A few months ago AMD created quite the confusion when they released the HD6870 and HD6850, two GPU’s which, contrary to their names, did not replace the HD5870 and HD5850. The reason for the name change was that AMD wanted to rearrange their naming scheme and use HD69x0 for the enthusiast/high-end GPU’s like HD6990, HD6970 and HD6950, while leaving HD68x0 for the performance cards.

Today AMD finally has released two of the HD69x0 cards: the HD6970 and the HD6950, both replacement for the HD5870 and HD5850 respectively. The following image illustrates how AMD sees these two GPU’s:

As we can see, the HD6970 goes up against the GTX570 while the HD6950 is positioned somewhere between the GTX460 and the GTX570. This is also reflected by the price. The recommended price for the HD6970 is $369-399 depending on configuration (€280-300) and $299-329 depending on the configuration for the HD6950 (€230-$260). This places the HD6970 just above the GTX 570 while the HD6950 sits just below the GTX570. It does however seem as though the first card on the street will cost a premium. For example, the Sapphire HD6950 right now seems to cost around $300 while the HD6970 costs around $370.

But enough of prices. Let’s look what makes these GPU’s tick.

• READ MORE (Source): AMD HD6950 and HD6970 – Bjorn3D.com