AMD: R8xx Speculation

[Silent_Buddha]

Sapphire HD 5870 TOXIC 2GB Review

Holy hell at the increase in Crysis Warhead at 2560x1600 4xAA. Less impressive gains in many other tests.

However, it's unfortunate that they don't also include min FPS as their comment...

The benchmarks show the Sapphire TOXIC to be a touch faster than the reference card, but what the graph doesn't portray is the perceptibly smoother games-playing experience.

Would seem to imply that min FPS is probably not as low, probably due to the larger framebuffer.

Regards,
SB

 

[mczak]

Holy hell at the increase in Crysis Warhead at 2560x1600 4xAA. Less impressive gains in many other tests.

"Less impressive"? None of the others show any difference whatsoever attributable to 2GB, not even at 2560x1600 8xAA (I think though there are actually other games out there which would benefit in this case). All other differences are less than clock difference would imply...

(edit: Though it's actually hard to conclude if there's any difference not due to clock, since it has 6% higher core clock but 4% lower memory clock to the compared HD5870 1GB card. In any case it's very very close)

 

[Mindfury]

ATI Radeon 5870 2GB 3X2 Eyefinity Gaming Experience

 

[ShaidarHaran]

ATI Radeon 5870 2GB 3X2 Eyefinity Gaming Experience

Doesn't sound too good... Bezels in the way of the targeting reticle in almost every game.

 

[compres]

Doesn't sound too good... Bezels in the way of the targeting reticle in almost every game.

Agreed, 3x2 not a good idea. But I knew that before the review even happened.

I think 3x1 or single monitor for me.

 

[Dave Baumann]

Agreed, 3x2 not a good idea. But I knew that before the review even happened.

I think 3x1 or single monitor for me.

Depends on the title. 3x2 is not something thats going to be great for an FPS (give me the 3x1 widescreen there!) but for an RTS that increases the field of view as the resolution increases then this can be very useful. Its not like a 3x2 config can't run in a 3x1 config very easily as well.

 

[CRoland]

Depends on the title. 3x2 is not something thats going to be great for an FPS (give me the 3x1 widescreen there!) but for an RTS that increases the field of view as the resolution increases then this can be very useful. Its not like a 3x2 config can't run in a 3x1 config very easily as well.

Is 5x1 possible? With the screens in portrait mode that might look good.

 

[RobertR1]

3x1 is the only thing I'd use for gaming.

 

[Erinyes]

Hey dave i actually have a question unrelated to the Silicon, but why do we see AMD's cards with relatively long PCB's? The 5870 has a 10.5" PCB. The GTX 480 from the leaks has the same size but seems to need significantly more power(might need a beefier VRM section or more components), and has 12 memory chips compared to eight on the 5870.

Even in the case of the 4870/4890 we saw fairly long PCB's(9.5"?) wheres the GTX 2xx series had either similar or slightly longer ones even though they had an additional NVIO chip and 14 memory chips in the case of the 260/275 and 16 chips in case of the 285

 

[compres]

Depends on the title. 3x2 is not something thats going to be great for an FPS (give me the 3x1 widescreen there!) but for an RTS that increases the field of view as the resolution increases then this can be very useful. Its not like a 3x2 config can't run in a 3x1 config very easily as well.

I can something like starcraft 2 running nicely in this 3x2 setup. The issue is changing the monitor arrangement for each kind of game.

If I had a lot of cash to burn, I would actually go for 5x1 and the eyefinity. In any case the E6 is a good buy just to keep your options open.

 

[Squilliam]

Hey dave i actually have a question unrelated to the Silicon, but why do we see AMD's cards with relatively long PCB's? The 5870 has a 10.5" PCB. The GTX 480 from the leaks has the same size but seems to need significantly more power(might need a beefier VRM section or more components), and has 12 memory chips compared to eight on the 5870.

Even in the case of the 4870/4890 we saw fairly long PCB's(9.5"?) wheres the GTX 2xx series had either similar or slightly longer ones even though they had an additional NVIO chip and 14 memory chips in the case of the 260/275 and 16 chips in case of the 285

If I recall properly, I believe it has something to do with the cooler design. Longer PCB will mean that the chip will be a little easier to cool quietly without relying on too many more expensive components like heat pipes. Its a trade-off effectively between length and expense from what I understand.

 

[Kaotik]

TBH I don't see why people complain about card lengths at all, they should complain about the cases breaching ATX specs if anything, every single "ATX case" (including as far as I know mATX) should fir HD5970 and every other max length card without issues.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

I can something like starcraft 2 running nicely in this 3x2 setup. The issue is changing the monitor arrangement for each kind of game.

You can setup a profile with 3x2 and 3x1 + 3x1. Then just right click on the ATI tray icon to switch profiles.

Or do like me and play all games in a window if they support it (most new games should). Then you just make a mondo window for RTS and a slightly smaller window for your FPS. That would also allow you to use most of 6 monitors for a FPS while keeping the crosshairs off the bezels.

Regards,
SB

 

[neliz]

Not sure if it was posted here already, but AMD have their OGL 4.0 preview driver up.
http://support.amd.com/us/kbarticles/Pages/Catalyst-OpenGL-preview-driver.aspx

That means OGL 4.0 for Evergreen and OGL 3.3 for RV7x0

 

[Mindfury]

Where are Evergreen refresh products?ATI's dead silence has lasted for months...

I think 6 months is enough for a respin,maybe ATI will make some architecture tweaks?

 

[neliz]

Where are Evergreen refresh products?ATI's dead silence has lasted for months...

I think 6 months is enough for a respin,maybe ATI will make some architecture tweaks?

You make it sound like AMD needs to rush out parts because they get beaten by the competition?

 

[Mindfury]

You make it sound like AMD needs to rush out parts because they get beaten by the competition?

AMD totally wasted K8 advantage against P4 five years ago....If samething happen again,AMD will be really fucked.

 

[Squilliam]

Where are Evergreen refresh products?ATI's dead silence has lasted for months...

I think 6 months is enough for a respin,maybe ATI will make some architecture tweaks?

They don't need to refresh Evergreen if Northern Islands are on schedule and due to release in another 6 months, and if their products are currently very competitive on price/performance. The recent overclocked parts may very well be all they intend to do with Cypress vs Fermi and Juniper may never face any competion for more than a couple of months before being discontinued.

 

[Erinyes]

If I recall properly, I believe it has something to do with the cooler design. Longer PCB will mean that the chip will be a little easier to cool quietly without relying on too many more expensive components like heat pipes. Its a trade-off effectively between length and expense from what I understand.

How would a longer PCB affect cooling design? The stock 4870/4890 cooling solutions have heatpipes anyway. Its the fan which makes the difference in noise, what other part on the card actually makes noise anyway?

TBH I don't see why people complain about card lengths at all, they should complain about the cases breaching ATX specs if anything, every single "ATX case" (including as far as I know mATX) should fir HD5970 and every other max length card without issues.

Not complaining, just curious. But is that true? a normal ATX case is supposed to be able to fit a 5970?

Where are Evergreen refresh products?ATI's dead silence has lasted for months...

I think 6 months is enough for a respin,maybe ATI will make some architecture tweaks?

They only just finished releasing the entire evergreen lineup last month, give em some more time. Also you gotta remember it took them 9 months after RV770 to release RV790. And i guess NI is probably on track to release in Q3 anyway

AMD totally wasted K8 advantage against P4 five years ago....If samething happen again,AMD will be really fucked.

Yea honestly i wonder what AMD actually did in the years they were on top with K8. If barcelona(which anyway is basically a K8) is all they could come up with then their cpu division looks like a dead end to me. Intel managed to go through Core 2, Nehalem(admittedly almost a core 2 with IMC), Westmere(Nehalem with AES NI?) and Sandy bridge also looks like it'll debut before we see Bulldozer

 

[Kaotik]

Not complaining, just curious. But is that true? a normal ATX case is supposed to be able to fit a 5970?

Yes, it fits just the "maximum length" of add-in cards, and IIRC, it's the same with mATX too.
So any case having problems fitting one in isn't really following the specs