AMD Radeon HD 7990 6 GB

[W1zzard]

Pay 1000$ get plagued with issues

same 1k gets you two options from nvidia, that are both nearly perfect, with the option to trade some performance for single-gpu (690->titan)

 

[BigMack70]

AMD's time would have been better spent improving drivers and fixing stutter than releasing this card...

The plastic cooler and coil whine have absolutely no business being on a $1000 card. Fail.

 

[Crap Daddy]

When the rumors hit about an official 7990 I was asking myself what are the reasons behind such a decision from AMD. Reading this review I understood: no reason at all.

One year after the GTX690 was launched, the HD7990 delivers about the same raw performance while using more power (we already knew that). Crossfire is broken in some titles (we already knew that). Frame interval benchmarking - which cannot be avoided lately - shows the same problems AMD is facing (we already knew that).

What we didn't know is that AMD is asking 1000 American dollars for this card (7 games and coil whine included).

 

[Frick]

When the rumors hit about an official 7990 I was asking myself what are the reasons behind such a decision from AMD. Reading this review I understood: no reason at all.

One year after the GTX690 was launched, the HD7990 delivers about the same raw performance while using more power (we already knew that). Crossfire is broken in some titles (we already knew that). Frame interval benchmarking - which cannot be avoided lately - shows the same problems AMD is facing (we already knew that).

What we didn't know is that AMD is asking 1000 American dollars for this card (7 games and coil whine included).

Yeah the timing is a bit weird. It feels like a lot is hanging in the air right now, regarding Crossfire.

 

[Casecutter]

I'm not sure what to make of this. Yes, AMD should've held back releasing this to reviewers if not the best drivers. It's been this long what's it matter, they couldn't have waited a week for said "Beta drivers", it not like they were trying to say push under "Q1 wire" or something. As to price AMD should have gone with $900. Sure it doesn’t have the "sexy elegance" of a GTX690 or Titan, nor does it need that! I'll use the savings on women… utilitarian is just fine in my case. I wonder why W1zzard left out the GTX690 in length comparisons on page 2; between the two "dueling" cards the AMD is only 1 inch longer at 12inches. That room goes to good use for that extra 2Gb of memory and the wider bus. While lastly having "optional" coil whine is not acceptable, you don't think they test the sample W1z got before it was delivered... strange.

I'd like to have more testes at 5670x, this is really why someone buying at this level is looking to use it, and honestly in that matrix it's not that bad for this 7990. There’s the clear advantage (Batman really the one exception) over the GTX690, but that’s not discussed?

Don’t get me wrong it’s not any huge win especially basing only from the W1zzards' write-up it is disconcerting. If I was looking for starting a 5670x1080 set-up this would be a standout, especially for $900 in a couple of weeks if you get all the bundle titles and no " whine".

What's super interesting is AMD has found TSMC making such great gains in deliveries they finally provide "Top-Shelf Malta" chips from the same fab process they started with now over a year and half ago, and the difference in significant! This tells me Tahiti was never their problem… Now considering AMD has enhanced the GNC structure/architecture (Bonaire), while spinning this further improved manufacturing it seems seem there’s good hope in "Sea Island".

 

[LAN_deRf_HA]

This.
Also the Blizzard games are still some of the most sold and played titles.
World of Warcarft reported 9 million subscribers worldwide last time they release the figures.
Even the most hated Diablo III still have around 1~2 million players worldwide regularly logs on. Not everyday but something like a few days a week.
There is really no excuse for AMD's poor Crossfire drivers on these games when nVidia have no problems.

I agree and hope WOW is included for a long time. Those benchmarks are very relevant to my friend who plays. Helped him decide to switch to a 670 (his 7950 didn't even offer an improvement over his 6950) and then the 690 results motivated him to go SLI. Since going SLI his DPS is up because as hard as it is to believe this old game still dips in high level combat areas which will negatively effect gameplay. He says he's at 60 pretty much all the time now no matter how busy the area.

 

[Ravenas]

The only disappointing part to me is the price. I bet w1zz would have given a 9.0 if the card was at the $799 sweet spot. The card itself has higher specs than counter parts so obviously requires more power to run. On big deal folks, your card scores 300 less marks in a benchmark than an equally priced card. These comments about this card in this thread get so nit picky IMO. If your care that much about crossfire by a 7990 ghz.

 

[W1zzard]

I wonder why W1zzard left out the GTX690 in length comparisons on page 2

i thought gtx 690 is same length as titan. i had both cards in my hands for the photo session but apparently missed that gtx 690 is a little bit longer.

690 is same length as 7970 ?

I'd like to have more testes at 5670x

the games which have no 5760x1080 graphs don't support that resolution

What's super interesting is AMD has found TSMC making such great gains in deliveries they finally provide "Top-Shelf Malta" chips from the same fab process they started with now over a year and half ago, and the difference in significant!

how do you know that amd hasn't been stockpiling these top 0.5% of chips since they began making tahiti ?

 

[EarthDog]

Depends on which model 7970 you are talking about. For example the HIS 7970 Turbo X is nearly 12" while the MSI TFIII is 10.6"

Titan = 10.5"
690 = 11"

 

[W1zzard]

Depends on which model 7970 you are talking about.

reference design of course. thanks for posting the measurements

 

[radrok]

Looking at Titan and 7990 Malta PCB I think that Titan could have been much shorter considering its PCB isn't crammed at all.

 

[W1zzard]

Looking at Titan and 7990 Malta PCB I think that Titan could have been much shorter considering its PCB isn't crammed at all.

larger pcb makes your life much easier as signal routing designer. it also reduces cost because of less layers/vias needed. and improves signal quality, which might mean better oc or higher out of the box clocks. larger pcb also lets you use a larger cooler. cost for a bit more pcb material is negligible

 

[Hayder_Master]

awesome review wiz, wait for quad crossfire xd:

 

[W1zzard]

awesome review wiz, wait for quad crossfire xd:

no quad cf planned, sorry. you can look at the titan sli review to get an idea what a mess that would be

 

[Casecutter]

Games which have no 5760x1080 graphs don't support that resolution

Sorry didn't mean your review, but others that test other title that give that modern ability.

how do you know that amd hasn't been stockpiling these top 0.5% of chips since they began making tahiti?

True we don't, but to find traction it would've been some point after New Zealand being canceled (originally March of 2012 release), while sometime about the first 7970GHz released in June. So AMD might have realized this sometime a little less than a year ago.

Now if each Tahiti wafer has 5,000-6,000 chips and .05% are "that good" that's like conservatively 3 Malta chips per. If the yield is say 40% (IDK) that's 2,500 XT/LE parts, now if they sold 50k of Tahiti cards since the point a year ago that dictates some 20 wafers. Figuring the .05% AMD would’ve amassed a war-chest of 60 Malta chips, or 30 cards. No wonder they took your sample, coil whine and all.

It would need to be at least 2% to make some 1,200 – 7990 off 20 wafers. Consider a speculative 50% profit (most business works/wants more) that’s return of 600,000 dollars. IDK, would ADM just leave that on the table? I think we see why either side has to release such options when they have the chips!

 

[EarthDog]

I had no idea wafers yield 5-6K cores? I thought they rock 8 or 10" wafers, and the GPU die is like 3/4" x 3/4" so......... ? Just based on that alone, those hyptothetic values are really off. I also have to imagine that yields of this caliber are a lot higher (1-2%). But like you I am simply guessing too.

 

[Casecutter]

I had no idea wafers yield 5-6K cores? I thought they rock 8 or 10" wafers, and the GPU die is like 3/4" x 3/4" so......... ? Just based on that alone, those hyptothetic values are really off. I also have to imagine that yields of this caliber are a lot higher (1-2%). But like you I am simply guessing too.

Honestly, I don't know the numbers, but I'd be surprise to know if I'm way out of the ballpark, such information isn't always readily unearthed. tI be good to know all of that but if that was known it be enlightening and a little hard to swallow as the raw part cost would shock you. There all other operating and engineering costs to account for with that.

Thought I read the density is something approching that, but yes it depend on nm2 of each chip. Supposedly Tahiti is a 365nm2 part, while I thought I read 28Nm wafer got bigger and are like 12" dia.

 

[PatoRodrigues]

AMD moving in the right direction. Late launch, but i'm glad they improved a few things.

Power consumption looks better, improved frame latencies with that prototype used by PCPer for example... Really a shame W1z didn't have more time with the card (maybe got it wrong, but he received the drivers after returning the card? Or is just that the main driver for it was on Win8?)

And people still insist in argue about the frame latency subject... And bash AMD. No wonder a member was banned.... C'mon, not that hard to see the positive side of it. Pretty obvious that AMD is working hard on it and knows how to fix it. Hang on 'till July (even Dave that only owns AMD hardware and is talking about for years will wait). Of course, you could move to nVidia, but they have their problems too. No fanboyism, but offer a top-of-the-line, generation leading, exclusive card for $1000 and then announce a fully-enabled version of the same card ISN'T FAIR. :shadedshu

Thanks for the review, W1z! What a beautiful card..

 

[SIGSEGV]

I agree and hope WOW is included for a long time. Those benchmarks are very relevant to my friend who plays. Helped him decide to switch to a 670 (his 7950 didn't even offer an improvement over his 6950) and then the 690 results motivated him to go SLI. Since going SLI his DPS is up because as hard as it is to believe this old game still dips in high level combat areas which will negatively effect gameplay. He says he's at 60 pretty much all the time now no matter how busy the area.

playing WOW using high end card configuration in SLI. you guys are amazing

---
i don't think 999$ was a good price point for HD 7990 despite they also bundled it with 8 AAA games.
i hope there will be a re-review of HD7990 'Malta' from wizzard using its newest driver (13.5 WHQL)

 

[LAN_deRf_HA]

It really is bizarrely demanding. I thought it was a netcode problem causing lots of over head some how since it benefits a lot from a nice overclocked 6 core (yes it's even sensitive beyond 4 cores for some reason) but more gpu power helps as well. I just don't get it because the visuals do not coincide with the hardware needed to max it out.

 

[HumanSmoke]

Now if each Tahiti wafer has 5,000-6,000 chips and .05% are "that good" that's like conservatively 3 Malta chips per. If the yield is say 40% (IDK) that's 2,500 XT/LE parts, now if they sold 50k of Tahiti cards since the point a year ago that dictates some 20 wafers. Figuring the .05% AMD would’ve amassed a war-chest of 60 Malta chips, or 30 cards. No wonder they took your sample, coil whine and all.

Not even close.
Tahiti is ~352mm^2 before packaging (~365mm after). TSMC use 300mm wafers. You're looking at ~160 die candidates per wafer.
After that, you're pretty much stuck. You can estimate the yield, but without knowing the wafer start split between GPUs (and whether the overall figure includes risk production of future products), and the number of wafer starts AMD has at TSMC it all boils down to guesses based on guesses.

 

[ogharaei]

What we didn't know is that AMD is asking 1000 American dollars for this card (7 games and coil whine included).

I really hope AMD fixes the whine, but I can already see someone lugging it home with a smile, installing it, double-clicking on his favorite game, and, bam, being greeted by coil noise as he snacks on cashews and almonds he bought in bulk to scrape together enough money.

It really is bizarrely demanding.

Spell effects will do that if you have the Particle Density setting on "Ultra" in 25-man raids. Played WoW until the end of Cata and 10-man raids were not a problem. It got ugly in 25s, though.

 

[Prima.Vera]

Yeah, the games that don't work on Crossfire with this card, are also the same than don't work with the 5870x2 Crossfire. The ones that hope that the Crossfire will be improved...keep dreaming.

 

[LAN_deRf_HA]

Spell effects will do that if you have the Particle Density setting on "Ultra" in 25-man raids. Played WoW until the end of Cata and 10-man raids were not a problem. It got ugly in 25s, though.

I think that's the specific situation he was talking about. Says with sli now he doesn't get dips there.

 

[the54thvoid]

...No fanboyism, but offer a top-of-the-line, generation leading, exclusive card for $1000 and then announce a fully-enabled version of the same card ISN'T FAIR. :shadedshu

Ah the power of the web to completely be taken as gospel...

That rumour is based on a speculative article from 3Dcenter (i think). Nvidia have not released any statement about a new card. The BSN article states there is no Ultra, just that the Titan LE, a working title, will in fact become the 780. Again, that story is rumour too. You canopt believe everything you read on the web. Sometimes you've just got to wait for the truth to appear.

EDIT:

Link to TomsHardware site where he has video/sound of the fans and how quiet they are, plus the associated coil whine.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-7990-review-benchmark,3486-15.html