HD 6970 & HD 6950 Reviews

I've never used the Sapphire Trixx app, but with Asus Smartdoctor you can unlock higher overclocks then turn it off and use CCC to overclock past the stock limits. It'll still start up when Windows but then you just exit and it's no longer running and taking up 10 MB of memory. CCC will remain with the expanded overclock range however.

Regards,
SB

 

What's the latest on currently-shipping 6950s? Are they still unlockable?
I'm not enjoying various issues with my GTX 580 and a 2x6850 unlocked sounds rather tasty.

 

It depends on the size of your monitor because AMD is also introducing 1GB versions of the 6970 for $279 a piece.

 

Well, ultimately I'd be considering a 3x landscape (19x12 or 19x10) monitor setup...so more memory would likely be needed.

 

What issues?

 

First one started getting desktop corruption - typical memory failure - with reboots of the GPU. Second one gets video corruption whenever an aero-transparency windows overlaps the video.

 

I guess in that instance you're looking at the 2GB model or the 2 x 2GB model some like to call the HD 6990.

 

So I went out and gave the GTX 580 back after driver sweeper and latest drivers didn't help and got a single 6950 which I flashed to a 6970...so what are the best artifact testers nowadays?

 

I always got artifacts in the ATI Tray Tools when there was a problem, while not in others. Though I guess it has also to do with that ATT highlights differences, while in the others the errors simply stay invisible. There is some burn-tester (red GUI, don't remember the name) which is suppose to do the same, but wasn't as sensitive as ATT.

Also STALKER in DX10/11-mode apparently is memory-sensitive to such a degree (corruption without crash, nice little cyan spots) that I could very exactly say when my memory was under-volted (I can't adjust memory-voltage in my 5870) for a given frequency.

 

Well I ran furmark and heaven and 3dmk11 and then played an hour of Fackfactory's cinematic mod maxed out and no issues. Looks like a good flash. Found out what the problem with the 580 might have been on one of the OC boards - low 2D clocks. Strange.

 

MSI R6950 Twin Frozr II OC review

http://www.guru3d.com/article/msi-r6950-twin-frozr-ii-oc-review/

 

Why are there two very different scores for the GTX 580 and 570 on his BFBC2 graph?

 

The top 2 must be 3x SLI or an error.

 

that msi review

so is it 1920 or 1280

 

I'm not sure what he's talking about there. Single link DVI is capable of 1920x1200@60Hz.

 

Since we're on the topic...if I have two 6950s in CrossFireX (I don't have the second yet), how do I plug in 3 monitors? Do they all connect to one card (thus requiring adapters)?

 

ya you connect them all to the one card.

 

ps: could what i quoted be related to a problem (im sure someone on b3d complained about it but cant find the post) of 30inch monitors not having a proper scaler ?

I did find this post from tech report forums

 

That's possible. The HP line of 30" monitors also lack a dedicated scaler. Their recommended non-native resolution is 1280x800 or exactly half of each dimension. It "can" run at other resolutions, but I think my video card might automatically be enabling and applying GPU scaling in resolutions other than 2560x1600 and 1280x800.

Regards,
SB

 

They dont like to keep it simple do they

ps: i think its explained better here :
http://www.ubergizmo.com/2006/02/dell-3007wfp-30-inch-lcd-monitor-review/