According to AMD's official website the HD8970 GHZ edition has the same specs as an 7970GHz

the 8970:

www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/oem-solutions/Pages/desktop.aspx#2

www.amd.com/us/Documents/AMD_Radeon_HD_8970_Feature_Summary.pdf

and the 7970 sheet:

www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/7000/7970ghz/Pages/radeon-7970GHz.aspx#3

so it is generally official, the 8000 series is a consumer buying trick as we have already seen in the past.

It is not out yet, once its out then we will determine what it is

KaynarAccording to AMD's official website the HD8970 GHZ edition has the same specs as an 7970GHz

the 8970:

www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/oem-solutions/Pages/desktop.aspx#2

www.amd.com/us/Documents/AMD_Radeon_HD_8970_Feature_Summary.pdf

and the 7970 sheet:

www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/7000/7970ghz/Pages/radeon-7970GHz.aspx#3

so it is generally official, the 8000 series is a consumer buying trick as we have already seen in the past.

cdawallHow will this hurt sales? When the people who buy the vast majority of these rigs configure them on Dell or Lenovo's or HP's site or see them in the local bestbuy and one has an 8950 in it the highest number card sold do you really think they are going to spend hours researching if that is a rebranded card or blindly purchase it? Do you really think for a second the people purchasing a PREBUILT PC give two flying hoots what rebrands in their PC as long as it is the fastest sold? No one is telling you to run out and spend 3 times as much as the hardware is worth for a prebuilt, but people buy them and right now the 8950 sounds like the fastest card out there.

Why do you think OEM's have terrible graphics cards with 4GB of onboard ram? Do you really think a GT620 can use 4GB of ram? On a spec sheet that looks great just like the 16GB of slow as heck ram they stuffed in next to it. OEM prebuilts are a numbers game and big numbers sell. Move on. You can get your panties in a wad all you want, but you are never going to stop it.

I am out to buy a PC that has an HD 8780 in it. I have read an HD 8780 review on TPU, and was very impressed by it, hence my decision to buy. I see Dell offering a desktop machine that boasts HD 8780. I may or may not notice that Dell's specs for that card differ from what I've seen in the mentioned review. I may or may not realize what AMD has done, and I decide to buy the Dell. I have been mislead, and once I discover it, I will return the desktop, outraged, I will voice my protest everywhere I can.

Hurt sales.

McSteelI am out to buy a PC that has an HD 8780 in it. I have read an HD 8780 review on TPU, and was very impressed by it, hence my decision to buy. I see Dell offering a desktop machine that boasts HD 8780. I may or may not notice that Dell's specs for that card differ from what I've seen in the mentioned review. I may or may not realize what AMD has done, and I decide to buy the Dell. I have been mislead, and once I discover it, I will return the desktop, outraged, I will voice my protest everywhere I can.

Hurt sales.

When are you going to discover it when you couldn't be bothered to read the spec sheet to begin with.

If I understand, they will only be available through OEM so the OEM and one that has a review here would be exactly the same

This is the same kind of outrage as when it appeared that the HD 6770 was "secretly" a 5770 (as was publicly announced and thus no deceipt). Whatever <shrug>

Wow! Rebranding everything for OEM desktops. That is pathetic.

Most people who go out and purchase a per-built desktop will never know this happened and most likely don't care so despite us computer enthusiasts seeing this as a pretty crappy thing to do, they can get away with it.

I think it's less confusing than 7970, 7970 GHZ, 7950, 7950 GHZ, 7950 BOOST, 7870, 7870XT, 7870 BOOST...


IF we are left with just 7970/7950 then 8970/8950 are the boost cards, this works really well, imho, because if anything, the current naming is as confusing as can be. Make all the GHZ/boost/youplaymeiplayyou cards the 8-series, leave the original 7-series as 7-series, and I am one happy camper.

cadavecaI think it's less confusing than 7970, 7970 GHZ, 7950, 7950 GHZ, 7950 BOOST, 7870, 7870XT, 7870 BOOST...IF we are left with just 7970/7950 then 8970/8950 are the boost cards, this works really well

Nice idea...
But of course that won't be the case. We already have (as example) 7950 Boost, 7950 vanilla, 7950 reduced-BoM/limited OC potential, plus a resell market of BIOS flashed to Boost. To that you can add the OEM 8950 which will -like every other OEM card- find its way into the retail channel as white box parts, warranty replacement/owner swap-outs. Ain't no way you're shutting that particular Pandora's Box.

I'd have preferred moving back to ATi's naming scheme - XT, Pro, XL, GT with leaving the top SKU XT vacant unless AMD know that the launch card/process won't be significantly improved upon, and if something happens (miracle of silicon revision efficiency) you'd have the XTX suffix as a fall back on.
Still, the way that IHV/OEM marketing like to bleed the user base, it's not overly surprising that they'd pass up any opportunity to slip the shiv in.

HumanSmokeNice idea...
But of course that won't be the case. We already have (as example) 7950 Boost, 7950 vanilla, 7950 reduced-BoM/limited OC potential, plus a resell market of BIOS flashed to Boost. To that you can add the OEM 8950 which will -like every other OEM card- find its way into the retail channel as white box parts, warranty replacement/owner swap-outs. Ain't no way you're shutting that particular Pandora's Box.

I'd have preferred moving back to ATi's naming scheme - XT, Pro, XL, GT with leaving the top SKU XT vacant unless AMD know that the launch card/process won't be significantly improved upon, and if something happens (miracle of silicon revision efficiency) you'd have the XTX suffix as a fall back on.
Still, the way that IHV/OEM marketing like to bleed the user base, it's not overly surprising that they'd pass up any opportunity to slip the shiv in.

those codes are used in the GPU code names nowadays. But I understand what youre getting at.

I honestly feel Pro should be the highest model atleast before they came up with XT etc.