Well, I bought a AMD HD6950 2GB to replace my HD5870. I was not going to, I thought. I was planning on waiting until the next cycle when they finally have 22nm chips and pick one up then.
Weeelll, my 5870 has a grinding fan and needs RMA'd. I didnt want to send it in since I would lose it for several weeks, but at the same time, I couldnt play games.
At the same time, Ive been looking for a card for my brother. I needed the card to drive a 1080P HDTV, so it needed some power.
I was going back and forth on what to do when I stumbled on some interesting information.
Apparently, the reference 6950s currently shipping are locking out the extra 128 shaders via the BIOS on the card. Soo, all that needs to be done to go from 1408 shaders to 1536 is a BIOS flash.
So, I picked one up, and filed for a RMA on the 5870.
My 6950 identifies itself as a 6970, has 1536 shaders and runs 890/1380, +20% powertune. Only issue is it has to be kept under 90C under (furmark) load or it crashes in a couple minutes. Peak (furmark) temp was 100C. I need to find some program to take over fan control..
Also, the 6970 clocks are about the most I can get out of the card. Ive played around with it a bit and slightly more is about all you will get. I tried 900/1400. No go. 890/1380 seems to be alright, though thats not a significant amount. This is probably how they are selecting chips for 6950 usage. They are not running 880+whatever% margin they consider 'safe.' Considering its $90-100 less, its a worthwhile trade-off, I think.
When I get the 5870 back, I will give it to my brother for the machine Im putting together for him. Still a very capable card that isnt cheap, and I think it will work well.
This is what I have so far as his:
Gigabyte 790XTA-UD4
AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE 3.2GHz @ 3.6GHz
2x 2GB GSkill DDR3-1333 8-8-8-21
Sapphire ATi Radeon HD5870 1GB
Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus HSF
Cooler Master UCP 700W PS
4x Seagate 7200.11 500GB
Needs a case, optical, and a copy of Winders. Ive been scrounging most of these parts. Only the RAM and the HSF are new. I guess the video card is technically 'new' too; but it was bought and paid for long before I started gathering parts for it.
Think Im going to get him the Cooler Master HAF 922 for a case.
*Im working on replacing my 4x 7200.11 500GB RAID 5 with 4x Samsung F3R 1TB. Likely will run them RAID 10 in his.
Weeelll, my 5870 has a grinding fan and needs RMA'd. I didnt want to send it in since I would lose it for several weeks, but at the same time, I couldnt play games.
At the same time, Ive been looking for a card for my brother. I needed the card to drive a 1080P HDTV, so it needed some power.
I was going back and forth on what to do when I stumbled on some interesting information.
Apparently, the reference 6950s currently shipping are locking out the extra 128 shaders via the BIOS on the card. Soo, all that needs to be done to go from 1408 shaders to 1536 is a BIOS flash.
So, I picked one up, and filed for a RMA on the 5870.
My 6950 identifies itself as a 6970, has 1536 shaders and runs 890/1380, +20% powertune. Only issue is it has to be kept under 90C under (furmark) load or it crashes in a couple minutes. Peak (furmark) temp was 100C. I need to find some program to take over fan control..
Also, the 6970 clocks are about the most I can get out of the card. Ive played around with it a bit and slightly more is about all you will get. I tried 900/1400. No go. 890/1380 seems to be alright, though thats not a significant amount. This is probably how they are selecting chips for 6950 usage. They are not running 880+whatever% margin they consider 'safe.' Considering its $90-100 less, its a worthwhile trade-off, I think.
When I get the 5870 back, I will give it to my brother for the machine Im putting together for him. Still a very capable card that isnt cheap, and I think it will work well.
This is what I have so far as his:
Gigabyte 790XTA-UD4
AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE 3.2GHz @ 3.6GHz
2x 2GB GSkill DDR3-1333 8-8-8-21
Sapphire ATi Radeon HD5870 1GB
Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus HSF
Cooler Master UCP 700W PS
4x Seagate 7200.11 500GB
Needs a case, optical, and a copy of Winders. Ive been scrounging most of these parts. Only the RAM and the HSF are new. I guess the video card is technically 'new' too; but it was bought and paid for long before I started gathering parts for it.
Think Im going to get him the Cooler Master HAF 922 for a case.
*Im working on replacing my 4x 7200.11 500GB RAID 5 with 4x Samsung F3R 1TB. Likely will run them RAID 10 in his.
