VisionTek Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition 3GB 384-bit GDDR5 PCI Express Video Card + Sleeping Dogs PC Game Coupon $360 + Free Shipping

Newegg has VisionTek Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition 3GB 384-bit GDDR5 PCI Express Video Card + Sleeping Dogs PC Game Coupon (automatically added to cart) for $400 - 10% off promo code VISTEK = $360 with free shipping. Thanks jays_on

Review Roundup courtesy of Engadget

Looks like a hot deal.

Quote from foreinter : Looks like a hot deal.

I currently have this card and it is amazing. WHISPER quite even at 100% fan speed, and runs super cool, Idles in the 30's.

The memory is slightly below GHz Ed specs @1425, but it overclocks well past GHz Ed specs anyway.

It is true you'll likely be able to push a standard 7970 past GHz Ed specs, however the ACTUAL GHZ Ed card should have a better GPU, meaning better overall performance. I had the Diamond Ref 7970 but have been much happier with this card in every area.

Quote from jays_on : It is true you'll likely be able to push a standard 7970 past GHz Ed specs, however the ACTUAL GHZ Ed card should have a better GPU, meaning better overall performance. I had the Diamond Ref 7970 but have been much happier with this card in every area.

Actually HD7970 Ghz Edition GPUs are exactly the same as non-Ghz ones. AMD called it XT2 but it's basically marketing for "we'll bump the voltage to 1.256V into them in the BIOS" and call it GPU Boost to compete with Kepler Boost for marketing reasons. Lame.

" Every GHz Edition video card we have overclocked at HardOCP, has turned out lackluster overclocking results. The previous, non-GHz Edition 7970 GPUs overclocked better for us." - HardOCP [hardocp.com]

Overclocking above 1150mhz will come down to silicon lottery (ASIC quality of the chip), PCB design, VRM/caps selection and cooling. The GPU in this case is clocked at 1050mhz and it should perform no worse than a 1000mhz + 50mhz GPU Boosted HD7970 Ghz edition card.

The only thing here is slightly underclocked factory memory speeds from 6000mhz of the $449 HD7970 GE cards. But again you are getting this for $360, not $450! Really 10 seconds in MSI after-burner and you got yourself 6Ghz GDDR5.

TechPowerUP [techpowerup.com] reviewed this card and it ended up as fast as a GTX680 even at stock specs.

Once you overclock this card, it'll smoke the GTX670 [techpowerup.com] that goes for around the same $360 price range.

Quote from BestJinjo : Overclocking above 1150mhz will come down to silicon lottery (ASIC quality of the chip), PCB design, VRM/caps selection and cooling. The GPU in this case is clocked at 1050mhz and it should perform no worse than a 1000mhz + 50mhz GPU Boosted HD7970 Ghz edition card.

Thanks BestJinjo, enjoy your posts, Always useful info for sure!

Regarding your above post, that is kind of my point, I believe the GHz Ed should be the better binned chips right?

Quote from BestJinjo : TechPowerUP [techpowerup.com] reviewed this card and it ended up as fast as a GTX680 even at stock specs. Once you overclock this card, it'll smoke the GTX670 [techpowerup.com] that goes for around the same $360 price range.

If it's about the same as the GTX 680 at stock then obviously that means it will still "smoke" the GTX 670, at stock. So you're only repeating yourself lol.

Tie in the fact that AMD dropped their card prices ~3 times? And Nvidia refuses to drop their prices AT ALL. AND The "best" possible deals on the GT 670 are only $40~$60 below it's retail $399 prices while AMD deals can go as low as ~$100 below normal retail price.

So I wouldn't call it fair to compare the GTX 670 with HD 7970 GHz

would amazon ever price match this? I have 200 dollars in gift cards.

Quote from Bitech : So I wouldn't call it fair to compare the GTX 670 with HD 7970 GHz

Totally agree. The 7970 is the AMD flagship aimed at the 680, so stock should smoke the 670 stock anyway. I say should because unless i'm mistaken the difference is not nearly what we had hoped. I got the ASUS 7970 Direct CU II, and overclocked i'm barely scratching that 680's stock Futuremark scores, but soundly beating the 670's. IMHO, this is a great deal if you're looking for that price range, but keep in mind that at this level it's the drivers that hold you back, not the hardware.

Quote from kkel19 : would amazon ever price match this? I have 200 dollars in gift cards.

Definitely worth a shot.

I thought that I had to stay with NVIDIA cards b/c of wanting to be able to use PhysX, which I thought was only available on NVIDIA cards. I tried doing a hybrid system, using an AMD card for my main video card and having a secondary NVIDIA card for physx. You have to jump through your butt to make that work b/c of NVIDIA disabling physx on their cards if the driver sees and AMD card. I couldn't get it to work even after using very questionable 'hybrid fixes'.

I was way, way incorrect about all that. It's so simple it's pitiful. I have 5850 that I'm playing Borderlands 2 on with PhysX enabled (handled by the CPU). It works perfectly.

You don't need NVIDIA to do PhysX. What a bunch of marketing crap.

PhysX in BL2 with AMD card.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_VE5yqNbLg

Quote from jays_on : I currently have this card and it is amazing. WHISPER quite even at 100% fan speed, and runs super cool, Idles in the 30's. The memory is slightly below GHz Ed specs @1425, but it overclocks well past GHz Ed specs anyway. It is true you'll likely be able to push a standard 7970 past GHz Ed specs, however the ACTUAL GHZ Ed card should have a better GPU, meaning better overall performance. I had the Diamond Ref 7970 but have been much happier with this card in every area.

TBH noone cares about idle temps. What're the load temps? That's where noise matters. You can make even reference cards silent at idle!

Quote from Bitech : If it's about the same as the GTX 680 at stock then obviously that means it will still "smoke" the GTX 670, at stock. So you're only repeating yourself lol. Tie in the fact that AMD dropped their card prices ~3 times? And Nvidia refuses to drop their prices AT ALL. AND The "best" possible deals on the GT 670 are only $40~$60 below it's retail $399 prices while AMD deals can go as low as ~$100 below normal retail price. So I wouldn't call it fair to compare the GTX 670 with HD 7970 GHz

It's 100% fair since they are currently priced similar to each other based on this deal. If GTX680 dropped to $300 on a Black Friday sale, you are telling me it wouldn't be fair to compare that deal to $360-400 HD7970s? Not sure I understand your logic.

Sorry, not sure how anything you said is relevant to gamers/consumers. I am not a shareholder of AMD or NV. I don't care how many times NV or AMD dropped prices.

I looked at this thread, and $360 HD7970 Ghz Edition costs about the same as a GTX670 and it smokes it. Overclock an HD7970 Ghz and it goes up against a 1250-1280mhz GTX680. GTX680 costs about $450 right now with rebates on Newegg. Is it the consumer's fault in this thread that NV continues to overprice its cards?

You can say it's unfair to compare HD7970 Ghz Edition to GTX670, but since I don't work for AMD or NV, I can't lower prices on GTX670/680. You can sit here and discuss NV's ability to keep prices high which may benefit shareholders or chastise AMD for dropping prices but the fact of the matter remains as a consumer choosing to buy a GPU now, this HD7970 Ghz Edition offers more value than GTX680 and performs faster than GTX670 at a similar price. You don't think that's fair, e-mail NV and ask them why they haven't dropped prices on the slower GTX670 or vote with your wallet and buy a competitor, and NV will eventually lower prices due to supply-demand economics !

Quote from wrmanis : Totally agree. The 7970 is the AMD flagship aimed at the 680, so stock should smoke the 670 stock anyway.

I never said HD7970 Ghz edition was meant to compete against GTX670. The point is this deal is HOT because at a similar price point to GTX670, AMD is selling you a card that performs like a GTX680. Not trying to be some fanboy here but that's the main point I made - for $360 you get a card that performs like a 680, and consequently smokes a similarly priced $360 GTX670s, meaning this deal offers better performance per dollar than 670 does at current prices for those consumers who are looking to compare what NV might offer against this deal.

If someone asks, "Is this deal worth it?" What are you going to say? I used NV's cards performance and price levels to provide a reference point that yes indeed this card offers more value and/or performance at a given price level against NV's offerings.

Quote from jays_on : Thanks BestJinjo, enjoy your posts, Always useful info for sure! Regarding your above post, that is kind of my point, I believe the GHz Ed should be the better binned chips right?

Thanks!

AMD said that but I don't believe it. Browsing various forums, Ghz Ed cards do not seem to overclock any better than if you took a regular HD7970 card and bumped the voltage to 1.25V yourself. Actually for overclockers, most 7970 Ghz edition cards may be less preferable since you are paying a premium for what essentially is a factory BIOS of 1.212-1.256V, used to achieve just a 1.05ghz overclock while Tahiti XT chip is capable of hitting 1050mhz on stock voltage of 1.175V. In other words, the Ghz Edition cards are factory overvolted to allow for chips with even ASIC of 50% to be able to hit 1050mhz and you pay AMD a premium for that peace of mind.

The only 2 cards that should actually overclock much better than normal 7970 chips are the Asus Matrix HD7970 Platinum and the MSI Lightning HD7970 / Boost Edition as those have hand-picked cream of the crop Tahiti chips. But if you buy a Gigabyte Windforce 3x 1100mhz HD7970 Ghz Edition it may not even overclock better than the old Gigabyte Windforce 3x 1000mhz card. I honestly think AMD just said they hand picked Ghz Edition chips to justify the $50 premium.

Think about it, Tahiti launched December 22, 2011. If AMD says the node has matured allowing them to hit 1050mhz clocks on certain Tahiti XT chips, wouldn't the benefit of a more mature 28nm node start to show up in the newer 300mm wafers manufactured in the 2nd half of 2012? Unless we know that 30% of the wafer has chips that can be used as XT2 in Ghz Edition and AMD sells exactly 30% Ghz Edition cards then some Tahiti XT chips have to end up in regular Tahiti XT cards anyway. Chances are AMD sells more regular HD7970 cards than HD7970 Ghz, leaving a lot of chips on the wafer that can hit 1050mhz but it doesn't need that many to sell under the Ghz Edition moniker. It can't throw those chips out and my intuition tells me some of those chips still end up making it to regular HD7970 cards which is why Ghz edition doesn't really overclock much better unless you get those uber after-market versions.

This is really no different than Core i7 2600K and 2700K having very similar overclocking headroom even though they are marketed as different chips.

Quote from flashfir : TBH noone cares about idle temps. What're the load temps? That's where noise matters. You can make even reference cards silent at idle!

It appears this card stayed at 76*C at 1100mhz overclock at TPU [techpowerup.com].

Quote from flashfir : TBH noone cares about idle temps. What're the load temps? That's where noise matters. You can make even reference cards silent at idle!

Well, I care about idle temps. And like I said, even with fan at 100% it is near silent. But like BestJinjo said it tops out in the 70's. The hottest mine has gone is 77 after playing crysis 2 for a few hours oc'd on ultra, dx11 patch and high res pack enabled.

Quote from BestJinjo : It appears this card stayed at 76*C at 1100mhz overclock at TPU [techpowerup.com].