# ASUS ROG ARES II 6144 MB



## W1zzard (Jan 21, 2013)

ASUS releases their ARES II dual-GPU HD 7990 today. Using two full Tahiti GPUs with clock speeds beyond the HD 7970 GHz Edition, it provides plenty of performance for even the most demanding titles at their highest settings. But does it provide enough to warrant a price of $1599?

*Show full review*


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## qubit (Jan 28, 2013)

"Low noise during gaming"

Music to my ears.  All high end graphics cards should aspire to this.


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## dj-electric (Jan 28, 2013)

Should they all also use AIO Watercooling solutions?


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## iO (Jan 28, 2013)

What a sick beast...


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## HammerON (Jan 28, 2013)

Amazing GPU
Thanks W1z for the review!!!


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## Frick (Jan 28, 2013)

1. It's about three times more than my car! 

2. Performance is kinda all over the place. Sometimes it's just weird (WoW ), and sometimes it actually does twice as many FPSs as the 7970.

BTW, any chance of a Crossfire review?


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## radrok (Jan 28, 2013)

This is such an engineering marvel, I mean that kind of performance on such a small package makes it a win.

Too bad the price is so steep that you could buy a quad 7970 for the price.

Awesome review W1zzard, ty 

Also INB4 omgwtf over 500w power consumption, unacceptable, etc etc.


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## Frick (Jan 28, 2013)

radrok said:


> Also INB4 omgwtf over 500w power consumption, unacceptable, etc etc.



For this it's not that bad. Now we might actually use those 1400W Platinum units in a single rig.


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## Norton (Jan 28, 2013)

I want to see that card break the single card record for WCG gpu crunching


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## badtaylorx (Jan 28, 2013)

hey, i thought they changed the nda date.....you sure this is ok???


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## W1zzard (Jan 28, 2013)

badtaylorx said:


> hey, i thought they changed the nda date.....you sure this is ok???



in the end they didnt change it


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## Darkleoco (Jan 28, 2013)

My only question is why would anyone besides collectors and the exceptionally rich purchase this card? There are many other possibilities if anyone actually NEEDS that much power you could get amazing quad-fire/quad-sli performance that I am sure exceeds what this card is capable of and could likely do it for less money as well.....


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## badtaylorx (Jan 28, 2013)

sweet


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## n0tiert (Jan 28, 2013)

this is betta than sex ,  mhhhhhmmmmmmooooaaaarr
grrrr i need to get this card......

@W1zzard any clue on  known plans about different coolers by EK & co?


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## ArchStupid (Jan 28, 2013)

How the hell did this get an 8.9..?

It's weaker than the 690GTX yet costs *60%(!!!)* more.
By far the lowest performance per dollar of any card.
Almost double the power consumption of the GTX 690.
It takes three slots + space for the block.

I mean come on, how can anyone take that score seriously?


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## Darkleoco (Jan 28, 2013)

ArchStupid said:


> How the hell did this get an 8.9..?
> 
> It's weaker than the 690GTX yet costs *60%(!!!)* more.
> By far the lowest performance per dollar of any card.
> ...



It beats the 690 in nearly every game that has decent crossfire scaling, it is also a limited edition and watercooled card, what kind of troll are you exactly?


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## the54thvoid (Jan 28, 2013)

Curiosity...

Anyone else use crossfire 7970's?  I had crossfire working in Far Cry 3 but it was micro stuttery occasionally.


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## natr0n (Jan 28, 2013)

Monster card is monstrously monstrous.


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## Sasqui (Jan 28, 2013)

I'm not impressed with the price/performance at all.  But that's apparently not the point.

Nice review and wise to break out the performance results.


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## cadaveca (Jan 28, 2013)

What impresses me the most is the card getting cooled by a single 120mm rad. Those are very decent temperatures for 600W or so going through a single rad.


I'd love to have one, could never afford it though. I wonder if the case is big enough to mod into a full PC case with the ARES II installed...


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## NdMk2o1o (Jan 28, 2013)

Defo gonna need one of these for that beast, heck most screwless cases even struggle with high end GPU's (my CM Storm Sniper and VaporX 7950 being a prime example)


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## leopr (Jan 28, 2013)

ArchStupid said:


> How the hell did this get an 8.9..?
> 
> It's weaker than the 690GTX yet costs *60%(!!!)* more.
> By far the lowest performance per dollar of any card.
> ...



This is weaker for you ?:



Spoiler
























It's a limited edition, they've always been expensive but you can get the same performance with two 7970 clocked to 1100/1500.


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## NdMk2o1o (Jan 28, 2013)

On average it is slower than the 690 in all resolutions bar 2560x1600 and only edges it by 3% then.


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## cadaveca (Jan 28, 2013)

NdMk2o1o said:


> On average it is slower than the 690 in all resolutions bar 2560x1600 and only edges it by 3% then.



Again, drivers affecting overall outcome.



			
				W1zz said:
			
		

> The ARES II's lack of CrossFire support affected the performance summary on the previous page a lot.
> 
> I removed Assassin's Creed 3, Batman Arkham City, F1 2012, StarCraft II, Skyrim, and World of Warcraft and created the graphs below.



And then, it takes the top spot, in nearly every resolution, except 1200x800.


Also, several titles show better performance with 5760x1080 than in 2560x1600, again...driver issues. That's not ASUS's fault.

If you have the money to spend on such a card then you MUST be smart enough to know that dual-GPU cards are always prone to multi-GPU rendering issues. This has been the case, FOREVER. As such, any such issues are not important, or you'd not consider the card anyway.


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## leopr (Jan 28, 2013)

NdMk2o1o said:


> On average it is slower than the 690 in all resolutions bar 2560x1600 and only edges it by 3% then.



Besides AC3 and a few games where the CF profiles are clearly not working the ARES is faster.

2560x1600:



Spoiler





























Only 3% ? the gap looks bigger to me.


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## NdMk2o1o (Jan 28, 2013)

cadaveca said:


> Again, drivers affecting overall outcome.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Thanks man, I will be honest there's only a few pages of GPU reviews I tend to look at: The card, power consumption and relative performance so completely missed the summary 2  15% faster at 2600x1600 not too bad, I woulod expect more refinement with mature drivers and working CrossfireX profiles


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## MxPhenom 216 (Jan 28, 2013)

Looks like a pretty sweet card. id probably get a GTX690 though still because of the price to performance ratio and performance to watt.


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## DarkOCean (Jan 28, 2013)

They could at lest use 2x6gb just to warrant such a ridiculous price.


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## BiggieShady (Jan 28, 2013)

This is the card that peaks at 480 W in Crysis 2, but when you run furmark it blows up your PSU with 650 W. It reminds me of early nvidia 400 series ferminators.


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## NdMk2o1o (Jan 28, 2013)

BiggieShady said:


> This is the card that peaks at 480 W in Crysis 2, but when you run furmark it blows up your PSU with 650 W. It reminds me of early nvidia 400 series ferminators.



That's just nonsense for 2 reasons, a: it didn't blow up the PSU and if you're running a card like this on anything less than an 850w PSU it's not the cards fault if the PSU does go bang and b: 400 series Fermi never blew up PSU's they fried when running furmark because their power circuitry wasn't up to the task of them being stressed like they were when running furmark (which NV fixed later on by limiting the power when running any kind of tool like furmark) 

A lot of people won't even touch furmark these days because of the unnatural load it places on GPU's that they don't get even when gaming at 100%. A lot of cards have died at the hand of furmark, not just Fermi. 

So run along now and stop spreading your misinformed FUD


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## the54thvoid (Jan 28, 2013)

BiggieShady said:


> This is the card that peaks at 480 W in Crysis 2, but when you run furmark it blows up your PSU with 650 W. It reminds me of early nvidia 400 series ferminators.



That would be the GTX590 cards with low quality parts.  Certainly not early Fermi.  Nvidia learned that lesson and made a sublime (though expensive GTX690).

If the 690 is an exquisite sports car then this is that very same car but with a tooled up engine.  It's way faster but prone to engine faults.  And costs more.

Still, it plays BF3 in crossfire (which W1zz had problems running in the past so crossfire compatibility isn't necessarily a permanent problem).  Though I';m off to check on other crossfire reviews to see if isolated issue.


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## BiggieShady (Jan 28, 2013)

NdMk2o1o said:


> A lot of people won't even touch furmark these days because of the unnatural load it places on GPU's that they don't get even when gaming at 100%. A lot of cards have died at the hand of furmark, not just Fermi.



Oddly, that was my point, I'm saying that the last time I've seen this kind of furmark power consumption jump was with GTX 480s ...

So not saying enough is like spreading misinformation ...

Weird.


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## the54thvoid (Jan 28, 2013)

Read a VR-Zone review which is in two parts.  It states that:



> Part two of our review will come later this week when the latest set of drivers from AMD, Catalyst 13.2, arrives with an improved memory manager which purportedly improves frame time consistencies (microstuttering) and general CrossfireX scaling fixes.
> 
> Read more: http://vr-zone.com/articles/asus-ro...n-a-different-league/18752.html#ixzz2JIs6CcAl



Can you hold on to that card W1zzard and retest those games when 13.2 comes out?  Or is it already on the plane under armed card, off to the next reviewer?


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## W1zzard (Jan 28, 2013)

the54thvoid said:


> Can you hold on to that card W1zzard and retest those games when 13.2 comes out? Or is it already on the plane under armed card, off to the next reviewer?



asus wants to pick it up tomorrow or so to send to some reviewers in sweden. once 13.2 is out we'll see how well these work, and then maybe they get whql'd in april/may


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## Socram13 (Jan 28, 2013)

A card for a minority, and as expected power consumption is really high together with crossfire problems...
GTX 690 is better overall.
AMD needs to launch HD 8000(GCN2) ASAP, HD 7000 have more than 1 year old, and games like Crysis 3 will require heavy hardware for Ultra settings.
25-30% performance increase from HD 7970 to HD 8970 can make a lot of difference in gameplay experience.


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## Relayer (Jan 28, 2013)

Talk about taking a "Brute Force Approach"!!! Brute forces your wallet too. 

Well done review, W1zzard.


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## LAN_deRf_HA (Jan 28, 2013)

Surprised xfire scaling was so detrimental to this. I thought at this point they were pretty even.


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## jihadjoe (Jan 29, 2013)

Awesome card, but hampered by less than awesome drivers.
Crossfire really threw a wrench in there.


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## Jack1n (Jan 29, 2013)

Pointless card,at this price you can buy 2x7970, a beefy 360 rad pump,res and full cover blocks with backplates,quality fans and still have money left over.


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## Bow (Jan 29, 2013)




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## Easy Rhino (Jan 29, 2013)

Frick said:


> 1. It's about three times more than my car!



what in the world do you drive?


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## Fluffmeister (Jan 29, 2013)

Niche card is super niche, goes without saying you could get massively better performance for $1600.

An impressive piece of kit nevertheless that will always be let down by the software side.

When it does beat the 690 is that extra performance truly worth a whopping $600 more and the considerably higher power consumption? Not really. Especially considering most of the time 690 in those scenarios is perfectly playable anyway, and even if it isn't... well at least you saved 600 bucks.


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## SIGSEGV (Jan 29, 2013)

imho this card is way too overpriced 
in my view, it'd be better getting 2 HD7970 and buy open loop watercooling 

2 x GIGABYTE GV-R797OC-3GD Radeon HD 7970 3GB 384-bit ... = $800
and spend the rest of money to get full gpu waterblock cover, kits and 240 mm radiator ($700 - $800)


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## Frenzic (Jan 29, 2013)

Me wants 2 of those suckers!! better sell the kids.


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## BigMack70 (Jan 29, 2013)

the54thvoid said:


> Curiosity...
> 
> Anyone else use crossfire 7970's?  I had crossfire working in Far Cry 3 but it was micro stuttery occasionally.



I have CF 7970s that I alternatively run at 1070/1800, 1150/1800, or 1200/1800 depending on how much noise I feel like standing (silent/ok/LOUD! respectively).

Zero issues in Far Cry 3 at 1440p with the following settings:
GPU Max Buffered frames = 1
Vsync = 1
and outside of the game, MSI Afterburner framerate limit = 60

That gets me 60fps maxed out with 4xMSAA at 1440p. No microstutter.

Anyways, not a big fan of this card really... just can't see the price premium being justified at all. It's also just not that much better than a pair of high end custom 7970s in CF, while the cost is nearly double.


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## eidairaman1 (Jan 29, 2013)

W1zzard said:


> asus wants to pick it up tomorrow or so to send to some reviewers in sweden. once 13.2 is out we'll see how well these work, and then maybe they get whql'd in april/may



Since AMD has the 13.1 Driver, I suspect the Latency Fixed Driver will be the 13.3s, (be smarter if they would wait for 13.4s)


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## Animalpak (Jan 29, 2013)

cadaveca said:


> *What impresses me the most is the card getting cooled by a single 120mm rad. Those are very decent temperatures for 600W or so going through a single rad.*




yes i absolutley agree even wtih full water block cant keep so low temperatures with 3x120mm radiators !!

beastly beast is a true beast card...


 Hope to see something like this with nvidia gpu s


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## Bjorn_Of_Iceland (Jan 29, 2013)

ArchStupid said:


> How the hell did this get an 8.9..?
> 
> It's weaker than the 690GTX yet costs *60%(!!!)* more.
> By far the lowest performance per dollar of any card.
> ...


You don't want to see Asus card reviews in the future anymore?


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## eidairaman1 (Jan 29, 2013)

Bjorn_Of_Iceland said:


> You don't want to see Asus card reviews in the future anymore?



He needs to be slapped


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## Jack1n (Jan 29, 2013)

SIGSEGV said:


> imho this card is way too overpriced
> in my view, it'd be better getting 2 HD7970 and buy open loop watercooling
> 
> 2 x GIGABYTE GV-R797OC-3GD Radeon HD 7970 3GB 384-bit ... = $800
> and spend the rest of money to get full gpu waterblock cover, kits and 240 mm radiator ($700 - $800)



An open loop with 2 full cover blocks,420 rad (3x140)+fans,fittings,tubing,pump,res cost only around 550$.


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## mediasorcerer (Jan 29, 2013)

Hey, how is it in metro2033 @2560x1600 hehe, what a horrible yet excellent game to sort out the graphics card men from the boys .

You got to hand it to Asus for this card, only they could get away with it, great engineering feat, about time for solid metals too, often thought about casting a shroud in aluminium, wouldn't be that hard either.

That's a ripper card, what ever way you swing it, numbers haint everything, i just want it.

If this card doesn't appeal to you,,,,,,,,?




you got the wrong hobby. hehe!!


Good read wi77ard.


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## tacosRcool (Jan 29, 2013)

Would thought it would be better in terms of performance vs the gtx 690 especially for $1600


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## Am* (Jan 29, 2013)

Holy crap...this card is a colossal failure.

The Devil 13 costs over 600 dollars less (even 700 less in some places), has a much better cooler even though it is an air cooler , it is worth more even purely in material costs, not a cheap piece of shit single rad with a water block that didn't even cover the whole card and could hit almost the same clocks. And to add insult to injury, they release it a year after the fucking card was originally released. It doesn't deserve a 4/10 for a score, let alone an 8.9; throw this worthless turd back at ASUCKS HQ where it belongs...shops around here couldn't get rid of their stocks of the original Ares fast enough and that was a half decent card back then. Anybody with a brain cell will not go anywhere near this piece of shit, but I give props to the few chosen retards that will buy this card.


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## yogurt_21 (Jan 29, 2013)

^ has a point.

1600$? that's 4 7970's.  or 2 of them and a good mobo/cpu/memory combo. Price makes it worthless.


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## BigMack70 (Jan 29, 2013)

yogurt_21 said:


> ^ has a point.
> 
> 1600$? that's 4 7970's.  or 2 of them and a good mobo/cpu/memory combo. Price makes it worthless.



I think that the price just sorts out who the card is for and who it's not for. It's for someone wanting to build a unique rig with a collector's item in it, who doesn't care at all about the price or value of the computer.

They could probably set this card at $2500 and it would still sell out.

I agree with you about it being worthless, but I'm not in the target audience.


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## rainbow dash (Jan 29, 2013)

this card is totally disaster..


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## Am* (Jan 29, 2013)

BigMack70 said:


> I think that the price just sorts out who the card is for and who it's not for. It's for someone wanting to build a unique rig with a collector's item in it, who doesn't care at all about the price or value of the computer.
> 
> They could probably set this card at $2500 and it would still sell out.
> 
> I agree with you about it being worthless, but I'm not in the target audience.



The price has nothing to do with the target audience. Even if you are a collector, there are way better options for you; you want a rare dual 7970 GPU card, get the Devil 13, if you want a dual 680 card or one that uses the best materials, get the 690. This Ares card has nothing over either of these and yet it costs $600 more. That's $600 more than the most expensive and best performing GPUs on the market which debuted a year ago. ASUS can fuck off -- this is beyond a joke, they are just taking the piss now. This is the first generation of graphics cards that offer limited edition dual GPU cards from both AMD and Nvidia without ASUS -- their price premium reasoning is long gone -- they did not have to engineer or redesign anything, as Powercolor already did that and still managed to make a profit by selling their cards for less. ASUS are not the only player in the limited edition GPU market anymore -- as far as I am concerned, they are no longer relevant.


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## BigMack70 (Jan 29, 2013)

None of those other cards are limited edition. The ARES II is, and on top of the unique design (rather you like it or not), that's going to make it much more desirable for some folks than the Devil 13 or 690.

Honestly there's no reason to get so mad at ASUS... some people will be very happy with this card.


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## Am* (Jan 29, 2013)

BigMack70 said:


> None of those other cards are limited edition. The ARES II is, and on top of the unique design (rather you like it or not), that's going to make it much more desirable for some folks than the Devil 13 or 690.
> 
> Honestly there's no reason to get so mad at ASUS... some people will be very happy with this card.



While the GTX 690 isn't a limited edition card, the Devil 13 IS.


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## BiggieShady (Jan 29, 2013)

rainbow dash said:


> this card is totally disaster..



Total disaster only for the credit card bill and the power bill, this monster is great for multi monitor gaming and it's quiet


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## BigMack70 (Jan 29, 2013)

The Devil 13 is a limited release but not a limited edition, so you don't get things like the serial # telling you which of the run of cards you have, for example.

I know that stuff sounds stupid, but it's going to mean a lot to some people.


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## Am* (Jan 29, 2013)

BigMack70 said:


> The Devil 13 is a limited release but not a limited edition, so you don't get things like the serial # telling you which of the run of cards you have, for example.
> 
> I know that stuff sounds stupid, but it's going to mean a lot to some people.



WTF... send an email to Powercolor and tell them you want a freaking number on the box for $600 extra, I bet they will engrave your girlfriend's name on it as a freebie for that kind of stupid money...



BiggieShady said:


> Total disaster only for the credit card bill and the power bill, this monster is great for multi monitor gaming and it's quiet



*facepalm* yeah it's great for multi monitor gaming...until next month, when a whole new generation of graphics cards are going to be released that will wipe the floor with this card. Until then it's only a disaster for the only two things that matter...


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## BigMack70 (Jan 29, 2013)

Hey I'm not arguing that it makes sense, I'm just trying to explain why some people aren't going to care about the price premium.


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## n0tiert (Jan 29, 2013)

i dunno why people arguing,

nobody pics on those ipad/iphone nerds paying huge money for a piece of crap forged by foxconn slaves, calm down...... 

u have to see it the other way , it´s an honour to get such sample for dismantling, testing, reviewing it.......  i bet they breed even more stuff like that in their labs but non public

thx, for the review, keep it up !


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## NinkobEi (Jan 29, 2013)

Why are these people angry that ASUS made a limited edition card targeted at the lazy wealthy? 

Personally I think it is a great engineering achievement and hope to see more (lower priced) models in the future. If it helps to break in the era of easy pre-packaged watercooling then count me in!


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## yogurt_21 (Jan 29, 2013)

NinkobEi said:


> Why are these people angry that ASUS made a limited edition card targeted at the lazy wealthy?
> 
> Personally I think it is a great engineering achievement and hope to see more (lower priced) models in the future. If it helps to break in the era of easy pre-packaged watercooling then count me in!



its not the first dual 7970 card so no, its not an engineering achievement. This version is 600$ more expensive than the powercolor version which was reviewed on this site, August of last year. Pre-packaged watercooling has come and gone, there is no era starting here, it was tried and ultimately proven inefficient compared with cheaper the less complex air coolers. The only reason this one has it is the high heat output, otherwise asus would have used air like it has in the last aries model. 

The last aries launched at the 1000$ price point with all of the limited edition crap, there is nothing on this one that justifies the extra 600$ That watercooler isn't worth an extra 600$, an extra 100$ at most. This is more for people who worship the ground that asus walks on, its not really for the uber rich enthusiest. After all if you can find 2 devil 13's for 1.2x the price of this one alone, why wouldn't you run those instead?


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## NinkobEi (Jan 29, 2013)

yogurt_21 said:


> After all if you can find 2 devil 13's for 1.2x the price of this one alone, why wouldn't you run those instead?



Obviously you aren't part of the targeted consumer group for this card. No need to get angry at that. Call it overpriced garbage if you want, I still think it's neat that they can completely package a waterblock with a videocard and have it maintenance free. I wouldn't buy it, because I am poor, but I'm not outraged that ASUS would make such a card.


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## the54thvoid (Jan 29, 2013)

Selling any product and identifying it as a limited run with individually serialised numbers on it is a marketing and manufacturing driven pricing strategy.

In the realm of manufacturing the less of something you make (or commit to make) necessarily incurs a higher production cost than against mass produced articles.

Asus did not make this card to sell to thousands.  Just a thousand, max.  And these cards (Ares 2) are not all about performance - I know, I have 2 water cooled 7970's and they run at 1050, therefore my product runs pretty much on par with this.

However, 2 x7970, plus 2 x water blocks plus rad, pump and fan would cost (in UK pounds) around £800.  That is for two not very special stock PCB's with no top end components.  This card is a limited run, with a custom built PCB with high quality components throughout, with far higher clocks and all pre plumbed into an effective cooling loop.

The card is obviously being sold at a higher cost than the sum of it's parts but that is for the specific reason it is a collectors, limited edition model. 

I would invite all the trolls bitching on this thread to go and peruse some watch forums and harp on about watch prices.  Or maybe some car forums.  Or any other special edition commodity that retails higher than it's manufacturing cost.

Guys, get a grip.

EDIT:  At the moment of typing this the system specs of the four folk on this page decrying the card are all Nvidia owners.  Go figure.


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## jihadjoe (Jan 30, 2013)

IMO whether you're an AMD or Nvidia fan, now is definitely not the time to be buying a high-end GPU. The HD7000 and 600 series are both old, about to be refreshed.


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## Fluffmeister (Jan 30, 2013)

The card is stupidly expensive and fails on many metrics people care about.

To suggest people who question the point of this card are either trolls or nVidia fanboys is rather pathetic.


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## Widjaja (Jan 30, 2013)

Novelty item/brag value for computer enthusiasts with a dash of overprice for having the ARES name in it.

Only thing I see which is appealing is not being a generic AMD ASUS triple slot high end card.


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## mediasorcerer (Jan 30, 2013)

Yes i love it too, how adventurous of Asus to bring this to market, of course it's for those tech enthusiasts who have plenty of spondoola but i say why not, if it was $1599.00 id probably come at it but $1600 is just too pricey.

I'm so glad Asus made this thing, it is a great idea and hopefully more vendors will follow suit with lower priced but similar offerings.

I can't believe folks would not appreciate the engineering in this card, who cares what the price is, as if we would buy it anyway? Love adventurous companies who aren't frightened to try something a bit new and different, good one Asus.

I'd love this card in my rigg already.


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## mediasorcerer (Jan 30, 2013)

the54thvoid said:


> Selling any product and identifying it as a limited run with individually serialised numbers on it is a marketing and manufacturing driven pricing strategy.
> 
> In the realm of manufacturing the less of something you make (or commit to make) necessarily incurs a higher production cost than against mass produced articles.
> 
> ...




You tell them buddy, your spot on, how could a tech enthusiast not like this card, i love ferraris, can't afford one, doesn't mean we cant appreciate the engineering in it, it's a bit moronic to be bitching i think, missing the point completely.


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## Am* (Jan 30, 2013)

the54thvoid said:


> Selling any product and identifying it as a limited run with individually serialised numbers on it is a marketing and manufacturing driven pricing strategy.
> 
> In the realm of manufacturing the less of something you make (or commit to make) necessarily incurs a higher production cost than against mass produced articles.
> 
> ...



You are quite clearly clueless and cannot comprehend the reasoning of people like me that are complaining about the release of this card. And for you to accuse me of being an Nvidia fanboy is beyond moronic -- I have been the one person out of the few that was pissed at Nvidia's shitty driver support for ages until sometime last year, when they got their act together, and I've said several times here on TPU and elsewhere that I would buy a 7970 over a GTX 680 anyday if I was looking for a card now, so nice fail there.

Both AMD and Nvidia price their cards based on what's selling for what on the market and how big the demand is. If even 1000 retards are still buying last year's re-released cards today, as a top-performance part, they are suggesting to both companies that last year's performance is still good enough -- so what happens? Originally planned $500 flagship replacement cards become priced as extreme-end $1000+ cards (as is the rumour now going around with the GK 110 Titan going for $900 dollars), and we get the same shit re-hashed in another generation under a slightly different name with just slightly lower power consumption. I don't want this to become another case of Nvidia's 9000 series bullshit, I want a much better card for the same money. This card only ruins the chances of that happening for pretty much everybody that wants competition. If you want to try and convince me that releasing this card now is somehow going to benefit anybody other than ASUS then please feel free to explain to me how it will do that.

EDIT: Oh and don't even get me started on your whole "you pay for what you get" bullshit theory, comparing an expensive watch or a supercar which are time-tested pieces of engineering to some shitty chips on a PCB with a $600-$1000 dollar 'GO FASTER' stripe on it. Expensive watches and supercars have decade-lasting and GUARANTEED resale value and do not get replaced anywhere near as quickly as something like consumer graphics cards, if ever (most decades-old supercars become sought-after collector's items due to their lasting unique design and flog for millions), even if you're selling them back to the manufacturer, which is something that this turd of a card will NEVER, EVER have. And do not even think of quoting UK pricing against a US product's retail value. The MARS II went for $1500 in the US, and guess how much it sold for here? £1300-£1600 pounds. In effect, you are not saving jackshit and you would likely be financially better off modding/almost making your very own card.



mediasorcerer said:


> You tell them buddy, your spot on, how could a tech enthusiast not like this card, i love ferraris, can't afford one, doesn't mean we cant appreciate the engineering in it, it's a bit moronic to be bitching i think, missing the point completely.



Oh and this is not the "Ferrari" of graphics cards...this is more like a VW Golf modded by some chavs with a shit-ton of neon lights, tinted windows and gigantic alloy wheels. Pretentious crap, is what this card is.


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## NinkobEi (Jan 30, 2013)

Am* said:


> You are quite clearly clueless and cannot comprehend the reasoning of people like me that are complaining about the release of this card. And for you to accuse me of being an Nvidia fanboy is beyond moronic -- I have been the one person out of the few that was pissed at Nvidia's shitty driver support for ages until sometime last year, when they got their act together, and I've said several times here on TPU and elsewhere that I would buy a 7970 over a GTX 680 anyday if I was looking for a card now, so nice fail there.
> 
> Both AMD and Nvidia price their cards based on what's selling for what on the market and how big the demand is. If even 1000 retards are still buying last year's re-released cards today, they are suggesting to both companies that last year's performance is still good enough -- so what happens? Originally planned future $500 flagship replacement cards are priced well as extreme-end $1000+ cards (as is the rumour now going around with the GK 110 Titan), and we get the same shit re-hashed in another generation under a slightly different name with just slightly lower power consumption. I don't want this to become another case of Nvidia's 9000 series bullshit, I want a much better card for the same money. This card only ruins it for everybody that wants competition. If you want to try and convince me that releasing this card now is somehow going to benefit anybody other than ASUS then please feel free to explain to me how it will do that.
> 
> Oh and don't even get me started on the whole "you pay for what you get" bullshit you're talking about, comparing an expensive watch or a supercar to some shitty chips on a PCB with a $600 dollar 'GO FASTER' stripe on it. Expensive watches and supercars have decade-lasting and GUARANTEED resale value and do not get replaced anywhere near as quickly as something like consumer graphics cards, if ever (most decades-old supercars become sought-after collector's items due to their lasting unique design and flog for millions), even if you're selling them back to the manufacturer, which is something that this turd of a card will NEVER, EVER have.



Now a permanent part of the internet. Hahahaha  Tell us how you really feel


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## Mindweaver (Jan 30, 2013)

I'm warning everyone in this thread to play nice or I'll start handing out infractions. On a side note I think this is a fantastic card at a great price.  If I was in need of a new card and could afford it I would buy this card. Oh and once the new cards came in, I would upgrade. That's what enthusiasts do. This is like fighting about the weather.. There's nothing you can do about it. 

I for one think it's great company's push there tech.


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## fullinfusion (Jan 30, 2013)

$1600 beans  I think I need another hobbie!

Never in this life time would I drop that kinda cash on a gpu!

Nice gpu though but imo not worth the cash. 

Thanx for the review W1zz


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## Frick (Jan 30, 2013)

I like Am*, he/she makes me smile. So much anger, so much time wasted.


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## TRWOV (Jan 30, 2013)

The Ares/Mars cards have always been for show. You can clearly get their philosophy right in the way they pack them, heck, they even come numbered. 

It's a collector's item not a practical solution. Let the collectors have them and go on.


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## Animalpak (Jan 31, 2013)

TRWOV said:


> The Ares/Mars cards have always been for show. You can clearly get their philosophy right in the way they pack them, heck, they even come numbered.
> 
> It's a collector's item not a practical solution. Let the collectors have them and go on.



agreed, but they also last longer than regular market gpu's... Because of their performances.


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## eidairaman1 (Jan 31, 2013)

Animalpak said:


> agreed, but they also last longer than regular market gpu's... Because of their performances.



This is basically like buying a New C6 Z06 or C6-R Corvette vs buying a C4 Corvette that has to be tuned


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## acerace (Jan 31, 2013)

Pricing is not the point of this card. I'll buy this card if I can and bragging around the forum just to piss the angry "enthusiasts".


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## Crowned Clown (Feb 17, 2013)

Wow!

But I'm more surprised seeing Diablo III for benchmarking... 
Techpowerup should've chosen a much more demanding game (even though old) like World in Conflict.


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## thebluebumblebee (Apr 12, 2013)

Would be fun to see what this would do for F@H.  Chimp Challenge starts today.


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## Asuka26x (Jun 7, 2013)

Finally aresII got some competion from my beloved sapphire-> hd7990 atomic


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## Widjaja (Jun 7, 2013)

qubit said:


> "Low noise during gaming"
> 
> Music to my ears.  All high end graphics cards should aspire to this.



Only thing which put me off buying a reference HD7970 for dirt cheap was the noises.

Chokes faintly screaming away similar annoyance to a mosquito then getting into the game the cooler starts sssssSSSSSHHHHHH.......
Either requiring a headset or having the speaker turned up loud.

Took it out and installed my HD7870 Direct CU ii again.


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