Chinese company Yeston thinks there's still room for factory-overclocked Radeon HD 6870 graphics cards in the market, it unveiled the R6870 Game Master, designed to have high overclocking headroom. The card uses a custom-design PCB with an 8+1+1 phase VRM to power the GPU. The VRM takes advantage of LFPAK MOSFETs and two NEC TOKIN Proadlizers, which condition power and enhance stability with voltage-assisted overclocking. Out of the box, the card ships with reference clock-speeds of 900 MHz core and 1050 MHz (4.20 GHz effective) memory, leaving it entirely to you to take the clock speeds where you want them to go, instead of being spoon-fed with factory-OC profiles.

Moving on to the cooling, Yeston gave the R6870 Game Master a zesty cooling assembly that spans three expansion slots. It uses a lateral-flow design with a blower pushing air through numerous aluminum channels where heat is dissipated to it. It appears like heat is conveyed to these channels using heat-pipes, and not a hot plate. As a nice cosmetic touch, Yeston gave the card a thick back-plate that is ridged. It helps reduce PCB bending and could assist heat dissipation just a little. Display outputs include two each of DVI and mini-DisplayPort, and one HDMI. Power is drawn from two 6-pin PCIe power connectors. Out now in the Chinese market, the Yeston R6870 Game Master is priced at 1,199 RMB (US $190).

Earlier this month, we learned that Korean PC cooling solutions expert Zalman was entering the graphics card market. At the time we could only see AMD Radeon graphics cards, those too, re-branded HIS Radeon graphics cards. We're now seeing the first true Zalman graphics cards, that implement Zalman's generations of expertise with VGA cooling. Pictured below are Zalman's HD 6700, HD 6800; and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 Ti graphics card designs that implement Zalman-made VGA coolers. This also confirms that Zalman will be a neutral board partner, selling both AMD Radeon and NVIDIA GeForce. Zalman will show off its graphics cards at the upcoming CES event.

Korean company Zalman, known more for its innovative PC air cooling solutions, PSUs, and cases, entered the graphics card business. The company is now an AMD Radeon add-in board (AIB) partner, and started its lineup off with some upper-mainstream models. It makes perfect sense for Zalman to enter this business, as it holds some expertise with high-end graphics card cooling solutions. Zalman can source PCBs from any of the major foundries such as PC Partner, Hightech Information Systems, or TUL, and assemble its coolers on top of them. Zalman's first three graphics cards are based on Radeon HD 6870, HD 6850, and HD 6770, with AMD reference clock speeds. What markets Zalman will target its new graphics card lineup with, is not known.

On the 29th of this month, NVIDIA will launch its newest graphics card SKU, the GeForce GTX 560 Ti 448 Cores. We got our first sniff of it last month. Today we present to you all the specifications that matter: clock speeds, voltages, device IDs, etc., but first a brief history. NVIDIA launched the original GeForce GTX 560 Ti back in January, based on its spanking new GF114 silicon. It packed 384 CUDA cores, a 256-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, 1 GB of memory, high clock speeds, and fairly decent overclocking potential. AMD's Radeon HD 6870 was "pwned" (NVIDIA's words). But then, AMD managed to work closely with its partners to create a 1 GB version of its Radeon HD 6950 graphics card. Coupled with diligent component cost balancing, AMD was able to neuter GTX 560 Ti to a good extant. With the upcoming winter shopping season, NVIDIA does not want to take any chances with its competitiveness in the $250-ish "sweetspot" segment, and hence it had to redesign the GTX 560 Ti.

The new GeForce GTX 560 Ti will come with "448 Cores" brand extension, and as it suggests, the GPU now has 448 CUDA cores as opposed to 384 cores on the original. The new SKU will use the same silicon on which the GTX 570, GTX 580, and dual-GPU GTX 590 are based: GF110. The chip will carry the marking "GF110-270-A1". Apart from the 448 CUDA cores, the new SKU will have a memory bus width of 320-bit, and standard memory amount of 1280 MB, just like the GTX 570. The GTX 560 Ti Core 448 has clock speeds of 732 MHz core, 1464 MHz CUDA cores or shaders, and 950 MHz actual (1900 MHz DDR, or 3.80 GHz GDDR5 effective) memory clock speed. So the only thing that sets the new GTX 560 Ti 448 Cores from GTX 570 is the CUDA core count (448 vs. 480 on the GTX 570).

HIS today released its latest performance segment graphics card, the HD 6870 IceQ 1GB. This card makes use of the large IceQ cooler found on Radeon HD 6970-based IceQ graphics cards. Its cooler makes use of a large heatsink to which heat is fed by four exposed-copper heat pipes, and ventilation is care of what HIS calls "Black Hole Impeller", a blower that draws in air from both sides of the card (obverse, reverse), channels it though the heatsink, and out of the case. This cooler, HIS claims, can keep temperatures down by as much as 24°C, and noise levels down by as much as 10 dB, compared to the AMD reference cooler.

Under the hood is an AMD Radeon HD 6870 GPU, which follows reference clock speeds of 900 MHz core, and 1050 MHz (4200 MHz effective) memory. It is backed by 1 GB of GDDR5 memory over a 256-bit wide memory interface. Perhaps the idea here is to let users take advantage of the cooler and overclock the card themselves. The HD 6870 packs 1120 VLIW5 stream processors, and is DirectX 11 compliant. The card draws power from two 6-pin PCIe power connectors. Display outputs include two DVI, one HDMI 1.4, and two mini-DisplayPort 1.2 connectors. There is a single CrossFire connector, that allows you to pair with any other HD 6800 series graphics card. Expect the HIS HD 6870 IceQ to charge a small premium over the reference base model graphics card.

SAPPHIRE Technology has just announced a new model in its successful HD 6800 series of graphics cards - the HD 6870 1GB Dirt3 Edition with Dual fan cooler and a voucher code for the full game in the package.

The SAPPHIRE HD 6870 Dirt3 Edition has the same internal architecture as the standard model, with 1120 stream processors and 56 texture processing units, but clock speeds are increased to 920MHz for the core and 1050Mhz (4.2Gb/sec effective) for the 1GB of GDDR5 memory giving users a boost in performance. The new SAPPHIRE exclusive cooler design has Dual fans to keep this model cool and quiet even when under load conditions, keeping even extreme gamers happy! This new design has two 90mm fans with thin impellers that can move the same amount of air at 10% lower rotation speeds than conventional fans, keeping noise low, and their special dust repelling bearings contribute to high reliability.

It's that time again, when bagging some rad graphics hardware is as easy as showing off your PC tuning skills and filling up a form in GPU-Z 0.5.5. PowerColor is back on board with us, and this time what we're giving away will come with the bragging rights of being perhaps the only people in the world to have it! Presenting, PowerColor and TechPowerUp Pimp my Rig Contest 2011!

You stand to win a rare, one of its kind PowerColor dual Radeon HD 6970 X2 prototype, which is designed by its makers to be one of the fastest, most tweakable graphics cards. There's just one prototype on the planet that's fully finished for the consumer, and you stand to win it! All you have to do is get the lowest possible 3DMark 03 score in default settings (of 3DMark), submit the validation link of your feat along with other details in the "PowerColor Giveaway" tab of GPU-Z 0.5.5. That's right, you don't need the fastest hardware to win this contest, just your skills.That's not all! You can still leave things to Lady Luck. From the pool of valid entries, we will randomly pick one person, who will bag an awesome new PowerColor Radeon HD 6870 X2 dual-GPU graphics card! So there's simply no reason not to try!

For more information, download GPU-Z 0.5.5, and click on the "PowerColor Giveaway" tab. Good luck!

Club 3D B.V. introduces the world first HD 6870 Dual GPU video card. The new Club 3D Radeon HD 6870 X2 2GB GDDR5 is the product that a gamer should look for nowadays. Offering on average 19% better performance in comparison to the best single GPU video card and now even more affordable, there is no other product in the market with a better price-performance ratio.

The Club 3D Radeon HD 6870 X2 features the award winning CoolStream thermal solution and is bundled with the latest DirectX 11 Dirt 3. This card will be in the shops worldwide in the first week of July. Recommended enduser price excluding VAT is USD 469.

TUL Corporation, a leading manufacturer of AMD graphics cards, today announces the very first dual GPU solution with BART XT graphics engine: the PowerColor HD6870X2. Powered by dual graphics engine, the PowerColor HD6870X2 delivers ground-breaking performance against the competitors and takes the game to the next level, enabling an unprecedented gaming experience you've never felt before.

The PowerColor HD6870X2 has 2240 stream processing units and 4.03 teraFLOP's of computing power, easily accelerating the gaming speed and maximizing the gaming power with 900MHz core speed and 1050MHz memory speed, fully tackling the most demanding game titles and allows the amazing gaming experience.

The PowerColor HD 6970 X2 isn't the only new dual-GPU graphics card on display at PowerColor, there's also the HD 6870 X2. We're not entirely sure why one would come up with such an SKU in an already crowded performance market segment, but perhaps PowerColor is trying to squeeze in between performance levels of HD 6970 and HD 6990. While not a bad idea, it comes with the usual challenges and limitations of a dual-GPU graphics card: application support for CrossFire, and usually high power draw.

Like on the HD 6970 X2, PowerColor used Lucid Hydra technology, with a Hydra Engine chip that provides each of the two AMD Barts GPU with a PCI-E 2.0 x16 link. Users can choose between AMD CrossFire or Lucid Hydra multi-GPU technologies. With Hydra enabled, you will be able to get this card to work in tandem with any other card in the system. Each Barts GPU has 1120 stream processors, 32 ROPs, and 1 GB of GDDR5 memory across 256-bit wide memory interfaces.

With no new GPUs in the works by either of the two main manufacturers, AMD and NVIDIA, this year's Computex event isn't going to be a very big exhibition of graphics cards. Instead, Intel's LGA2011 and AMD's AM3+ platforms are going to steal the show. It does leave graphics card manufacturers some attention, if they come up with something really out of the ordinary. PowerColor wants to be one of them. Flexing its in-house engineering muscle, the company is readying a dual-GPU graphics card that makes use of two 40 nm "Barts" GPUs for a CrossFire on-a-stick solution.

The two Barts chips will feature the BartsXT (Radeon HD 6870) configuration, with the card being designed to offer performance on par with HD 6870 CrossFire, with 3-GPU and 4-GPU CrossFireX support, and lower power draw than two single-GPU HD 6870 cards. The PCB design is the same as every dual-GPU AMD card ever made, there are two GPUs sitting on either sides of a PLX-made PCI-Express bridge chip, and each GPU system having its own VRM. There's 1 GB of GDDR5 memory over a 256-bit wide memory interface per GPU. Power is drawn from two 8-pin PCI-Express power connectors. The cooling solution is not pictured, but expect a multi-fan heatsink that spits hot air into the case.

ColorFire, the associate brand of Colorful that specializes in AMD Radeon-based graphics cards, today released a new Radeon HD 6870 card geared for extreme overclocking. Its design revolves around high-grade VRM, powerful cooling, and dual BIOS, each packing overclocked settings. The ColorFire Xstorm HD 6870 is a completely non-reference design card, the GPU is powered by a 5+1 phase VRM that uses POSCAP capacitors. The card uses two BIOS ROM chips that can be selected using a push-switch on the rear panel. The "normal" BIOS packs clock speeds of 940 MHz core and 1100 MHz (4.40 GHz effective) memory, while the "turbo" BIOS runs the card at 1050 MHz core, 1150 MHz (4.60 GHz effective) memory.

The card is cooled by a large custom-design cooler the company earlier used on an HD 6850 card with similar design. It uses a large heat pipe-fed heatsink that is cooled by a 110 mm fan. Other overclocker-friendly features include consolidated voltage measure points with cables; and hardware-based voltage adjustment using DIP switches on the card. It draws power from two 6-pint power connectors. Display outputs include two DVI, and one each of full-size HDMI 1.4a, and DisplayPort 1.2. Colorfire will first sell the card in Asia, and then in Europe.

TUL Corporation, a leading manufacturer of AMD graphics cards, today announces an advanced version of PCS+ HD6870: the PowerColor PCS++ HD6870. As an upgrade edition of award-winning PCS series, the latest product features with ultimate factory overclocked setting, clocks in at 975MHz core speed, while memory clocks in at 1150MHz, providing 8% better gaming performance with 5% less power consumed.

The PowerColor PCS++ HD6870 also takes advantage of "Platinum Power Kit" onboard design, includes the qualified components such as Volterra, Poscap and Proadilizer, enhances the power efficiency and provides the superior overclocking performance in a stable gaming environment.

PowerColor is reportedly working on a new Radeon HD 6870 graphics card that uses Eyefinity6 display output configuration. Eyefinity6 allows users to connect up to six full-HD monitors over each of the GPU's six TMDS links, which can then be virtually merged to create a large display head spanning the six physical displays. You can also create multiple Eyefinity display heads among the six physical displays, or use HydraVision to create multiple virtual display heads to occupy each physical display. The graphics card uses six mini DisplayPort 1.2 connectors to connect to its display, a variety of connector dongles should be bundled as well.

Eyefinity aside, PowerColor's card sports 2 GB of GDDR5 memory over a 256-bit wide memory interface. Clock speeds are not known. The card uses the same GPU cooler found on the HD 6870 PCS models, and a red-colored PCB. The DirectX 11 compliant GPU features 1120 stream processors, and can pair with any other Radeon HD 6800 series graphics card in CrossFire configuration. PowerColor is likely to unveil this card at the upcoming CeBIT event.

After having swept through the global market with the dominating N460GTX Hawk, world-renowned graphics card and mainboard manufacturer MSI announces the next-generation Hawk series, the R6870 Hawk graphics card. Equipped with the advanced Twin Frozr III thermal design, the all new R6870 Hawk is the world's first graphics card to use propeller blade technology. When compared to traditional fans, the air flow is increased by 20%, allowing the GPU temperature to be up to 21 degrees lower. Furthermore, it uses the 8+2 phase PWM design to provide the GPU with 2 times the power supply, along with triple overvoltage functions that allow further evolution of R6870 Hawk's overclocking capability. The R6870 Hawk has the most perfect performance blend of cooling, power components, stability, and high performance found on a graphics card today.

Announcing the winners of the second and final month of PowerColor and TechPowerUp GPU-Z giveaway (January 2011). We picked up three lucky winners from a pool of 20,000 entries, from all over the world. Spanning across December 2010 and January 2011, the contest gives six lucky winners some rad graphics hardware from PowerColor. Here are the winners:

• Danny from Israel, wins PowerColor Radeon HD 6970
• Steve from United Kingdom wins PowerColor Radeon HD 6870 PCS+
• Grant from United States wins PowerColor Radeon HD 6850 PCS+

Huge congrats, guys! PowerColor will contact the winners directly and arrange for shipping of the prizes. This concludes the giveaway. We would like to thank PowerColor for making the giveaway possible. TechPowerUp will return with more interesting contests such as this.

Gigabyte introduced its fastest graphics card based on the AMD Radeon HD 6870 GPU, bearing the SuperOverclock (SOC) badge. SOC graphics cards make use of top quality components and a copper-rich PCB as prescribed by the company's own Ultra Durable VGA+ specifications, and use high-end cooling. The GV-R687SO-1GD, as it's formally known, carries clock speeds of 950/1150 (core/memory), against reference speeds of 900/1050 MHz. The card uses a 10-inch long PCB that uses a stronger VRM to leave room for some overclocking. The GPU itself is hand-picked by performance binning.

The card is cooled by Gigabyte's WindForce 3X GPU cooler, which makes use of a large aluminum fin array to which heat is conveyed by copper heat pipes, ventilated by three 80 mm fans. As with every other HD 6870, there are 1120 stream processors 1 GB of 256-bit GDDR5 memory, and display connectivity that includes two each of DVI and mini-DP, and one HDMI. Gigabyte's HD 6870 SOC is expected to be priced closer to the $250 mark.

After the launch of NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 560 Ti, AMD made it easier for partners to release overclocked and custom-design Radeon HD 6870 graphics cards. Partners seem to be responding to this. HIS released two new custom-design Radeon HD 6870 graphics card models, based on the Barts IceQ X board design the company implemented on its HD 6850 IceQ X series. Like with the HD 6850, there's the base model that sticks to AMD reference clock speeds of 900/1050 MHz (core/memory), and a Turbo-X model that uses overclocked speeds of 975/1150 MHz. The "X" in Turbo-X denotes that it's faster than the Turbo model based on AMD's reference design board, by HIS. The cooler makes use of a slightly large aluminum fin array to which heat is conveyed by 8 mm thick nickel-plated copper heat pipes, which is centrally ventilated by a 92 mm fan. The cooler is covered by a frosty-looking shroud. Like with every other HD 6870, the card features 1120 stream processors, and connects to 1 GB of GDDR5 memory over a 256-bit wide memory interface. HIS did not give out pricing details.

SAPPHIRE Technology has just added two new models to its FleX family of graphics cards that can support three screens in Eyefinity mode, out of the box, without the need for DisplayPort monitors or active adapters. The SAPPHIRE HD 6870 FleX is the highest performing card with this feature, allowing gamers to use low-cost DVI monitors for all three screens. The new SAPPHIRE HD 5670 FleX delivers a cost-effective Eyefinity solution for increased productivity in tasks such as editing or business applications.

Both the SAPPHIRE HD 6870 FleX and the HD 5670 Flex can support three DVI monitors in Eyefinity mode and deliver a true SLS (Single Large Surface) work area without the need for costly active adapters. With the SAPPHIRE FleX solution, the first two monitors are connected to the DVI outputs, as usual. A third DVI monitor can be connected to the HDMI output with the passive cable adapter supplied. Thus three DVI monitors can be used in Eyefinity mode without any additional investment.

AMD finalized its recalibrated product pricing of Radeon HD 6800 and Radeon HD 6900 series products in the wake of NVIDIA's launch of the GeForce GTX 560 Ti later today. NVIDIA's new GPU is expected to revive the green giant's competitiveness at a key sub-$300 price-point, which could destabilize AMD's SKUs in the price-proximity. Without many options left, AMD is setting the following new prices (EUR and USD):

• Radeon HD 6870 1 GB: 189.99€, $219
• Radeon HD 6950 1 GB: 225.00€, $259
• Radeon HD 6950 2 GB: 239.99€, $269~289

The prices should be in effect very soon. Prices apart, AMD will also release a new driver that will bring about considerable performance improvements to all Radeon HD 6000 series GPUs.

SAPPHIRE Technology has just announced a new high performance model in its latest series of graphics cards - the HD 6870 TOXIC Edition with Vapor-X cooler. The SAPPHIRE HD 6870 TOXIC Edition has the same internal architecture as the standard model, with 1120 stream processors and 56 texture processing units, but clock speeds are increased to 970MHz for the core and 1150Mhz (4.6 Gb/sec effective) for the memory giving users a considerable boost in performance. The same SAPPHIRE exclusive cooler will also be offered on a model with the standard clocks of 900MHz core / 1050MHz memoy (4.2Gb/sec effective) - the SAPPHIRE HD 6870 Vapor-X Edition.

The SAPPHIRE exclusive Vapor-X cooler ensures that the card runs quietly and efficiently. Together with other special hardware features including on-board 10-phase power control and SAPPHIRE's highly efficient, cool running patented second generation Black Diamond chokes this ensures there is a good margin for performance tuning (overclocking) by enthusiast users. SAPPHIRE's overclocking tool for these models - TriXX - is available for users to download from the SAPPHIRE Select Club - free for SAPPHIRE enthusiasts to join online.

In the wake of impending competition from NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560Ti, AMD is busy fine-tuning its performance-segment offer. It is lowering prices of Radeon HD 6950 with the introduction of a new 1 GB variant, and reportedly working on Radeon HD 6870 "Turbo" models. Combined with the two, AMD is also planning a new driver which is out and out focussed on performance enhancements for Radeon HD 6000 series GPUs.

Catalyst 11.1a Hotfix introduces performance improvements specific to Radeon HD 6800 and HD 6900 series, in turn specific to games. One can expect performance improvements of up to 35% with Anti-Aliasing in some games. Catalyst 11.1a is also going to give users full control over the way the driver handles tessellation, allowing users to override applications' tessellation settings (much like AA and AF). In the future, there's also scope for an AMD-optimised tessellation setting that adjusts tessellation detail to give the best details with minimal performance impact.

DOWNLOAD: AMD Catalyst 11.1a Hotfix Update

A list of changes follows.

Here are the winners of PowerColor and TechPowerUp giveaway for the month of December, 2010, month 1 of 2 of the Giveaway. For the months of December and January, three lucky participating users each month of GPU-Z got to win some groovy hardware from PowerColor. This month's winners are as follows:

• John from United States wins PowerColor Radeon HD 6970
• Farhan from Malaysia wins PowerColor Radeon HD 6870 PCS+
• Mahen from Sri Lanka wins PowerColor Radeon HD 6850 PCS+

A big congratulations to the winners. PowerColor will contact them directly and arrange for the shipping of the prizes. If you have already made a submission in this round (PowerColor TechPowerUp Giveaway December 2010 - January 2011), you don't need to make a submission again. Being an ongoing contest, winners are picked from an ever-growing pool of submissions.

Gigabyte also rolled out a new performance-segment Radeon HD 6870 graphics card that is optimized for overclocking, and is overclocked out of the box as well. The GV-R687OC-1GD from Gigabyte features the company's in-house PCB and cooler designs. The PCB looks to be around 10-inches long, and makes use of Ultra Durable VGA+ construction. The WindForce3X GPU cooler makes use of a large aluminum fin array and three 80 mm fans to keep the card cool.

The GPU is clocked at 915 MHz against reference speeds of 900 MHz, and memory at 1050 MHz (4200 MHz GDDR5 effective). The card features 1 GB of GDDR5 memory across a 256-bit wide memory interface. Display connectivity includes two each of DVI and DisplayPort; and one HDMI. Gigabyte did not announce its price.

ASUS rolled out its second AMD Radeon HD 6870 graphics card, and its first non-reference design one: the HD 6870 DirectCu. The card features two features that make it supposedly better than the reference design, the Direct Cu GPU cooler, and a refined PCB design that make use of high-grade components. To begin with, the DirectCu GPU cooler combines a GPU base in which copper heatpipes make direct contact with the GPU die, conveing heat to a dense aluminum fin array which is cooled by a quiet fan.

The PCB makes use of "Super Alloy" voltage regulation components, such as Super Alloy chokes, Super Alloy capacitors, and Super Alloy MOSFETs, that not only increase durability, but also result in a cooler operation. The card is also factory-overclocked slightly, with the GPU running at 915 MHz but memory staying at 4200 MHz GDDR5 effective. Display connectivity includes two DVI, and one each of DisplayPort and HDMI. Other features include Super Hybrid Engine (which manages clock speeds based on load), and Voltage Tweak (which allows adjustment of voltages). ASUS' new card is yet to be priced.