# ASUS Radeon HD 7970 CrossFire



## W1zzard (Jan 4, 2012)

AMD's Radeon HD 7970 has quickly established itself as the fastest single GPU graphics card in the world. In our ASUS HD 7970 CrossFire review we take two of these beasts for a spin to see what benefit they offer. One of the highlights is reduced power consumption thanks to AMD's new ZeroCore power technology.

*Show full review*


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## alexsubri (Jan 9, 2012)

Thanks as always! The max power consumption is amazing! Compared to the 6970 Crossfire! (525watt vs. almost 600 watt)

BTW, first


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## v12dock (Jan 9, 2012)

Need drivers otherwise is very fast


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## entropy13 (Jan 9, 2012)

W1zz teasing readers with a multi-monitor setup in the future.


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## alexsubri (Jan 9, 2012)

This is obviously too expensive for me, however I'd be good with 2 7950's (Coming in Feb) , hoping that they will be less than $400 or at least around the same price of the 5850s when it came out.

The 7990 (coming in march--will be two 7970s in xfire) is going to be wicked sick. I guarantee you that it will be $800-$1200 price range ($1200 being like special editions or limited editions)


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## dj-electric (Jan 9, 2012)

1 - drivers, derivers drivers
2 - worse scaling then HD6000 at 1920\2560 = 7970 needs to stretch it's legs, its not really worse


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## Lionheart (Jan 9, 2012)

Oh how I want, improved drivers will fully unleash these beasts ^_^


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## alexsubri (Jan 9, 2012)

Dj-ElectriC said:


> 1 - drivers, derivers drivers
> 2 - worse scaling then HD6000 at 1920\2560 = 7970 needs to stretch it's legs, its not really worse



All ATI drivers are shit once a new product is released. It will take time, just like any other GPU to work its kinks out. The scaling is due to the drivers. But, you can't complaing playing Crysis 2 maxed out Ultra Package @ 2560 x 1600 with 70 FPS


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## buggalugs (Jan 9, 2012)

Yikes, still using bad drivers. 

 I'm pretty sure AMD will release WHQL in the next few hours.


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## theJesus (Jan 9, 2012)

Dj-ElectriC said:


> 1 - drivers, derivers drivers
> 2 - worse scaling then HD6000 at 1920\2560 = 7970 needs to stretch it's legs, its not really worse


I don't think the scaling is worse; it's wholly dependent upon the drivers.  If you notice, where it does work, scales almost 100% in most situations.


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## hardcore_gamer (Jan 9, 2012)

"Remember, this money can buy you an Xbox 360, plus Kinect, plus 46" TV......"


Who the 4^cK buys Xbox 360 in 2012 ?


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## Trackr (Jan 9, 2012)

No offense, W1z, but I can't trust a review with a 920 anymore.

I went from 65 FPS to 75 FPS in Crysis @ 1080p going from a 920 to a 2500k.

I suppose it wasn't until I updated myself that I saw the difference.


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## Jack Doph (Jan 9, 2012)

> With this generation of cards AMD introduced their new ZeroCore power saving technology which really can shine in CrossFire. In a CrossFire setup only a single card will be active when not gaming; the other cards will be essentially switched off, consuming only 1W of power and producing no heat or noise. Once a gaming session starts, the additional card(s) will instantly wake up and be ready to provide their full power without any manual switching or software configuration required. It seems AMD has found the holy grail for multi-GPU power consumption reduction.



I'm not sure I fully understand this, as I'm running 5850s in CrossFire and they behave in the exact same way, leading me to think it's driver-related, rather than 'technology' related as such.
Am I missing something?


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## W1zzard (Jan 9, 2012)

Jack Doph said:


> I'm not sure I fully understand this, as I'm running 5850s in CrossFire and they behave in the exact same way, leading me to think it's driver-related, rather than 'technology' related as such.
> Am I missing something?



your cards go into a lower power state where they are all off including the fan ?



Trackr said:


> No offense, W1z, but I can't trust a review with a 920 anymore.
> 
> I went from 65 FPS to 75 FPS in Crysis @ 1080p going from a 920 to a 2500k.



go overclock your 920 and it'll be faster than the stock 2500k in many benches (happens here)

my 920 does 2x pcie x16 for this review, yours can't


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## Jack Doph (Jan 9, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> your cards go into a lower power state where they are all off including the fan ?



Yes, exactly as you describe in your review is how mine behave as well.


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## pantherx12 (Jan 9, 2012)

Mmmm I see 100% scaling in places


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## buggalugs (Jan 9, 2012)

Whats the noise like running 2 of those bad boys?


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## W1zzard (Jan 9, 2012)

Jack Doph said:


> Yes, exactly as you describe in your review is how mine behave as well.



hmm amd claims this is a new feature. 











maybe your card behaves the same but consumes normal idle power and not 1W like in zerocore


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## W1zzard (Jan 9, 2012)

buggalugs said:


> Whats the noise like running 2 of those bad boys?



in 2D, like a single card due to ZeroCore power.

in 3D, twice that of a single card. almost, since the second card might be loaded less. maybe higher because of worse airflow to one card. single card is already quite noisy in 3d


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## Jack Doph (Jan 9, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> hmm amd claims this is a new feature.
> 
> maybe your card behaves the same but consumes normal idle power and not 1W like in zerocore



Well, the only difference I find is that the fan on card 2 does not turn off (ever), but this may be due to my ambient temps never going below 25C (and is currently at 35C - we had 40C+ today btw).
Everything else is at 0%
Power usage measured is less than 1w (which I have to presume as being the fan drawing this power).
:/

Any insights?


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## W1zzard (Jan 9, 2012)

how did you measure 1W ?


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## Jack Doph (Jan 9, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> how did you measure 1W ?



CCC & GPU-Z XD
However, if I launch more than one tab in my browser, or a second GPU-Z, this goes up a tad.
The annoying thing is that whenever I try do do a screen-grab, card #2 kicks-in :/
Without any useful independent hardware tools, how else can I measure this accurately?
CCC only goes so far and GPU-Z seems to add more to GFX stress in that it forces the second card to kick-in (even if only at the lowest MHz - 157core/300MHz mem).

Is there something more reliable I can rely on?


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## blibba (Jan 9, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> in 2D, like a single card due to ZeroCore power.
> 
> in 3D, twice that of a single card. almost, since the second card might be loaded less. maybe higher because of worse airflow to one card. single card is already quite noisy in 3d



Two sources of an amount of noise do not make twice that amount of noise.


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## W1zzard (Jan 9, 2012)

blibba said:


> Two sources of an amount of noise do not make twice that amount of noise.



how would you explain it to him then without giving any specific numbers and confusing him even more?



Jack Doph said:


> CCC & GPU-Z XD
> However, if I launch more than one tab in my browser, or a second GPU-Z, this goes up a tad.
> The annoying thing is that whenever I try do do a screen-grab, card #2 kicks-in :/
> Without any useful independent hardware tools, how else can I measure this accurately?
> ...



software only shows measurements for the gpu (excluding everything else on the card, like memory).

you can't measure card only power consumption without complicated hardware tools. thats why only few reviewers test it

i'm quite sure that your second card will consume its idle power in 2D, which is probably around 25 W for 5850


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## Frizz (Jan 9, 2012)

I just sold my rig to enable myself to buy a new car.. now I wanna sell my car to enable myself to buy three of these babies . Zero core feature definitely looks like a winner being a Crossfire user for over 2 years this looks to be very beneficial in terms of $$$ and noise.


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## jpierce55 (Jan 9, 2012)

Once again I am amazed at the idle power consumption.


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## 20mmrain (Jan 9, 2012)

Nice review Wizzard.... As always! Any news on TriXX support for the Sapphire version?


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## blibba (Jan 9, 2012)

buggalugs said:


> Whats the noise like running 2 of those bad boys?





W1zzard said:


> in 2D, like a single card due to ZeroCore power.
> 
> in 3D, twice that of a single card. almost, since the second card might be loaded less. maybe higher because of worse airflow to one card. single card is already quite noisy in 3d





blibba said:


> Two sources of an amount of noise do not make twice that amount of noise.





W1zzard said:


> how would you explain it to him then without giving any specific numbers and confusing him even more?



I'd say something like:

_"In 2D, there are no additional fans running compared to a single card, due to ZeroCore power. So any difference in noise is made by the change in airflow path alone, and probably won't be noticeable.

In 3D, obviously you've got too fans rather than one, and, more significantly, stifled airflow so the top card's fan will have to run faster. Whereas a single 7970 is about as noisy as an X, two 7970s are noticeably noisier- about as noisy as a Y."_

You have to fill in the X and Y, I've never worked with these cards or enough other cards to compare them with 

Some reviewers also go for DB readings, though these can be misleading as certain types of noise are more noticeable even when they are no noisier (e.g. high pitched).

Don't take any of this as criticism, though. I made my original post just to point that out, not to have a go. I think you consistently make reviews that are amongst the best on the internet.


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## mcloughj (Jan 9, 2012)

> Prices of full HD 1080p displays have been coming down a lot and are very affordable now. Maybe I'll just grab three of them for an updated VGA benchmarking rig.



Excellent idea... would be very interested in reading it when/if you do.


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## Mindweaver (Jan 9, 2012)

blibba said:


> Two sources of an amount of noise do not make twice that amount of noise.



So you're saying 2 speakers in stereo isn't louder than 1 speaker in mono? I agree adding a second speaker does not double the level of sound, but 2 speakers from a distance can produce a louder volume at a distance. Example: Take a single speaker or fan and sit it 15 feet away and then take 2 speakers or 2 fans and sit them the exact same feet away and they will be louder than the single speaker or fan. Another example turn on a 40mm fan in a server room.. then turn on a 1u server with say 6 40mm fans and it will sound like a huey taking off.. hehehe Just my 2 cents..  

@W1zzard : Great review as always!


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## Bjorn_Of_Iceland (Jan 9, 2012)

Awesome power right there


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## blibba (Jan 9, 2012)

Mindweaver said:


> So you're saying 2 speakers in stereo isn't louder than 1 speaker in mono?



No. You can tell that I'm not saying that, because I didn't say it 



Mindweaver said:


> I agree adding a second speaker does not double the level of sound...



But that's what I actually said. Excellent.



Mindweaver said:


> ...but 2 speakers from a distance can produce a louder volume at a distance. Example: Take a single speaker or fan and sit it 15 feet away and then take 2 speakers or 2 fans and sit them the exact same feet away and they will be louder than the single speaker or fan. Another example turn on a 40mm fan in a server room.. then turn on a 1u server with say 6 40mm fans and it will sound like a huey taking off.. hehehe Just my 2 cents..



Yes.


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## TheMailMan78 (Jan 9, 2012)

100% scaling in some games made my pants sticky........I know, I have low expectations of life.


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## Mindweaver (Jan 9, 2012)

blibba said:


> *No. You can tell that I'm not saying that, because I didn't say it*



Err that was me being sarcastic.. I should have added the, "I get it" at the end.. hehehe I was going for the student asking the teacher.. hehehe bit.. 




blibba said:


> But that's what I actually said. Excellent.


 And I was agreeing? 




blibba said:


> Yes.


Then I was trying to help you explain it in a non tech way..  You're welcome! 

I can't wait for the 7950's to come out! I might replace my 5850's with them.. I really want that second card to cut off using only 1w when not gaming....


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## FreedomEclipse (Jan 9, 2012)

So....according to the summary... adding another 7970 for crossfire only gives it a 24% boost over the single card??

that makes it real hard to justify getting 2 cards.


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## entropy13 (Jan 9, 2012)

FreedomEclipse said:


> So....according to the summary... adding another 7970 for crossfire only gives it a 24% boost over the single card??
> 
> that makes it real hard to justify getting 2 cards.



AMD still haven't improved much the software side of things for that. Crossfire doing worse than a single card in Skyrim, for example, contributed to lowering that overall percentage.


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## FreedomEclipse (Jan 9, 2012)

yeah, with the amount of issues ive recently had with AMD drivers im considering selling both my 6970s and grabbing one 7970 for my needs


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## wrathchild_67 (Jan 9, 2012)

Is there an error on the Skyrim benchmarks page in regards to the Geforce 590? Is there really negative performance scaling for the 590, or are the 590 scores switched with the Geforce 580 scores?


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## blibba (Jan 9, 2012)

FreedomEclipse said:


> So....according to the summary... adding another 7970 for crossfire only gives it a 24% boost over the single card??
> 
> that makes it real hard to justify getting 2 cards.



There are a few benchmarks that don't do well with crossfire, but mostly it's just crossfire only doubles your GPU computational performance - it doesn't double anything else to do with the GPU (bandwidth, for example) or CPU speed. As you get to higher resolutions, scaling will appear better and better because the bottleneck shifts towards GPU computational performance (right until you run out of VRAM ).


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## W1zzard (Jan 9, 2012)

wrathchild_67 said:


> Is there an error on the Skyrim benchmarks page in regards to the Geforce 590? Is there really negative performance scaling for the 590, or are the 590 scores switched with the Geforce 580 scores?



sli not working, but eating cpu time + lower clocks = lower score than 580


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## alexsubri (Jan 9, 2012)

W1zz, I need your personal professional opinon ...would you pefer a single 7970 3GB or a GTX 560 Ti 2Win ..which is Dual GPU however only 1GB GDDR5 per GPU...yes the GTX 560 Ti 2 is faster in most cases, but more and more games are going to be requiring more than 1GB GDDR5..

I am still waiting for the 7950 to come out. I think that crossfired will be the best bang for your buck


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## Steevo (Jan 9, 2012)

entropy13 said:


> AMD still haven't improved much the software side of things for that. Crossfire doing worse than a single card in Skyrim, for example, contributed to lowering that overall percentage.



Apparently Nvidia the maker of all good software has just decided not to bless its users with that option either for some unpopular games like skyrim. 


AMD is de devil and makes bad software we can both agree though.


Any way mounting dimensions could be posted W1zz?


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## cadaveca (Jan 9, 2012)

You know, I told myself I was going to skip the 7-series a few months ago.

Today, I want three.





Although I see some scaling issues, I see the smae problems on my 6-series cards more often than not, so for an initial showing, I think the results are pretty good.

That said, the numbers are one thing. the actual usability is another.

I am very interested to see if ZeroCore is working With Sandybridge's IGP, with Lucid software switching between devices, as this may provide the ultimate in power savings, yet raw horsepower...IGP gets used @ the desktop, and the 7970 is idle @ 1W...then under load the 7970 kicks in, and you get great gaming performance, too!

Of course, that brings up the question of whether such tech would work with Crossfire as well. For me, that would be ideal, and I'd not need multiple rigs, one for work, with more CPU than GPU, and one for play, with more GPU than CPU. Potentially you can get the best of both worlds here...

Isn't Ivybridge supposed to supprot multiple monitor outputs, too? IvyBridge IGP for 2D, and 7970 Crossfire for Eyefinity, on the same rig? Will that be possible?


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## W1zzard (Jan 9, 2012)

alexsubri said:


> W1zz, I need your personal professional opinon ...would you pefer a single 7970 3GB or a GTX 560 Ti 2Win ..which is Dual GPU however only 1GB GDDR5 per GPU...yes the GTX 560 Ti 2 is faster in most cases, but more and more games are going to be requiring more than 1GB GDDR5..
> 
> I am still waiting for the 7950 to come out. I think that crossfired will be the best bang for your buck



if i had something that would serve me for basic gaming i wouldnt buy anything until at least summer


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## theJesus (Jan 9, 2012)

FreedomEclipse said:


> So....according to the summary... adding another 7970 for crossfire only gives it a 24% boost over the single card??
> 
> that makes it real hard to justify getting 2 cards.


It all depends what you're going to be playing.  The games where scaling _does_ work, it's near 100%.


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## 20mmrain (Jan 9, 2012)

The thing is that these cards are still very new. Scaling will get better by the next set of rivers for sure.... and better and better each time drivers are released. My GTX 580's didn't scale very well in everything either when they first came out but 2 to 3 months into it they sure did. There is still a reason for getting two cards..... and that reason will get even better as time goes on.


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## overclocking101 (Jan 9, 2012)

nice review w1zz!!! here's hoping that this "zero core" thing actually works as hopped and doesnt just mess up crossfire for these cards. I know with earlier cards amd has had issues getting the power states right at a driver level causing users to have to hack the driver or create certain profiles for gaming.


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## Trackr (Jan 9, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> go overclock your 920 and it'll be faster than the stock 2500k in many benches (happens here)
> 
> my 920 does 2x pcie x16 for this review, yours can't



Oops, sorry, forgot to respond..

No, I was referring to my i7-920 @ 4.0Ghz versus my i5-2500k @ 4.8Ghz.

That's what gave me the 15% difference.

Also, I can't claim anything about the HD 7970, but PCIe 2.0 x16 has no noticeable performance difference compared to PCIe 2.0 x8 with my GTX 480s.


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## theJesus (Jan 9, 2012)

Trackr said:


> Also, I can't claim anything about the HD 7970, but PCIe 2.0 x16 has no noticeable performance difference compared to PCIe 2.0 x8 with my GTX 480s.


W1z has done numerous tests showing what kind of difference the amount of PCIe lanes makes, and if I recall, x8 to x16 on 2.0 does make a difference.


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## W1zzard (Jan 9, 2012)

theJesus said:


> W1z has done numerous tests showing what kind of difference the amount of PCIe lanes makes, and if I recall, x8 to x16 on 2.0 does make a difference.



it probably doesn't, but trackr would complain about it anyway


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## theJesus (Jan 10, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> it probably doesn't, but trackr would complain about it anyway


Yeah, I remembered wrong.  I went back and checked your graphs and there wasn't much difference.  I think there was a very slight difference, maybe like 1fps or something, but I forget already.   Makes me wonder if the 7970 might actually be enough to make a more noticeable difference.


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## buggalugs (Jan 10, 2012)

AMD has a 7970 driver on their website. Still no 12.1 WHQL though.....wtf are they doing??

 The cards started at $699 in Australia and they still sold out, theres only a couple of models left so they bumped the price to $749, one store even had $800 on a 7970 and they still sold out.

 They are basically charging anything they want and stock is disappearing fast.

 Newegg has sold out too.


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## Trackr (Jan 10, 2012)

W1zzard said:


> it probably doesn't, but trackr would complain about it anyway



Why would I complain that more PCIe lanes don't make a difference?

That is my argument.

You're the one who said that it WOULD make a difference to have two cards in two PCIe 2.0 x16 slots as opposed to two PCIe 2.0 x8 slots.


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## blibba (Jan 10, 2012)

Trackr said:


> Why would I complain that more PCIe lanes don't make a difference?
> 
> That is my argument.
> 
> You're the one who said that it WOULD make a difference to have two cards in two PCIe 2.0 x16 slots as opposed to two PCIe 2.0 x8 slots.



Wizz was saying that you'd complain that they do make a difference, if he used a P67 or Z68 platform for the test.

As it happens he used an X58 platform, so you complain about it being too slow (even though its plenty fast enough that when you hit its CPU bottleneck, you're talking about silly FPS anyway).

His remaining alternatives are X79, which still has some issues with CF as I understand it, and Bulldozer/Phenom II. Yeah...


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## XacTactX (Jan 10, 2012)

7970 CrossFire uses less power at idle than an HD 5770 (13w vs. 15w). Someone tell me that's hilarious.


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## FreedomEclipse (Jan 10, 2012)

XacTactX said:


> 7970 CrossFire uses less power at idle than an HD 5770 (13w vs. 15w). Someone tell me that's hilarious.



not really... thats just the 7970's 'ZeroCore power state' at work. IT can completely shutdown a GPU if it isnt in use


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## Trackr (Jan 10, 2012)

blibba said:


> Wizz was saying that you'd complain that they do make a difference, if he used a P67 or Z68 platform for the test.
> 
> As it happens he used an X58 platform, so you complain about it being too slow (even though its plenty fast enough that when you hit its CPU bottleneck, you're talking about silly FPS anyway).
> 
> His remaining alternatives are X79, which still has some issues with CF as I understand it, and Bulldozer/Phenom II. Yeah...



So, he was suggesting that I would complain about PCIe 2.0 x8 bandwidth because I complained about i7-920 performance?

But those are complete opposites.. PCIe 2.0 x8 does not bottleneck performance. i7-920 DOES bottleneck performance.

It seems like he was just trying to insult me instead of listen to my comment..


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## blibba (Jan 10, 2012)

Trackr said:


> So, he was suggesting that I would complain about PCIe 2.0 x8 bandwidth because I complained about i7-920 performance?
> 
> But those are complete opposites.. PCIe 2.0 x8 does not bottleneck performance. i7-920 DOES bottleneck performance.
> 
> It seems like he was just trying to insult me instead of listen to my comment..



He was taking the piss out of you for complaining about things that aren't really problems.

He succeeded. And, to make it even better, you didn't get it.


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## treehouse (Jan 11, 2012)

FreedomEclipse said:


> So....according to the summary... adding another 7970 for crossfire only gives it a 24% boost over the single card??
> 
> that makes it real hard to justify getting 2 cards.



cpu limitation


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## XacTactX (Jan 11, 2012)

FreedomEclipse said:


> not really... thats just the 7970's 'ZeroCore power state' at work. IT can completely shutdown a GPU if it isnt in use



So what part of my statement needed correcting? ZeroCore or not it still uses less power... which is awesome!


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## Darkleoco (Jan 11, 2012)

Nice review, shame we can't have decent Crossfire Drivers yet, hopefully the aftermarket versions will be released after proper drivers


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## Trackr (Jan 11, 2012)

blibba said:


> He was taking the piss out of you for complaining about things that aren't really problems.
> 
> He succeeded. And, to make it even better, you didn't get it.



He only succeeded because he said something so vague that I thought it made it sense, when it actually made no sense at all.

And he did that INSTEAD of listening to my concern.

Believe what you want, but running a 4.0Ghz i7-920 IS a problem.

How can you think that a 10-20% CPU bottleneck in a high-end review is not a problem?

I'm astounded.


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## Fatal (Jan 11, 2012)

Great review Wizz  but the cards are too much for my broke ass right now


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## blibba (Jan 11, 2012)

Trackr said:


> How can you think that a 10-20% CPU bottleneck in a high-end review is not a problem?



This sentence shows how little you understand. It really pisses me off when people spend the kind of money that you have without doing any research into these things.

CPU bottlenecks are at a fixed number of FPS for any given set of graphical settings, drivers, OS etc. They are not a percentage penalty. If you get a Sempron and couple it with two 7970s, and then with four, you're going to get identical FPS in every game. According to your implied theory, you should get a discounted version of the FPS you'd get on a high-end platform.

Wizz's graphs only show averages. So you're getting the average of the times when the GPU was able to open up, and the times when the CPU was limiting every graphics solution to roughly the same FPS. This can look like this:











But as you increase the resolution, the FPS spends less and less time being capped by the CPU and more and more time being capped by the GPU, so you get results like this:










As an overclocked i7-920 never imposes a bottleneck at anything even near unplayable FPS in any games in the suite, I really don't see the issue. The graphs show that at 1024*768 or in undemanding games, there's a tiny difference between one 7970 and two. Yes, they'd show a bigger difference with a more powerful CPU, but who cares? The graphs also show that the i7 920 is almost never a bottleneck at 2560*1600 - note near perfect scaling in crossfire in many games. And that's what anyone reading this review is likely to actually care about.


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## fullinfusion (Jan 12, 2012)

Nice review Wiz 
but $1100 for 2 of these cards? Not in this life time. I think I'll hold off on this round and grab a 6950 to add to my system and have better performance then two of these suckers and still be cheaper


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## Avelict (Feb 17, 2012)

So I'm in the process of acquiring a new rig for gaming and high poly count 3-d rendering using mainly Maya/Zbrush. Im pretty set on the CF7970's, and Im planning on the i7-2600k with OC set to 1.4vcore. At that speeds do I still need to worry at all about the CPU bottlenecking my system at all?


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