Manufacturer: Price: $ 450/$430 US Author: Steve Date: 11/06/2012

[ Introduction ]

Today we are checking out the HIS 7970 IceQ X² GHz Edition and 7950 IceQ X² Boost Clock graphics cards, which have been designed to get the most out of AMD’s 7900 series. Both cards boast a seriously upgraded cooling solution that is designed to reduce operating temperatures and improve overclocking potential... The Radeon HD 7900 series was first introduced in January 2012 when AMD unveiled the Radeon HD 7970 on Jan 9th followed by the 7950 on Jan 31st. These flagship graphics cards were the first from the Southern Islands GPU family and they launched with a retail value of $549 and $449. When we first tested the Radeon HD 7970 we found that it was on average 42% faster than the old Radeon HD 6970 and 22% faster than the GeForce GTX 580 based on a dozen games that we tested with. The Radeon HD 7950 on the other hand was 32% faster than the 6970 and 14% faster than the GeForce GTX 580. Since the initial launch of the Radeon HD 7900 series graphics cards quite a lot has changed. The pricing and performance has changed which has to do with a change in competition. Nvidia released their first GeForce GTX 600 series graphics card two months after the arrival of the new Radeon HD 7900 series when they debuted the GTX 680. Another two months down the track and we had the GTX 670 and at $400 it was not only cheaper than the Radeon HD 7950 but it was also some 15% faster based on our findings. For this reason alone AMD reduced the pricing of their entire Radeon HD 7000 series range and have continued to reduce pricing throughout the course of 2012. However recently with the release of the Catalyst 12.11 Beta drivers AMD has been able to drastically improve the performance of the Radeon HD 7000 series graphics cards in a number of popular games, many of which we test with. Games such as Battlefield 3 are claimed to have up to 10 - 15% more performance, while in certain cases performance can be boosted as much as 20%. Other popular games such as StarCraft II, Sleeping Dogs, Dirt and Metro 2033 all claim to receive huge performance gains when using the latest beta drivers. With pricing of the Radeon HD 7900 series currently at an all-time low, while performance has never been better, it seems like the perfect time for HIS to create their most impressive 7970 and 7950 graphics cards yet, as they launch the 7970 IceQ X² GHz Edition and 7950 IceQ X² Boost Clock.

Table of Contents >>> Introduction <<< HIS 7970 IceQ X² GHz Edition HIS 7950 IceQ X² Boost Clock Test System Specs & 3Dmark 11 Benchmarks: Aliens vs. Predator, Alan Wake Benchmarks: Battlefield 3, Borderlands 2 Benchmarks: Crysis 2, Dragon Age II Benchmarks: Deus Ex: Human Revolution, Dirt 3 Benchmarks: Hard Reset, Just Cause 2 Benchmarks: Max Payne 3, Sleeping Dogs Benchmarks: The Elder Scrolls V, The Witcher 2 Power Consumption & Temperatures Overclocking Performance Conclusion Next Page ->

Alk	Posted on: 11/07/2012 08:34 PM That gaming bundle is amazing. Wish I didn't buy mine a few months ago now!

Epsss

Posted on: 11/12/2012 02:25 AM Sick looking graphics card. Love how its only a dual slot rather than a triple.

SonDa5

Posted on: 01/23/2013 12:24 PM The photos of the PCB don't match up. Some of them show power connector with 6+8 and others show 8+8. Confusing with the photos. I don't know what the PCB really looks like.

Alk	Posted on: 01/27/2013 08:53 PM You do realize that there are two graphics cards being reviewed here? As the review states the 7970 has the 8+8 connectors and the 7950 has the 6+8, how hard is that?