VisionTek’s HD 7970 still brings solid value to gaming

Conclusion

This has been quite an enjoyable exploration for us in evaluating the VisionTek HD 7970.  At reference speeds, it did well performance-wise comparing it to the reference GTX 770 and even the EVGA GTX 770 SC and the Galaxy GTX 770 HOF.  However, once we overclocked it, we even saw it narrow the performance gap somewhat with the $650 reference GTX 780. We are totally impressed with this enthusiast card which is nearly able to go head-to-head against the GTX 780 in a couple of games.

We see good overclockability at stock voltage and fan profile even when the VisionTek HD 7970 is overclocked beyond GHz Edition speeds, and it scales well in performance. Unfortunately, it is not a very quiet card under load.

For its $359 price, overclocked it gives good bang for buck compared to the performance of the reference GTX 770 which is priced at $399.  The HD 7970’s 3GB over 2GB vRAM for the GTX 770 may be valuable for gaming at super-widescreen resolutions using multi-GPU CrossFire.  To upgrade to a 4GB Nvidia card usually costs about $40 more than the 2GB cards.

Pros

• The VisionTek HD 7970 provides excellent performance for a 3GB $359 card and it beats the HD 7970 GHz Edition when it is user overclocked and does very well against the GTX 770.
• 3GB over 2GB of vRAM can be very useful in some situations.
• The cooling design exhausts air out of the case.
• Two or three of these cards in CrossFire can be used together to increase performance far beyond a single card.
• 3-panel Eyefinity plus an accessory display can be driven off of a single HD 7970.
• A bundle promo is included for a flexible three-game digital download at most etailers.
• Lifetime warranty and good customer service.

Cons

• Noise.  It is a noisy card when under load.

The Verdict:

• If you are buying a “sweet spot” upper-range video card right now that is perfect for 1920×1080 and 2560×1600 as well as being good performance bang for buck in a $359 card, the VisionTek HD 7970 is a good choice and gets ABT’s “Recommended” award.

We do not know what the future will bring, but the VisionTek HD 7970 brings great value and a good performer to AMD’s current line up right now. With great features like Eyefinity 2.0 , you can be assured of immersive gaming by picking this card for 1920×1080 or higher resolution. If you currently game on an older generation video card, you will do yourself a big favor by upgrading.

The competition is hot and Nvidia offers their own set of features including multi-display Surround  and PhysX. We are interested to see if there will be any further downward adjustments in overall pricing as AMD is bringing out a refresh to their lineup very shortly and a likely replacement for the HD 7970 ,much as Nvidia has already done with the GTX 680 to GTX 770 refresh.

Stay tuned, there is a lot coming from us at ABT. We are building a GTX 780 SLI “Battlebox” this weekend and will kick off a brand new contest next week that will give away seven Batman: Arkham Origins keys! And don’t forget to check our Forums. ABT forum tech discussions are among the best to be found anywhere!