# 560 TI 2GB vs 7850.. what specs won't tell you.



## RigRebel (Jul 5, 2012)

This quote came from another site but since this info is commonly sought by people I thought I'd share the post here. Enjoy. 

[quote name="insyxion" url="/t/1271115/nvidia-gtx-660-suppose-to-be-299-329#post_17503580"]Since USA is usally cheaper then europe, so i guees its probably gonna be over 340$ in europe.. 
I'm looking to upgrade my 6870, should i get AMD 7850? 
The question i'm most curious about, Is it true that nvidia cards are running most games much smoother?[/quote]

Recently, I tested two cards (for personal purchase) at the same price point ... a Diamond 7850 2GB and an EVGA 2GB 560 ti. I can tell you that, although the 7850 overclocked much higher and had higher FPS (@11FPS higher vs 7850 stock clocks in Furmark) the GTX 560 TI was by far smoother with way less chop and shutter in game. The 560 Ti would chop ONLY for about 10-15 seconds after level load on Diablo III (max settings no v-sync) but the 7850 would chop every time I came upon a large mob or the screen angle changed. I was very dissappointed in the 7850, since it was a 2GB card as well, and the 2GB Memory with buffer should have cut the chop to that of the 560 TI or less.  I even tried tripple buffering and it had no affect. Also, once you start adding in AA and other filtering, settings that extra 11FPS is going to get chewed up fast anyways so aslong as either card stays above 60FPS with V-sync on you're good to go even without the 11FPS boost from overclocking IMO. And to get that 1250Mhz clock out of the 7850 while staying at decent temps you're going to need to flash the bios to get around CCC Overdrive and or buy a higher priced model like an ASUS Direct whatever it's called or MSI Twin Frozer III or PE model. You could go aftermarket heatsink but then you'll spend more $, void the warranty and loose Crossfire space. Not worth the extra 5-8FPS over modest 1050Mhz +20%OV imo. I'd rather modest clock to 1050Mhz with 20% overvolting and keep stock fan, CF space and warranty; or, like I said buy a model that can handle higher clocks (with stock HS/Fan and warranty) like the ones mentioned above.  

Also just FYI, On temps they both sucked. On noise the EVGA sucked worse becaue the fan sounds like a jet engine at 50%... How EVGA gets around this is they have the heat handling heavy on the passive heatsink side of things. Essentially, they run the fan stock low at about 36%-46% even at full load and thus let the heatsink take on more heat because it is a big ass heat sink. The down side is, at stock clocks and stock fan levels, it will run quite BUT the temps will run over 85-88* C at full load and around 48*C idle. That's why the tests that show the 560 Ti runs quiter is an absolute joke and a lie because it only runs quiter at stock fan curves and the trade off is it runs hot as shizz! The Diamond 7850 had a radial fan with noticeably lower noise above 50% but virtually the same exact temps because I discovered the heat sink heat plate was machined horribly rough like a finger print. http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/showthread.php?t=167140 

In the end both cards went back to the store and I'm waiting on the GTX 660 Ti before I make any more purchases. I think if I'm going to purchase again it will be a 2 fan model, something like the MSI TwinFroz III, or the Zotac 670 short twin fan model coming out soon. I would suggest that if you're going for an AMD 7850 spend the extra cabbage to get a 2 fan short model like the MSI http://us.msi.com/product/vga/R7850-Power-Edition-2GD5-OC.html  or  http://us.msi.com/product/vga/R7850-Twin-Frozr-2GD5-OC.html that has a good 2 fan heatsink assembly that can take better advantage of the high overclocking potential of the 7850 GPU and still remain within good temps and not require an aftermarket cooler that takes up Crossfire space.  :thumb:

*But yes, my personal expierence showed Nivida to run smoother against nearly a direct competitor (7850 is slightly stronger) with all things like game, game settings and CPU remaining constent. * The 7850 sucked IMO.. well let's be kinder and say it fell really short of expectations. Oh and catalyst was, is and always will be the biggest piece of crap. Would only see my HDMI monitor as an HDTV even though the onbarod intel chipset picked it up at 1920x1080 no problem. Catalyst gaming profiles saved to .exe never worked properly, colors wonkey, it conflicted with MSI Afterburner startup profile settings and no matter how many times you delete Catalyst profiles they hide in some obscure reg key. All in all, the 7850 has more raw power and higher FPS potential (depending on the game and baring equal tessallation handeling because Nvidia is much better at tessallation handling) but way less fit, finish and finesse imo. Nvidia, as mentioned above by OPs, has smoother operation and way better drivers that work right. Essentially, would you rather drive a big jerky transmition V8 Corvette with bad radio buttons or a smoother Lexus 250 ISF that works right? That's a decent analogy. 

Hope this helps. I'm Sorry for wall of text and spelling check crits but it's a lot of info! :thumb:


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## phanbuey (Jul 5, 2012)

ive generally found this to be true... last direct comparison I did was with the 4870 and the gtx 260 tho.

One review site (still trying to find it) has a metric that measures choppiness i think - you can read their reviews and see exactly.


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## pigulici (Jul 5, 2012)

Well, I think the comparison it is not fair, hd7850 it is not showing all can do because of imature driver/software, but at the end of the day the question remaine:to buy a old vga who work well now but in the future it may be obsolete, or a new vga card who work now with hiccup but in the future will work well; I personally I see that in most cases(on same price) nvidia is stronger in 3D, and amd in 2d;I just buyit 1 month ago a sapphire hd7850 oc, with custom cooling, I can tell that after 3rd driver version it is start to show me what she can do(catalyst 12.4 and 12.6 are crap, 12.7b it is ok), for me the quality of 2d it is more important(I game casually, but when I play I want to enjoy it), but for a gamer it is a tough question what to buy now...


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## RigRebel (Jul 5, 2012)

pigulici said:


> Well, I think the comparison it is not fair, hd7850 it is not showing all can do because of imature driver/software, but at the end of the day the question remaine:to buy a old vga who work well now but in the future it may be obsolete, or a new vga card who work now with hiccup but in the future will work well; I personally I see that in most cases(on same price) nvidia is stronger in 3D, and amd in 2d;I just buyit 1 month ago a sapphire hd7850 oc, with custom cooling, I can tell that after 3rd driver version it is start to show me what she can do(catalyst 12.4 and 12.6 are crap, 12.7b it is ok), for me the quality of 2d it is more important(I game casually, but when I play I want to enjoy it), but for a gamer it is a tough question what to buy now...



Hi pigulici... you know what, you're right, to be fair I shouldn't say that Catalyst will always be crap. I do know that in the day though I opted for Omega drivers that made Catalyst run much smoother. Also, keep in mind this is just my own expierence. Maybe the card is more suited for SB or IB and PCI-E 3.0 which my board and CPU are not; but, both cards were tested on same equipment and the results on chop were less with Nivida "in my opinion" since dealing with things like sound pitch, chop and overall expierence it is more of a qualitative opinion left to me as the individual rather than quanitative analysis with numbers. Also, I can only test with what is out there. I can't depend on future drivers at the time of testing but a side note should be mentioned that this may improve with driver development over time, good point :thumbsup: Furthermore, I could get both of the cards down in cooling but again the fan noise on the EVGA was just too high for gaming without headphones, the Diamond was borderline bareable. Also, the the fact that I'm using the 560 Ti 2Gb is again, it's all that was out there comprable. However, I will say that if weighting the options again for future purchases, I'll still tend to move towards the card with better cooling options, smoother buffer (no chop) with less glitchy drivers over a card with 10-20% higher FPS but choppy, under developed glitchy drivers regardless of whom makes it. Personally, I perfer fit and finish with solid performance and no bugs over a modest increase in power. I mean honestly, I know a certain amount of driver suckage goes with the territory but (as video cards push higher and higher price tags and wage review wars with FPS being the cornerstone) shouldn't we step back a bit and say.... "Hey Mr. video card maker man...If you're gonna charge me close to $300.00 for a "mid-ranged" graphics card; that shiz better be FLAWLESS (including drivers, temps, chop and noise) at it's segments speeds!!!!"?   ... Also, I will say my tech collegee has an AMD referrence 7970 and he reports minimal chop only at level load like the GTX 560 Ti 2GB I tested so maybe it's driver/specific model related.    



phanbuey said:


> ive generally found this to be true... last direct comparison I did was with the 4870 and the gtx 260 tho.
> 
> One review site (still trying to find it) has a metric that measures choppiness i think - you can read their reviews and see exactly.



Thanks Phan, if you please post or send me links I'll check it out... Do any reviews allued to why this is so ? Is it driver or card related ?


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## phanbuey (Jul 5, 2012)

Here is the link:  The tech report 

http://techreport.com/articles.x/23150/4

"... We've noticed them at times when results from our FRAPS-based testing didn't seem to square with our seat-of-the-pants experience. The fundamental problem is that, in terms of both computer time and human visual perception, one second is a very long time. Averaging results over a single second can obscure some big and important performance differences between systems."

but yeah - they try to measure "smoothness" and FPS rather than just raw numbers alone... they have a great explanation of why just FPS based testing is misleading:

http://techreport.com/articles.x/21516

This is what *could* be happening with the less smooth card, the 7850 in this case:

"However, GPU 1 has a problem running this game. Let's say it's a texture upload problem caused by poor memory management in the video drivers, although it could be just about anything, including a hardware issue. The result of the problem is that GPU 1 gets stuck when attempting to render one of the frames—really stuck, to the tune of a nearly half-second delay. If you were playing a game on this card and ran into this issue, it would be a huge show-stopper. If it happened often, the game would be essentially unplayable."


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## gopal (Jul 6, 2012)

Well Overall The HD7850 is better but in some games GTX 560Ti is better and it also supports PhysX(I know there are very limited range of PhysX games)and you will be needing physX in games epically in Batman Arkham series and Metro2033 and because HD 7850 doesn't support PhysX AMD has to add a plus point and it is you can oc it to even at 580 or 670 levels which is monstrous ocing and the temp will also good at below 75C but to handle this GTX 560TI has a big advantage which is it's price it is 180$ and the price of HD7850 is 240$ So a big difference but My choice still will be the HD7850 for it's monstrous ocing capabilities but you can also get the GTX 480 it is better then bother but as you will be readed the review the GTX 480 is a hot-headed GPU so if you don't mind the temps and the size then GTX 480 will be your choice if not the HD 7850 and if you want to save money the GTX 560Ti!
In the end my chice will be the HD 7850 or the GTX 480!
But the choice is yours!


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## Widjaja (Jul 6, 2012)

In my experience I have always found AMD to either perform really well in a game or not perform well for what it is expected to perform like.

While nVidia generally seems to run well in all games.


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## Elmo (Jul 6, 2012)

pigulici said:


> Well, I think the comparison it is not fair, hd7850 it is not showing all can do because of imature driver/software, but at the end of the day the question remaine:to buy a old vga who work well now but in the future it may be obsolete, or a new vga card who work now with hiccup but in the future will work well; I personally I see that in most cases(on same price) nvidia is stronger in 3D, and amd in 2d;I just buyit 1 month ago a sapphire hd7850 oc, with custom cooling, I can tell that after 3rd driver version it is start to show me what she can do(catalyst 12.4 and 12.6 are crap, 12.7b it is ok), for me the quality of 2d it is more important(I game casually, but when I play I want to enjoy it), but for a gamer it is a tough question what to buy now...


Amd mb amd proc amd gpu nuff said


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## pigulici (Jul 6, 2012)

Well, one reason it is that in my country amd have better price vs performance than intel/nvidia low/middle segment, and for hardware of high performance segment I have no money(like  i7, ...)...but I wish to have, so everyday learn something new...


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## Elmo (Jul 6, 2012)

pigulici said:


> Well, one reason it is that in my country amd have better price vs performance than intel/nvidia low/middle segment, and for hardware of high performance segment I have no money(like  i7, ...)...but I wish to have, so everyday learn something new...



Don't feel bad in my country it's that too I would say there are poor people too but now u still can have cheap builds with intel so I don't see this as an excuse . But hey no wrong done buy what u like its your money and a semi free world. where u from neway?


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## dj-electric (Jul 6, 2012)

One does not simply ignores HD7850's legendary overclocking abilities.


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## phanbuey (Jul 6, 2012)

Widjaja said:


> In my experience I have always found AMD to either perform really well in a game or not perform well for what it is expected to perform like.
> 
> While nVidia generally seems to run well in all games.



^^ I would agree with this - when I did my original comparison the AMD card seemed to either kick ass, or not...  Whereas the nvidia would plod along at roughly the same level through games.

I think it also is based on the actual cards, and not so much the manufacturers - maybe the 7800 is just not as good of a design as the 7900, because the reviews of the 7900 show it to be a smooth card.


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## pigulici (Jul 7, 2012)

Another think that it is clear on both players(nvidi/amd)it is that on paper all vga cards are very good, but from paper to real world(i'm from romania btw)...


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## Jeffredo (Jul 7, 2012)

I had a Sapphire HD 7850 OC and sent it back after a few days.  I play mostly RPGs and my most played game at the moment (well - for the last six months!) has been Skyrim.  My old GTX 460 1GB @ 875 Mhz was oftentimes smoother...until it ran out of VRAM.  The HD 7850 would stutter for a few seconds when I panned the camera in a new zone while the GTX 460 would not.  I did a FRAPS run around Windhelm with the Ultra preset and the GTX 460 actually beat it by a few FPS.

I'm sure some of my problem was a 1680x1050 monitor and an X4 980 BE.  That was a few months ago and just this past week I finally saved enough money to order a 1920x1200 monitor (ASUS PA248Q) and an ASUS GTX 670.  I'm pretty sure even with the Phenom II I'll see a performance boost in games with the much better GPU and higher resolution.   Next  year I'll be able to build a new PC and can migrate them over.


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## NC37 (Jul 7, 2012)

Jeffredo said:


> I had a Sapphire HD 7850 OC and sent it back after a few days.  I play mostly RPGs and my most played game at the moment (well - for the last six months!) has been Skyrim.  My old GTX 460 1GB @ 875 Mhz was oftentimes smoother...until it ran out of VRAM.  The HD 7850 would stutter for a few seconds when I panned the camera in a new zone while the GTX 460 would not.  I did a FRAPS run around Windhelm with the Ultra preset and the GTX 460 actually beat it by a few FPS.
> 
> I'm sure some of my problem was a 1680x1050 monitor and an X4 980 BE.  That was a few months ago and just this past week I finally saved enough money to order a 1920x1200 monitor (ASUS PA248Q) and an ASUS GTX 670.  I'm pretty sure even with the Phenom II I'll see a performance boost in games with the much better GPU and higher resolution.   Next  year I'll be able to build a new PC and can migrate them over.



Shame it wasn't a newer board. Could have SLIed that 460 for pretty cheap. Overall love my little dual 460 setup. Do wish it had more VRAM but performance is great.


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## gopal (Jul 7, 2012)

+1^
For that


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## Desert Eagle (Jul 7, 2012)

I'm using a GTX 560 Ti right now and it's been a good soldier. I would recommend it to anyone at ~ $220 if you can. I will be upgrading to a GTX 680 after a couple more paychecks (I never buy anything for my rig on credit cards or I would go hog-wild lol) but my GTX 560 Ti has been one of the best cards I've ever owned.


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## Nordic (Jul 7, 2012)

You mentioned heat problems because the heatsink was rough. It's a diamond card. They like don't even try ever. Not a brand to buy.


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## Widjaja (Jul 7, 2012)

phanbuey said:


> ^^ I would agree with this - when I did my original comparison the AMD card seemed to either kick ass, or not...  Whereas the nvidia would plod along at roughly the same level through games.
> 
> I think it also is based on the actual cards, and not so much the manufacturers - maybe the 7800 is just not as good of a design as the 7900, because the reviews of the 7900 show it to be a smooth card.



I noticed this issue first time back in the X19xx days.
I went from a 7600GS 256mb AGP to an X1950pro 512mb AGP.
Some games showed vast overall improvement while others stuttered even though it had high fps.


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## ChristTheGreat (Jul 7, 2012)

Never noticed any stutter with a single GPU, which a slower card would be smoother that a faster card.

if I compare my old 8800GT 512mb with my HD4870 1gb, there is just no word to say, the HD4870 was just faster, like my old 7600GT vmod then + SLI, is nothing compare to my x1950xt 256mb, except that it was a barbecue 

My HD6950 is just freaking good for the price I paid over a year ago (209$ brand new), and I never noticed stutter.. just changing monitor sometimes, one can be bad at gaming with high FPS, because the MS the monitor is rated, is maybe not right, I don't know. My old 205BW is just crapy if I compare to my VE228H, when gaming. 

Anyway, my opinion, you get the card that is right for you. If one doesn't work well for you, don't keep it.


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## Velvet Wafer (Jul 7, 2012)

I wonder, why none of the "Big" Members has written any comment to this


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## 3design (Jul 7, 2012)

Seriously, that is why I always consider MSI / ASUS / XFX / Sapphire / Zotac / EVGA. These brand are better, professional and straight with quality assurance.


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## Zubasa (Jul 7, 2012)

3design said:


> Seriously, that is why I always consider MSI / ASUS / XFX / Sapphire / Zotac / EVGA. These brand are better, professional and straight with quality assurance.


If you go AMD on a budget, HIS is not bad, at the very lease we generally don't get any quality issues with them.


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## Nordic (Jul 8, 2012)

Zubasa said:


> If you go AMD on a budget, HIS is not bad, at the very lease we generally don't get any quality issues with them.



...and avoid diamond unless you like the risk of a possible rough heatsink or something worse...


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## rectifryer (Jul 9, 2012)

Something as ambiguous as this would probably be more of an issue of driver development and optimization of a game for a certain architecture.  Personally, I don't experience any stuttering with the nvidia 330m with moderate settings or a single 5850 in D3 maxed out.  Silly comparison IMO.


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## RigRebel (Jul 9, 2012)

Widjaja said:


> In my experience I have always found AMD to either perform really well in a game or not perform well for what it is expected to perform like.
> While nVidia generally seems to run well in all games.



Hmmm that's a thought, I do know that they have been reported slower on DX9 for the 7000 series and lower tessallations than Nvidia on average so that would affect older games and new ones with heavy tessallations. 




pigulici said:


> Well, one reason it is that in my country amd have better price vs performance than intel/nvidia low/middle segment, and for hardware of high performance segment I have no money(like  i7, ...)...but I wish to have, so everyday learn something new...


I don't understand the recent belief in performance/cost for AMD. Sure back in the day, an AMD K7-Thunderbird was well worth it over an Pentium 4 because it performed 20% faster; but, now a days I really don't think that applies anymore with intels multi-core solutions because Intels per core performance is WAY better than AMD's. AMD is just making larger hyperthreading pipes. That's great for servers but near usless for gaming. Also, Look at the i3-2100 vs the AMD II X4 960T (same price)... the i3 scores slightly higher and only 2 cores. I think a lot of people confuse # of cores with performance but that's not entirely correct. Intel is much strong per core. And also, who need more than 2-3 cores for gaming because 99% of the games out there currently do not use more than 2 cores? Also, I loved my AMD K7, Duron and even old K5 nickel plated chip... but since multicores, INtel owns IMO.



james888 said:


> You mentioned heat problems because the heatsink was rough. It's a diamond card. They like don't even try ever. Not a brand to buy.


Well to be fair, I learned that the heat sink, which was the problem, is actually an AMD reference heatsink and it's the same on the PowerColor Card that looks identical> Now, I personally think PowerColor is junk but Diamond had a decent name in the past... like 8-10 years ago. Someone must have bought the name. 



james888 said:


> ...and avoid diamond unless you like the risk of a possible rough heatsink or something worse...



I will now lol, But again as said above they are actually AMD reference design heatsinks from what OPs have said. 

PS. I am not an AMD hater, I honestly gave the 7850 a try and was looking for good performance and will pat AMD on the back for it's Overclocking though! that was aweome! On catalyst and overall chop it just fell short. But, so did the 560 TI just more on heat than anything else.  



rectifryer said:


> Something as ambiguous as this would probably be more of an issue of driver development and optimization of a game for a certain architecture.  Personally, I don't experience any stuttering with the nvidia 330m with moderate settings or a single 5850 in D3 maxed out.  Silly comparison IMO.



How was it silly ? The original question asked by OP was whether Nvidia cards were smoother than AMD and I had an exact match comparisson that showed Nvidia was smoother. I didn't plan on reviewing them, it turned out that way from use lol. These cards were intended for personal use and both cards I picked where in the same exact price range with near similar stats baring that the 560 TI is older. I purchased the 560 TI 2GB took it back because it sounded like a jet engine at 74*C with stock clocks then paid $10.00 more for the 7850. Right now they are the best competitors at that price point unless you jump up to the 448 core. The comparison was real world based on what I planned to use and it just so happens it answered his question exactly for that comparison. I didn't think having exact facts he was looking for was silly dispite the cause... sure the cause may be drivers but the facts are still the facts... the Nvidia proved smoother in an exact comparisson. 

 Ps My 8800GTS has absolutely NO chop/SHutter at 1680x1050 max settings no AA... is't only 30fps but it still doesn't shutter. I Bought my EVGA 8800GTS never used in the box from a co-worker for $75.00 in 2009  ...So maybe it is driver but I don't care about that... I just paid close to $300.00 for a choppy cards. If Nvida's 660 Ti acts the same way I'll be saying the same about it.  


PS thanks to all the posters for their input  and keeping friendly!


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## Nordic (Jul 9, 2012)

RigRebel said:


> Well to be fair, I learned that the heat sink, which was the problem, is actually an AMD reference heatsink and it's the same on the PowerColor Card that looks identical> Now, I personally think PowerColor is junk but Diamond had a decent name in the past... like 8-10 years ago. Someone must have bought the name.
> 
> 
> 
> I will now lol, But again as said above they are actually AMD reference design heatsinks from what OPs have said.



I can't get a source of this... it was on the bitcoin forums somewhere. This guy purchased a diamond 7970. It had terrible terrible like 90c temps at stock. So he figured the heatsink (amd reference) must not of been factory installed well enough. It wasn't that it wasn't installed well enough, the heatsink copper base was not machined right. It was seriously rough. So he lapped it and got the same temps as all the other amd reference cards he has that weren't from diamond. This and this alone is why I have a thing against diamond. Had nothing to do with amd's reference cooler which is good enough for clocks.

Is this at all similar to your diamond card that you tested?


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## RigRebel (Jul 9, 2012)

james888 said:


> I can't get a source of this... it was on the bitcoin forums somewhere. This guy purchased a diamond 7970. It had terrible terrible like 90c temps at stock. So he figured the heatsink (amd reference) must not of been factory installed well enough. It wasn't that it wasn't installed well enough, the heatsink copper base was not machined right. It was seriously rough. So he lapped it and got the same temps as all the other amd reference cards he has that weren't from diamond. This and this alone is why I have a thing against diamond. Had nothing to do with amd's reference cooler which is good enough for clocks.
> 
> Is this at all similar to your diamond card that you tested?



Awsome post for 1 reason, It confirms I'm glad I didn't lap mine  lolz.... yeah mine was machined horribly aslo. Mine was installed well and actually had high grade silverite thermal compound. The problem was that the cooper base on the heat sink looked like a finger print.    I thought you saw the link. This is my heat sink in the picture http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/showthread.php?t=167140
Not mine as in same model, mine as in that's my kitchen counter   lol

PS. I did call Diamond about it and the agent gave me the "well that's the first we've heard about it" and "I'll send an email to upper managment". I didn't hear back but didn't give all my information because was still sending the card back and he eluded that me removing the heatsink to discover the problem could void my warranty. So ya... Diamond gets the thumbs down!


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## Nordic (Jul 9, 2012)

In the guy I mentioned got a perfectly fine 7970, he just had to put some work into it.
No I did not see that link or those pictures. That does oddly resemble a fingerprint.


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## RigRebel (Jul 9, 2012)

james888 said:


> In the guy I mentioned got a perfectly fine 7970, he just had to put some work into it.
> No I did not see that link or those pictures. That does oddly resemble a fingerprint.



Yea, if you read that thread you'll see was somewhat itching to put the work into it too but I was back in forth about lapping it. I've lapped before but it came down to 1. Worried about that small ledge and no body reported doing it yet and 2. it was barely 3 days old when I discovered it and just didn't want to risk it or voiding warranty. 3. Eh I originally wanted the 660 TI when it comes out anyways just got antsy.


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## eidairaman1 (Jul 9, 2012)

7850 is a sleeper actually


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## CaptainFailcon (Jul 9, 2012)

Get the 560
better drivers better game support and 2GB of vram will make battlefield 3 happy


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## Desert Eagle (Jul 9, 2012)

CaptainFailcon said:


> Get the 560
> better drivers better game support and 2GB of vram will make battlefield 3 happy



Normally I would gice you +1 internets for that recommendation but the GTX 660 Ti is just around the corner. Wait for it.


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## Desert Eagle (Jul 9, 2012)

Velvet Wafer said:


> I wonder, why none of the "Big" Members has written any comment to this


ch 

They only teach us what we don't know when we piss them off. It's a well known fact.


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## SIGSEGV (Jul 11, 2012)

i dont really know what's the purpose of this thread? ranting on the specific amd cards vendor or what.. hello world, is there anybody out there who has sapphire, asus, gigabyte, xfx, msi, his HD7800 or HD7900 series card had a problem like op said?


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## Nordic (Jul 11, 2012)

SIGSEGV said:


> i dont really know what's the purpose of this thread? ranting on the specific amd cards vendor or what.. hello world, is there anybody out there who has sapphire, asus, gigabyte, xfx, msi, his HD7800 or HD7900 series card had a problem like op said?



The original purpose was comparing amd vs nvidea. His results were that nvidea was better. I think it was the bad heatsink from diamond that made nvidea look better myself. So that is why the thread veered towards bad vendor.


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## baggpipes (Jul 11, 2012)

So you tested using only diablo III? Seems like you would want to get your corvette and lexus on different tracks to test.....


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## RigRebel (Jul 11, 2012)

baggpipes said:


> So you tested using only diablo III? Seems like you would want to get your corvette and lexus on different tracks to test.....



Yeah I would have loved to put them on The Secret World, direct X11, tessallations, good AA options, MMO, full rendering, etc etc. In fact, that was a main game reason to purchase the cards and it would have been a good test but the game launch got pushed back and the video cards had to go back before cut off so negatory on the tracks to test.  I was caught up in a lot too. Testing 3 cards in 1-2 weeks, work and trying to play through D III launch and TSW betas left me short of breath. Infact had to skip a beta weekend  . I Could have loaded older games but none that would tells us much.



Desert Eagle said:


> Normally I would gice you +1 internets for that recommendation but the GTX 660 Ti is just around the corner. Wait for it.



Resounding : AGREED 



eidairaman1 said:


> 7850 is a sleeper actually



On overclocking couldn't agree with you more, but at what cost ? $$$ Aftermarket heatsink, voiding warranty, loosing CF space ?


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## eidairaman1 (Jul 13, 2012)

RigRebel said:


> Yeah I would have loved to put them on The Secret World, direct X11, tessallations, good AA options, MMO, full rendering, etc etc. In fact, that was a main game reason to purchase the cards and it would have been a good test but the game launch got pushed back and the video cards had to go back before cut off so negatory on the tracks to test.  I was caught up in a lot too. Testing 3 cards in 1-2 weeks, work and trying to play through D III launch and TSW betas left me short of breath. Infact had to skip a beta weekend  . I Could have loaded older games but none that would tells us much.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Dude If a card went bad with an aftermarket heatsink I just put the original one back on before RMA, You dont have to say you modified the card or anything just state your having issues or it just up and died, they dont ask further questions.

I did that for a Radeon 9700 Pro that I accidently Killed.

Also Spacing for Motherboards is mainly 2 slotted so you can have 2 dual slot cards. only beef is tri slot cards. IIRC the 7800 series is only standard crossfire and not tri or Quadfire...

Also words like "around the corner" is not very reassuring, specific dates that they are in Retail and etail are.

Ill just say look at your performance numbers and pricing. power draw is another factor but if your gonna overclock it makes it a minute point.


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## Xzibit (Jul 13, 2012)

I was on a EVGA 560 TI 1GB and got a Diamond 7870 2GB 1ghz edition to try out. 

Having had
EVGA GTX 260
EVGA GTX 460 SC
EVGA GTX 560 TI
* Yes i like EVGA 

Yes, the drivers are simplier with Nvidia cards but one thing I didnt like was the Heavy gradient look. If you ever used Adobe Photoshop and applied that it was just horrid to look at. The only way to get rid of it was to apply x4 MSAA or higher and you still had the subtle glaze overlay to deal with in 3D.  The gradient look was annoying since you cant adjust to minimize it in 2D so its always there.

That was the first thing I noticed once i installed the AMD card. No gradient or glazed over lay in 2D or 3D.
Its not all perfect so far but that was a HUGE differance i noticed right off the bat.


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## RigRebel (Aug 21, 2012)

eidairaman1 said:


> Dude If a card went bad with an aftermarket heatsink I just put the original one back on before RMA, You dont have to say you modified the card or anything just state your having issues or it just up and died, they dont ask further questions.
> 
> I did that for a Radeon 9700 Pro that I accidently Killed.
> 
> ...



Dude … It wasn't an aftermarket heat-sink it was stock. I never put an aftermarket heat sink on that card that was the stock heat sink with the problems and I'm not paying close to $300.00 for that garbbage. If Diamond is getting ATI reference heat-sinks machined that badly and putting them out for the public to use then they need to flog the person who made that piece of crap decision on the head with mouse and keyboard and close up shop... that's f-ing ridiculous that they would try to pass that garbagge off as a "quality" video card. I'm not modding crap to handle their poor ass quality. It's just as easy for me to hand that piece of crap back to them and say "i'll take my money back have a nice day" Which is exactly what I did AFTER I let them know of the issue and got the "well I'll send an email to managment" reply from the helpdesk worker and then never heard back ... so eh not my problem and I'm sure as heck not going to lap a 2week old prodcut (at the time) void the warranty and possibly have more issues just because of their crappy ass $8.00 an hour labor workmanship... screw that. They can pawn that junk on some other sucker.


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## eidairaman1 (Aug 22, 2012)

well just return the card


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