AMD: Southern Islands (7*** series) Speculation/ Rumour Thread

[psolord]

That's because you have all the eye-candy turned up (I'm not talking about AA/AF), much of which makes a very small change in image quality. A 4870 is way more powerful than the XBox or PS3, for example, and the latter two provide 90% of the non-input-related gaming experience that you get on a PC.

I don't think Doomtrooper is being that unreasonable from that perspective. However, everything is subjective, and you may really enjoy the incremental details that a 570 SLI provides.

I guess we are stepping on subjective territory now, but going from 720p/30fps to 1080p/60fps (rest of the quality options aside), is not an incremental increase for my taste, not to mention that anything less that 1080p will force me lose the 1:1 pixel mapping of my panel.

 

[DuckThor Evil]

Not until Nvidia puts some pressure on them in the ~$350 market.

I think 7950 at 399$ is putting more than enough pressure to it. I'm sure AMD don't mind people steering towards the upper lineup, but 50$ is too little between those cards. 100$ between 7850 and 7870 and only 50$ between 7870 and 7950 makes 7870 a terrible offer.

 

[UniversalTruth]

Not until Nvidia puts some pressure on them in the ~$350 market.

Nvidia think they have a response at that level and it is called GTX 580. Ok, gaming performance charts put it slightly above 7870 but in power consumption 7870 is leaps forward.

Yes i second on this, without saying if Nvidia is ready to launch soon a GTX660... there's no need to put down the price now, before to know how many it cost and how it perform. ( basically this is not only a question of 670, but more the entire lineup. )

Honestly speaking, GTX 680 doesn't deserve the 499$ price tag. The only thing that protects its current status is the absolute lack of availability. Thus the impression that its price should be even higher. Which is much more ridiculous than available Radeon 7970 at the old price of 549$.
See how the performance improvements in NV's entire lineup will be almost as the transition 480-580, 470-570, etc., i.e 670 at 580 level or slightly slightly above it.

 

[Albuquerque]

That's because you have all the eye-candy turned up (I'm not talking about AA/AF), much of which makes a very small change in image quality.

As was mentioned by psolord, this is highly subjective. I can immediately tell the difference between medium and high settings on every game in my collection. I can also immediately tell a difference with and without AA, especially on transparent textures.

A 4870 is way more powerful than the XBox or PS3, for example, and the latter two provide 90% of the non-input-related gaming experience that you get on a PC.

True, and then, false. Your perception of the experience may be very similar, and you are certainly entitled to your opinion on that matter. But it is not "90%" of the experience to me -- especially in terms of overall "eye candy" that you have so easily dismissed. All of that 'eye candy' that you think doesn't matter? That's why I use my PC to game.

However, everything is subjective, and you may really enjoy the incremental details that a 570 SLI provides.

A 570SLI enables far more than "incremental" details over a 4870 in both an absolute and relative sense. Far more texturing, far more antialiasing, far more pixels on your screen, far more frames per second on newer and more demanding games.

I personally have moved from an r9700 (unlocked 9500np), X800XTPro, 7950GT, dual 3850's, dual 4850's, a single 5850 and now to a 7970. Every upgrade was precipitated by the fact that I couldn't run the games I want to play at the resolution and 'eye candy' settings that I wanted to. Far Cry with all settings at full at 1600x1200 on a Radeon 9700 with 4xAA? Nope, not happening. Didn't work on an X800 either, but was mostly attainable on my 7950GT.

Dont get me wrong - my overvolted, hacked-firmware overclocked 5850 was a fantastic performer for it's age. But even with my Dell 2007WFP 1680x1050 at 4xMSAA it struggled; and we're not even going to talk about my new Dell U2711 2560x1440 beast at 4xSSAA. It would've been a slide-show. Even my overclocked 7970 can't sustain 60FPS in the most demanding scenes with this configuration.

And that's the kind of configuration that I expect to play with my PC, and that I'll not be seeing with any console for another few generations (at the earliest.)

 

[lanek]

Nvidia think they have a response at that level and it is called GTX 580. Ok, gaming performance charts put it slightly above 7870 but in power consumption 7870 is leaps forward.



Honestly speaking, GTX 680 doesn't deserve the 499$ price tag. The only thing that protects its current status is the absolute lack of availability. Thus the impression that its price should be even higher. Which is much more ridiculous than available Radeon 7970 at the old price of 549$.
See how the performance improvements in NV's entire lineup will be almost as the transition 480-580, 470-570, etc., i.e 670 at 580 level or slightly slightly above it.

Nvidia have stop 580 production... not there's no one anymore, but between the 560 4480cores, 570 and 580.. this start to make a lot of GF110 who have gone. .. This too indicate a 660-670 are coming soon
http://www.techpowerup.com/164181/NVIDIA-Stops-Production-of-GeForce-GTX-580.html

What i said is AMD will wait to know how the lineup of Nvidia end ( cards as the 660-670 who are not released yet ) performance and price wise, before fix a new 7870 price. ( i could be wrong and a new price is allready decided )

 

[Doomtrooper]

As was mentioned by psolord, this is highly subjective. I can immediately tell the difference between medium and high settings on every game in my collection. I can also immediately tell a difference with and without AA, especially on transparent textures.

True, and then, false. Your perception of the experience may be very similar, and you are certainly entitled to your opinion on that matter. But it is not "90%" of the experience to me -- especially in terms of overall "eye candy" that you have so easily dismissed. All of that 'eye candy' that you think doesn't matter? That's why I use my PC to game.


A 570SLI enables far more than "incremental" details over a 4870 in both an absolute and relative sense. Far more texturing, far more antialiasing, far more pixels on your screen, far more frames per second on newer and more demanding games.

I personally have moved from an r9700 (unlocked 9500np), X800XTPro, 7950GT, dual 3850's, dual 4850's, a single 5850 and now to a 7970. Every upgrade was precipitated by the fact that I couldn't run the games I want to play at the resolution and 'eye candy' settings that I wanted to. Far Cry with all settings at full at 1600x1200 on a Radeon 9700 with 4xAA? Nope, not happening. Didn't work on an X800 either, but was mostly attainable on my 7950GT.

Dont get me wrong - my overvolted, hacked-firmware overclocked 5850 was a fantastic performer for it's age. But even with my Dell 2007WFP 1680x1050 at 4xMSAA it struggled; and we're not even going to talk about my new Dell U2711 2560x1440 beast at 4xSSAA. It would've been a slide-show. Even my overclocked 7970 can't sustain 60FPS in the most demanding scenes with this configuration.

And that's the kind of configuration that I expect to play with my PC, and that I'll not be seeing with any console for another few generations (at the earliest.)

This is a subjective matter, but you do realize your gaming resolution and your in game settings require higher end products or crossfire setups, 99.5% of PC gamers would lower the resolution or details. High end video card sales make up a very small segment of overall sales. I still feel games today are not optimized, they are programmed to work over a wide range of hardware or written for consoles, sure the Frostbite engine is rare exception but that is generally not the trend PC games are taking now,

I would consider you as an enthusiast, a rare breed in todays PC gaming world.

 

[iMacmatician]

This is a subjective matter, but you do realize your gaming resolution and your in game settings require higher end products or crossfire setups, 99.5% of PC gamers would lower the resolution or details.

Just to drop in on this conversation…

For Marble Blast, the only game I play (besides stuff like Windows Pinball), I started playing it on a laptop so I use the keyboard to move the camera instead of the mouse. I need a fast camera turning speed for the best gaming experience, which gets slower the higher the display settings are. So I find that I have to use a resolution like 848x480 or 1024x640 over the full display resolution (which on my MBP is 1440x900). Also I don't seem to notice texture/background quality differences either, at least when I'm actually playing. I may not be like many other gamers either, but I'd take large hits on resolution/quality for slightly increased smoothness and camera turn speed (several times I've tried switching to 16-bit color but that doesn't seem to help things).

That being said, if I could run smoothly at a higher resolution, I'd do so in a heartbeat. And I have no problem with those who get high-end hardware for smooth quality performance at high resolutions.

 

[Albuquerque]

This is a subjective matter, but you do realize your gaming resolution and your in game settings require higher end products or crossfire setups, 99.5% of PC gamers would lower the resolution or details. High end video card sales make up a very small segment of overall sales. I still feel games today are not optimized, they are programmed to work over a wide range of hardware or written for consoles, sure the Frostbite engine is rare exception but that is generally not the trend PC games are taking now,

I would consider you as an enthusiast, a rare breed in todays PC gaming world.

You do realize you're having this conversation on Beyond3D, right? A forum whose very roots are the enthusiast PC market, specifically catering to those who want the most advanced 3D interactions possible?

If we're going to have your discussion, the Intel HD2000 video should be sufficient to play pretty much every "common" PC game out there. I should know, because my switchable graphics-equipped laptop, when using the Intel HD graphics built into my Arrandale i5-540M, can play essentially every Flash, HTML5 and Shockwave game I've thrown at it. It also is very capable of playing a huge pile of the Steam game library that would be considered in-vogue by the 'commoner' PC gaming public.

If we're going to take your example to its logical conclusion, an ATI 4870 would be an absolutely absurd amount of horsepower for the common PC gaming public. As would a six-core, twelve-thread processor, 32GB of ram, six 240GB SSD's attached to a PCI-E 2.0 8x hardware RAID card, a Creative Labs X-Fi audio card, a Sapphire 7970 OC edition video card attached to a Dell U2711 monitor. I think we've now established that I'm "one of the 1%".

But that's not why we're here, and that's not why we're having this conversation. This is Beyond3D, and it's the 3D Chips and Architecture discussion forum. I want more power, and I have use for it. Niche or not, I have a wallet and I voted with it -- and bought a $550 USD video card to plug into my $4000 PC to display on my $1000 monitor. Problem? <trollface.jpg>

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Now all I need is for the price of the 7750's to drop and hopefully the Sapphire fanless 7750 will drop into a comfortable price range for me. And then I'll see how it does in a HTPC.

Regards,
SB

 

[AlphaWolf]

Newegg is starting to reflect the price drops.

 

[Doomtrooper]

You do realize you're having this conversation on Beyond3D, right? A forum whose very roots are the enthusiast PC market, specifically catering to those who want the most advanced 3D interactions possible?

If we're going to have your discussion, the Intel HD2000 video should be sufficient to play pretty much every "common" PC game out there. I should know, because my switchable graphics-equipped laptop, when using the Intel HD graphics built into my Arrandale i5-540M, can play essentially every Flash, HTML5 and Shockwave game I've thrown at it. It also is very capable of playing a huge pile of the Steam game library that would be considered in-vogue by the 'commoner' PC gaming public.

If we're going to take your example to its logical conclusion, an ATI 4870 would be an absolutely absurd amount of horsepower for the common PC gaming public. As would a six-core, twelve-thread processor, 32GB of ram, six 240GB SSD's attached to a PCI-E 2.0 8x hardware RAID card, a Creative Labs X-Fi audio card, a Sapphire 7970 OC edition video card attached to a Dell U2711 monitor. I think we've now established that I'm "one of the 1%".

But that's not why we're here, and that's not why we're having this conversation. This is Beyond3D, and it's the 3D Chips and Architecture discussion forum. I want more power, and I have use for it. Niche or not, I have a wallet and I voted with it -- and bought a $550 USD video card to plug into my $4000 PC to display on my $1000 monitor. Problem? <trollface.jpg>

I am also in that 1%, and yes I have been on this forum since its inception and know very well what Beyond3D is about lol. All I am stating is hardware is way ahead of the games (has been since DX 8) being released and it is only going to get worse with next gen consoles get closer to being released. Alot of the advanced features of your 7970 will not be used for two years, that is the problem with PC gaming somewhere along the line game developers thought eye candy equals good game play, it doesn't.

 

[rpg.314]

As would a six-core, twelve-thread processor, 32GB of ram, six 240GB SSD's attached to a PCI-E 2.0 8x hardware RAID card, a Creative Labs X-Fi audio card, a Sapphire 7970 OC edition video card attached to a Dell U2711 monitor.

WTH do you work?

I think we've now established that I'm "one of the 1%".

I think the percentage you are looking for is a lot lower.

 

[Albuquerque]

I think the percentage you are looking for is a lot lower.

LOL, it was a tongue-in-cheek response regarding the "niche" that my video game settings fit into. Given the "niche" that my entire computer fits into, I think my video game settings are exactly where they should be

Rest assured, in terms of my income bracket, I am NOT "the 1%."

 

[Blazkowicz]

WTH do you work?

if it's worth a month salary it's pretty affordable .

my whole set up is worth about 500 euros, or 700 euros with the speakers that were a gift. maybe 100 euros more.
it includes a server, a workstation (starved for ram and ran from a 20GB hard drive), an audiophile amp (tiny chinese one at 30 euros) and just from now an audiophile sound card (asus xonar dx).
CRT monitors were 0 euro.

I'm looking for a 7" ARM netbook (600 grams to 800 grams) where I'll plug in a 3G modem with the cheapest data plan.
later I can add a new mobo with 8GB memory, a low end SSD and the workstation (where my work stops) will be in better shape.

radeon 7750 with linux drivers or some other card would be a final icing on the cake.
then a piledriver CPU but I don't know how I can use it except donating electricity to folding@home or the LHC.
any convoluted plans depend on the availability of all-you-can-eat fiber in my home.

 

[LordEC911]

What i said is AMD will wait to know how the lineup of Nvidia end ( cards as the 660-670 who are not released yet ) performance and price wise, before fix a new 7870 price. ( i could be wrong and a new price is allready decided )

They already have a pretty good idea of Nvidia's lower lineup since they dropped GTX680. The main question that AMD is waiting on is when exactly Nvidia will launch and how they end up playing their hand, in regards to pricing.

7870 still has a LOT of room to work with, if need be, even with the supposedly disappointing amount of wafer starts though that should be alleviated over the next few months if it hasn't already started to happen.

Remember, AMD is still holding onto the 1.5Gb 7950s for an effective counter attack if things get a little too lopsided in the ~$350 market.

 

[Albuquerque]

WTH do you work?

LOL, oops I took this as "what the hell" rather than "where the hell".

I am the senior Windows platform architect for all customer-facing / customer-interaction systems for Taco Bell corporate in Irvine, CA. This machine was paid for via a chunk of my annual bonus. The pay looks good on paper, but really doesn't go as far as you would think when you live in Orange County... Fortunately I have basically no debt, except the exorbitant rent, insurance, food and utilities. I'm only out here for a few years, and then I'm moving back east. It was much more of a "job move" than a "money move."

 

[Dooby]

a Dell U2711 monitor. I think we've now established that I'm "one of the 1%".

Why such a small monitor? And why only 1 of them?

Real 1%'ers use 16:10 (2560x1600) and have a spare monitor just for IRC while they play games.

Don't make me get security to "show you the door".

(I have *no* other possessions in this world though )

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Why such a small monitor? And why only 1 of them?

Real 1%'ers use 16:10 (2560x1600) and have a spare monitor just for IRC while they play games.

Don't make me get security to "show you the door".

(I have *no* other possessions in this world though )

What? Only a single secondary monitor? Cheapskate. Must have at least 2x addtional monitors, not only for IRC, but also for monitoring other things while playing a game. Or in some cases, playing 2-3 games at the same time.

Regards,
SB

 

[Albuquerque]

LOL! I still have my Dell 2007WFP; I will make sure to flip it 90* and buy a second one to ensure my continued alignment with our 1% overlords!

(or I'll just will it to my brother like I had planned, along with my 5850... shhh!)

 

[rpg.314]

LOL, oops I took this as "what the hell" rather than "where the hell".

I am the senior Windows platform architect for all customer-facing / customer-interaction systems for Taco Bell corporate in Irvine, CA. This machine was paid for via a chunk of my annual bonus. The pay looks good on paper, but really doesn't go as far as you would think when you live in Orange County... Fortunately I have basically no debt, except the exorbitant rent, insurance, food and utilities. I'm only out here for a few years, and then I'm moving back east. It was much more of a "job move" than a "money move."

You machine is nice, but 6 SSD's in a RAID? I wonder which use case would need this config but not do well with a SSD/HDD combo.

Having used multiple monitors for work, I am never going back to single monitors, even for normal office-like work, let alone something like gaming/programming. I wonder why you using only one.