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Temperature:
To measure core GPU temperatures, we run three in-game benchmarks and record the idle and load temperature according to the min and max temperature readings recorded by MSI Afterburner. The games we test are Crysis 2, Lost Planet 2 and Metro 2033. We run these benchmarks for 15 minutes each. This way we can give the included thermal solution and GPU time to reach equilibrium.
From a thermal standpoint we can see that AMD really took the Tahiti XT GPU cooling seriously. When running the HD 7970 at the default ,settings the temperature never peaked above 78°C. This wasn't the case for all the other high-end graphics cards we tested, as the majority of GPUs sat in the 85°C range by comparison. Even when overclocked, the GPU core stayed slightly cooler than the GTX 580, but with the core sitting at 1125MHz the total temperatures did increase by 8°C.
As mentioned before, the new blower style fan was quieter than the fans used in previous generation cards, but it was still noticably audible when the RPM level was above 30 percent. However, the sound coming from the fan blades is purely the sound of air being pushed through the heatsink, and not the high pitched tone that the fans on the HD 6900 series produced.
Power Consumption:
To measure power usage, a Kill A Watt P4400 power meter was used. Note that the numbers represent the power drain for the entire benchmarking system, not just the video cards themselves. For the 'idle' readings we measured the power drain from the desktop, with no applications running; for the 'load' situation, we took the sustained peak power drain readings after running the system through the same in-game benchmarks we used for the temperature testing. This way we are recording real-world power usage, as opposed to pushing a product to it's thermal threshold.
At the default settings we were actually surprised to see the HD 7970 use more power than the HD 6970, even if it was only by 7 watts. However, while the HD 7970 does use slightly more power under load, the percentage of additional power is well under the performance increase in comparison to the HD 6970. So, overall the HD 7970 provides more performance per watt than the previous generation cards.
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The only thing I have to disagree with you on is that it's overpriced... or rather, it's not 'relatively' overpriced compared to Nvidia's GTX 580. For having an average of 25.8% higher performance in 2560x1600 (With only a single score under 18% difference) I think the $50 (10%) more you pay over the GTX 580 is worth it if you're spending that much to begin with. On a whole though both cards are overpriced.
Add on to that all the new or improved features and it's a pretty solid package imo, even though I was hoping for a bit more from the 28nm node.
ATI is trying to take advantage of its new GPU as the "fastest single-core chip" before Kepler is out. The price will be lowered afterwards plus some performance improvements through new drivers.
Was going to opt for one of the new Sapphire Dual Fan 6970s but since in a months time the 7xxx series will be out, will probably wait until these get on the market.
Only issue is that I can't fit a full 275mm GPU in my case. Ideally needs to be less than 250mm.
TBH after the failings of the FX/Bulldozer CPUs, AMD does need this to hit the market strong, since for the past years nVidia have been infront of AMD on performance. Seems AMD is starting to go for better price/performance instead of trying to compete head on with Intel.
Mind you, if the Piledrivers improve the Bulldozer architechture and fix it's issues (by having 8 true cores instead of modules), and manages to fit an AM3+ socket, then I might be tempted to go for one of them aswell.
The 6970 was only around $300 at launch, so I honestly expected this one to be around $400. AMD is not going to sell many cards with this price point, because to be honest, it's NOT worth it. A 15% increase over a 580 in most cases is awful, not only because it's 28nm, but because it's a whole new Architecture.
Overpriced, underperforming, not worth it. I'll wait for Kepler.
Also, the HD 6970 had an MSRP of closer to $400 at launch, so it was expected this card would retail higher due to the better performance.
Anyway, this should be at $400, if it were $400, it would be reasonable for sure. $350 would be the sweet spot that would really just destroy Nvidia. The thing I love about AMD/ATI's cards were the fact that they offered the best price/performance. $550 is absolutely overpriced, you can't even argue it. The GTX 580 is also overpriced, and while this does beat out the 580 for a similar price ($50 more than the 3GB 580), this is a standard reference next-gen card. It should be around the same price as their standard current gen cards, or around $50 more. It's nothing amazing in the performance department, either. If it had a solid 40%-45% increase over the GTX 580, I could see $550.
That said... I was still expecting a bit more wow factor, I'm guessing the 7990 when that comes around will do the big leap though much like the 6990 did. Maybe we can get a MARS version...
the price is high, but what do you expect? its new tech. they are always overpriced initally. sure, the initial price is high, even by those standards, but im sure if you wait a month or two, it will drop considerably. in any case, i believe that the extra price is partly justified with all the features offered, ecpecially considering that it has some better power management technology added in, as well as the improvements to eyefinity with the audio and the 3d features. i myself wouldnt use such a feature (the 3d), but hey, its there for others if they want it. ive never really understood the hype behind 3d anyway.
i say let people wait until its cheaper, and then im sure it would be a great value card.
I believe anandtech did a test with pci-2.1 and there was no difference in gaming. In GPGPU calculations there was something like a 7-10% performance loss. Don't have the exact numbers in front of me though.
^Fanboy squeal amirite?
Anyway, although the performance is great on this card, I'm particularly interested in the cooling. I hope NvIDIA takes a leaf out of AMD's book and improves the cooling solutions on their future cards, as I'm not terribly interested in going back to AMD in the future (NVIDIA is just a more logical choice, considering its feature set and software support).
I look forward to a review of a 670 or 680 card (or equivalent, though I don't see them changing it).
My jaw drops at the thought of a 690 GPU though, I can only imagine how epic that card will be (performance and price wise XD).
Normally I would've gone for an Intel+nVidia build but to build it to the spec I would've wanted it would've cost me around £1000 atleast and I don't have that kinda money. AMD seems to have move to competing on price, hence why I've gone for an AMD build at a little over £500. However I've noticed alot of games are displaying nVidia logos on.
Granted I might not have explored every type of card on there but I'm going by what I've seen so far.