August 1st, 2012

Gigabyte Officially Releases Radeon HD 7970 Super OverClock Edition

Gigabyte finally added HD 7970 SOC to their website. This model is part of Gigabyte’s Super Overclock Series and is a quite solid and massive construction.

Card codenamed GV-R797SO-3GD has multiple features designed for overclockers. Besides probably the most distinctive part of this card, which are five 40mm fans, card was built with high quality components marked as Ultra Durable VGA+ – this included 2oz Copper PCB, Proadlizer and Japanese capacitors, ferrite core and metal chokes.

From such a powerful card you might be expecting a better, selected GPU, like Tahiti XT2, but Gigabyte decided to use the first iteration of this silicon. Also it has ‘only’ reference memory configuration of 3GB GDDR5 384-bit. From interesting features there is a special XTREME swtich which enables additional BIOS features for extreme overclocking.

As mentioned earlier this card has penta-fan cooling system, which requires 3 slots, but since the fans are pointed towards the side of the card, it will be easier to setup two of such cards in CrossFire.

Card is factory-overclocked to 1080 MHz (reference clock is 925 MHz). There is no such thing as boost clock with this card, but you’ll probably find it very easy to flash the BIOS from XT2 GPU. Memory clock is not changed and remains at 5500 MHz effective.

Gigabyte’s HD 7970 SOC requires two 8-pin power adapters and at least 650W power supply. It is equipped with two mini-DisplayPorts and one of both HDMI and DVI. A price of this card varies from $539 to $600.

Author: WhyCry

skr13
Huge card, and 5 side fan are funny at least ;)
For that price i would prefer 2 HD7870 in Crossfire.
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BestJinjo
The performance is impressive. The cooling setup I don’t like. They should have used that PCB with premium components and kept the 2 slot Windforce 3x cooler. Power consumption reduction over the reference HD7970 GE is 35W at load!! That’s the benefit of using efficient and higher quality components, despite running at 1080mhz vs. 1050 for the GE model.
Here is a nice review:
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Gigabyte/HD_7970_SOC/
Beats the GTX680 by 10% at and GTX670 by 20%
1600P. MSRP is rumored to be around $500, not $600.
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FYFI_13
King of the noise, 51dbA!
FYFI_13
Where did you get those numbers from?! It’s only 2% faster then GTX680, 9% faster then GTX670. Plus, it’s as noisy as hoover :D
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Gigabyte/HD_7970_SOC/28.html
http://videocardz.com/ VideoCardz.com
MSRP and actual price are two completely different things ;)
I looked for those in stores, and that’s the price.
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BestJinjo
Poor design indeed, but nowhere near as noisy card vs. the worst contenders:
1) FX5800 Ultra (worst ever made)
2) HD6990
3) GTX480 reference
4) HD4890 reference
BestJinjo
Umm no. I said at 1600P (2560×1600) not all resolutions. People who spend $500 on graphics cards don’t game at 1280×800 or 1680×1050. Those resolutions shouldn’t be included for enthusiast cards into the average. That’s why W1zzard kicks them out by resolution. He only keeps 1280×800 and 1680×1050 so he can show the performance of much slower cards that can’t run 1080P and 1600P. He even said so himself.
From that same review you linked
2560×1600 4AA
GTX670 = 83%
Gigabyte SOC 7970 = 100% (100/ 83 = 20.48% faster ~ 20%)
2560×1600 AA
GTX680 = 91%
Gigabyte SOC 7970 = 100% (100/91 = 9.89% faster ~ 10%)
If you don’t like that card, the PowerColor Vortex II 1100mhz or Sapphire Vapor-X are just as fast with much quieter coolers.
BestJinjo
I spoke to a buddy in UK and he said he can find Sapphire Vapor-X HD7970 GE for 390 pounds. Using the Scan.UK website I also found HD7970 GE for 325 pounds! The slower Asus Direct CUII 680 TOP goes for 490 pounds. I guess it depends on the country. Here in the US the Vapor-X is $450 and Asus Direct CUII TOP 680 is $540. NV also charges $580 US for reference GTX680 4GB cards. That’s a big joke.
http://videocardz.com/ VideoCardz.com
Yes, 4GB versions are a big mistake, since 256-bit interface hardly uses already installed 2GB’s. My GTX 670 has never exceeded 80% of memory usage.
A big joke are prices in Europe. I will never understand why I had to pay $475 for my GTX 670, which should cost $75 less. But despite that I would have not changed it to HD 7950 as you already know I’m the BF3 guy.
The high price of HD 7970 SOC is almost certainly connected to the number of those cards on the market. I read today that HD 7970 SOC was produced only in a volume of 100 units, while GTX 680 SOC gets a high volume.
FYFI_13
Previously i’ve had an ATI HD4870x2, now i have Nvidia GTX480 – both of these were REALLY loud with the stock coolers. I wouldn’t like to try your first two cards :)
skr13
UPDATE: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 680 SOC – “This SKU tagged under product code Gigabyte GV-N680S-2GD and is Gigabyte’s most high end GTX 680 offering”
http://www.guru3d.com/news/gigabyte-geforce-gtx-680-soc-sneak-preview/
http://www.eteknix.com/reviews/graphics/gigabyte-gtx-680-super-over-clock-2gb-graphics-card-review/ REVIEW
FYFI_13
“People who spend $500 on graphics cards don’t game at 1280×800 or 1680×1050.”
According to Steam most people use 1080p resolution which i do and i own a card that used to cost around 500 bucks (and my previous card too). Now check out same link and 1080p (2% against GTX680 and 10% against GTX670). Keeping that in mind an overclocked GTX670 blows this hover into little pieces by any meaning (power consumption, price, performance). Sorry ;)
http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey

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VideoCardz.com

Gigabyte Officially Releases Radeon HD 7970 Super OverClock Edition

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