Hope you get the hold of one soon and can build an app around GCN.
While the 7970 only comes with a 5% core freq. bump, there's a 33% increase in core config and it has a 63% increase in transistors, over the 6970, and double that of the 5870. Plenty of potential.

What info do you have on its power requirements, and board size? Those are probably the most important items that will determine whether I get one.

Board is nothing special - todays "standard" boards will run it. If buying new make sure you get PCI-E 3.0 lanes - not essential now, but will be useful over the life of the board. It runs fine over PCI-E 2.0, its not an issue or performance hit. I am running two 7970s in crossfire inside a small Lian-Li Armorsuit PC-P50 case, MSI 890FXA-GD70 motherboard, 1090T @3.6Ghz, 16Gb RAM @1600mhz. Runs smooth as silk, no issues.

I also have a 3960X full tower case, Rampage IV Extreme E-ATX, but its has 2x5970s in it and I am not messing with that, its slated for the 7990s when they come out. The 7970s stay in their long term home where they are.

Its drawing around 215w if going at full stretch 1125/1575 and power slider at max +20% so if any 5XXX or 6XXX or 5XX card runs on an existing board, 7XXX will run without exception, and at a very significant power saving. I would say I am running at about 180w power draw on the card as I am not hitting it full stretch at present.

The 215w is worst case no external voltage overclock, the absolute well stretched full blast all overclocked power draw with external voltage applied - the whole nine yards - is around 255-260w. Real world non overclock use around 180-215w. Budget for 300w, and that is way overkill giving a nice margin for use and max efficiency in the PSU. A bland real world budget figure for all us mere mortals not slamming with a mega overclock or LN2, is 200w leaving no margin.

Power draw is a non issue, I guarantee it draws less than existing similar class cards, so no hidden additional cost - no special motherboard either, nor CPU. Discount all that, if you are satisfied with performance levels, go buy one, there are no associated additional hardware factors lurking in the background - other than a significant power saving.

Anyone with bottle-neck worrys, read the review below which essencially says if you have a modern 4 core class CPU as minimum, real world bottle necking doesnt exist.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon-hd-7970-cpu-scaling-performance-review/

EDIT: There is a case that says wait for the 1.5Gb card memory versions. The first release cards are all full blown 3Gb GDDR5 memory to give performance on very high res triple/six stacked 2550x1440 monitors for power gaming & multi panel monitor needs. If there is no requirement for that, some will not need 3Gb, so the 1.5Gb cards will be just the job, cheaper, and no performance hit. I have no idea when the 1.5Gb version are due, or which 7XXX variants they will apply to. Milegae on this is subjective of course, as its dependent on poersonal use, aims and intentions. But its a nice option for AMD to put out there.

Regards
Zy

Lots of positives raised about the 7970. So I won't go there :)

Good point about the 1.5GB card. It would definitely be less expensive, and there is no reason why it would crunch less on a high GPU utilizing project. On projects that require you to build an app_info file to obtain higher GPU utilization the more RAM the better, but even then 1.5GB would be enough to run several tasks simultaneously.

A few more reasons to wait:

NVidia should be releasing 600 series cards within the next few months. These should offer up alternatives to the 7970 and should force the high prices down (as will better yields).
It's likely that AMD will have a refresh/interim series update that uses XDR2, probably after NVidia's release.
Existing apps still run well on existing 5000 & 6000 series hardware. The apps will probably have to be developed/enhanced (mature) to gain greater performances for the 7900series.

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So, AMD just told us that they cannot gives us even one card as they have sent everything to retail. So, we don't expect to have a card soon.

gdf

AMD just told us that they cannot gives us even one card

What a Pity!

At £440 ($550/499Euro) they are not cheap.

The 7950 is reportedly due out on 31st Jan, but it's still likely to cost around $449 (~410Euro). I think the lesser AMD 7000 GPU's are due out in Feb, but if they are not GCN they won't be any use.

Hope you asked NVidia too; their GK-104 Kepler isn't far off.

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Ok, good news, we seem to be able to get hold on one in a couple of weeks.

gdf

@Zy: my unlocked HD6950 @ 900 MHz ist jsut as fast at MW as your HD7970, although I'm running the "native" CAL app, of course. And I don't think I'm drawing more power while doing so, the entire rig draws < 300 W off the wall, with an i7 @ 4.0 GHz crunching on 7 other threads.

However, still very impressive performance of the newcomer, with the nVidia app! Ideally in OpenCL you program and it works on any hardware.. but we all know how fragile performance on GPUs is still. There's certainly more potential in GCN.

MrS

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Yup - as you point out its the effect of OpenCL apps. I reckon that will be more widespread as OpenCL takes hold over time - red or green team - but for now it has a greater impact on perception.

Hardcop did a no holds barred - as far as the new AMD hardware locks would allow them - voltage tweek overclocking session, and they were bowled over by the result, the untapped power still there under the hood is stunning. I've seen others do similar sessions also coming to the same conclusion. If you havent seen it, the session is at:

http://hardocp.com/article/2012/01/09/amd_radeon_hd_7970_overclocking_performance_review/1

I suspect similar levels of performance increase will come out of the green team, the effect of 28nm. As always the final conclusions and preferences will come from software developments, and the use an individual wants to put the card to. I've said it before, but .... 2012 is gonna be fun :)

Regards
Zy

Their OC at stock voltage is cool (but hey, anyone can do this ;). However, for 1.26 GHz they need 1.30 V - that's massive! The last time I applied that much to a chip 24/7 was at 65 nm :p And my Cayman hums along nicely at 1.10 V.

Anyway, with watercooling this might not be such a bad proposition, if you've got a limited amount of PCIe slots and want to maximize your credits. Drawing 100 W more for 33% more performance out of such a high end card.. if you calculate that as e.g. 100k RAC more for 100 W more, then it doesn't look all that bad. Which is why I'm not running my Cayman at e.g. 0.9 V and 700 - 800 MHz, even though it would be more efficient.

And achieving this high clock speed on a new design bodes well for all future GCN cards!

MrS

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Scanning for our furry friends since Jan 2002

ack .... the designs go in leaps and bounds on every shrink. Its probably only a couple of shrinks away before people start yelling "my hologram is better than your hologram" rofl :)

Regards
Zy

Any update on when we may be able to start testing the 7970 here?

Hi, after adding GPUGrid on my Q6600+GTX470, I also have an I7-2600+ 2 HD5870
GPUs.
It's my 'work puter', has 3500GByte storage and 8GByte DDR3 (1388MHz;base clock is @ 102MHz, PSU is 1KWatt, other QX9650+GTX480, has a 650Watt PSU, same as the one above. (WIN XP, x86 & x64 on the NVidia hosts and WIN 7 64bit on the I7-2600)

It's now doing Rosetta, Malaria on CPU and SETI runs 6 WUs on 2 HD5870 GPUs, using OpenCL.
1 core free to load and write the result file.
Is there already a OpenCL version for ATI (AMD) GPUs.?
I've not been able to read all forum info on this.

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Knight Who Says Ni N!

We might receive a GCN card soon to test.
gdf

Not yet, Fred.

MrS

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Hurry up and give these guys a card, AMD.
Pleeeeeeease. :p

Or you could just buy one. Send some of the undergrads out for a weekend carwash and use the proceeds to purchase a 7970.

If all goes well, there are good chances that we will be able to provide a new AMD application very soon for all type of cards which are supporting OpenCL, not only GCN. We are already testing now.

I'll keep you posted by the end of the next week.

gdf

Awesome!
Very much looking forward to it. :)

I read that BOINC 7.0.11 is required to identify the HD 7970.

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Its 7.0.3 and above. I am running 7.0.8 and its fine. I've seen 7970s at POEM running 7.0.3, so as long as 7.X.X is loaded - should be fine

Regards
Zy

Anyway, I hope there will be an OpenCL (or BROOK?), soon ;-)
Thanks for your reply, as GPUgrid is my main project, now.

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