UK online retailer Overclockers.co.uk upload Heaven Benchmark results, comparisons, release date and approximate price.
The AMD HD 7950 is almost here. Overclockers.co.uk boss Gibbo announced the release date on their official forums as January 31st, a date which we had all assumed but hadn’t had official confirmation of. Stock is already in the hands of retailers, as you’d expect, and a few select benchmark results demonstrating the overclocking potential of the 7950 are shown:
AMD 7950 Stock (810MHz Core / 5000MHz Memory) – 1680*1050
AMD 7950 Maxed on Overdrive (1025MHz Core / 6300MHz Memory)
AMD 7950 Maxed OC on Asus OC BIOS (1180MHz Core / 7200MHz Memory)
Note: as before the 1680*1050 4xAA 4xAF is the in-house resolution the OCUK forum uses for simple performance comparison. The card sampled reached 1180MHz on the core by flashing with an ASUS 7970 BIOS capable of greater voltage, and over 1000MHz with the stock 7950 BIOS. As with the 7970, this represents a huge overclock vs. the stock clock of 810MHz. Flashing the 7950 with a 7970 BIOS did not unlock any additional shaders. However Gibbo stated:
Right some odd Heaven results here:-
7950 @ 925MHz / 5500MHz = 1504 points
7950 on 7970 BIOS @ 925MHz / 5500MHz = 1545 points
7970 @ Stock (925/5500) = 1584 points
So even though according to GPU-Z the shaders are not unlocking, flashing to the Asus 7970 BIOS is definitely giving a performance boost, though its not quite at genuine 7970 performance levels, kind of like half way from the results.
So either some shaders are unlocking or the 7970 BIOS is making other improvements, maybe memory timings etc. which is giving the boost.
Still flashing the BIOS is so easy anyway and it would appear the 7970 BIOS is giving some performance enhancement even when clock speeds are identical.
7950 @ 925MHz / 5500MHz = 1504 points
7950 on 7970 BIOS @ 925MHz / 5500MHz = 1545 points
7970 @ Stock (925/5500) = 1584 points
So even though according to GPU-Z the shaders are not unlocking, flashing to the Asus 7970 BIOS is definitely giving a performance boost, though its not quite at genuine 7970 performance levels, kind of like half way from the results.
So either some shaders are unlocking or the 7970 BIOS is making other improvements, maybe memory timings etc. which is giving the boost.
Still flashing the BIOS is so easy anyway and it would appear the 7970 BIOS is giving some performance enhancement even when clock speeds are identical.
At 2560*1600 the 3GB 7950 (Max OC), 7970 and NVIDIA GTX 580 OC are compared. This doesn’t directly compare a stock 7950 with 580; a good deduction is that it’s not quite as fast as the 580 at 800MHz, but is extremely strong as you overclock and has far more overclocking headroom.
AMD 7950 Maxed OC on Asus OC BIOS (1180MHz Core / 7200MHz Memory)
AMD 7970 Maxed OC on Asus OC BIOS (1225MHz Core / 7800MHz Memory)
NVIDIA GTX 580 3GB OC (902MHz Core / 4355MHz Memory)
Gibbo notes that the UK street price will be approximately £350, roughly £100 less than the 7970 and competetive with the 1.5GB GTX 580. All boards are also non-reference, which will make finding water blocks somewhat tricky. Versions from a range of AIBs will be available from the 31st baring unforeseen circumstances. The 7950 should be a hell of a card for enthusiasts willing to overclock or end-users taking advantage of AIBs with strong factory overclocks.
Source Overclockers.co.uk Official Forums
