMD fans would have you believe the 680 would have released at $700.

This is very true, I have a feeling if this was nvidia forced to drop prices twice in a month there would be a out cry from certain forums and non stop reminders of how evil and greedy nvidia is.

AMD is doing poorly. They lost me as a fan and I was pretty die-hard in their corner.

I'm sure they will be around in the future, though.

That's where there logic failed IMO, they claimed that the 7970 price was justified because of how it compared to the 580 which is laughable. What they failed to realize is the 580 wasn't going to be around that long to support the 7970 pricing, apoppin nailed it when he said "They had absolutely no clue about Kepler and it looks like they were expecting another late GTX 480."

AMD thought they can overprice because there wasn't going to be any competition. Now that nvidia is releasing there cards there pricing has completely fallen apart.

Edit: added quote

Nvidia did a very honorable thing in a similar situation. When the GTX 280 priced dropped because the HD 4870 launched with performance higher than Nvidia expected, they reacted instantly by dropping their prices and they REFUNDED their early adopters the difference.

AMD customers paid $100 more for the same hardware - last month - and they also lost out on 3 games you can get now. And now it looks like another price drop . . .
- Do you think AMD cares about their fans and customers? They are the predators, it appears.

Unfortunately for them, there only prey thus far has been there customers.

I don't think there will be another price drop - just that the 925 MHz editions of HD 7970 could be quietly discontinued, to be replaced by the GHz edition, at the same $450 price point. 1000MHz is an 8% increase over 925MHz, so it's gonna be neck-to-neck with a stock GTX 680 (of course the bandwidth should also be increased by at least 5%).

What this means is that GTX 680 would have to drop to $450, in order to compete.

Discontinuing the original 925MHz edition would be a good move by AMD, IMHO.. All HD 7970's can be overclocked to at least 1100MHz, so selling them at only 925MHz is hurting them financially!

Picture another card cheaper and faster than the HD 7970



Then what?

it never was really the ability to clock higher. It was the power consumption. The 7970 sucks power the more you jack up the clocks. Chips are designed and created. They aim specifically for certain clocks that have a point where the power used per calculation is optimal. When you hit the goal you have the best case where power consumed per calculation is lowest and the clocks are good. If they miss it then you have to use more watts per calculation than anticipated. There is almost always adjustments.

The 7970 was clocked low because its power envelope. push the clocks up and the power consumption goes high with it. These cards are designed to sell in a small bracket. A very tight space. It will be interesting to see if these ghz editions use more power or the same as the 925mhz versions. If they use the same then we know they had finally reached a better level of silicon.

The 7970 wasnt that terrible in power consumption from the start. without any silicon level improvements we still could see 1ghz models. They could release them at a slightly higher power bracket. I am real interested in seeing their power consumption. whether they really improved their silicon or not.

All of this matters little cause the gk104 is extremely power efficient. And overclocking it to the current max does not shoot up the consumption badly. its clocks are not close to tapped. Nvidia could easily bring out 210watt 1300mhz gtx680TI or what ever. Nvidia has a lot more room to raise the clocks without even maturing its silicon. imagine it only gets better so i cant see AMD taking any crown. Nvidia wont let it happen