It is now February, and despite the weather outside (which feels like late spring/early summer) not following the middle of winter approach, the year has only just begun. AMD has really been on the ball with new releases; however, and has managed to launch two of the three planned enthusiast level graphics cards with the AMD Radeon HD 7970 and the Radeon HD 7950 on January 9th and 31st respectively. What this means is that the company has the rest of the year to dole out the cheaper and lower performance cards. Even so, if this leaked slide is to be believed, it looks like AMD will not be wasting any time and is planning to roll out a slew of 7700 and 7800 series card launches before the second quarter of this year is over!
As one step down from the 7900 series, Pitcairn represents AMD’s new "mid-range" parts. As of now, the Pitcairn series includes Pitcairn XT and Pitcairn Pro which will be labeled the Radeon 7870 and 7850 respectively. This recent leak does not stray too far from previous rumors, and both Pitcairn 7800 series AMD cards should see a March 2012 launch. The article further specifies a March 6th, 2012 release as the first day of the German CeBit 2012 trade show. In name, Pitcairn is the successor to the current Barts XT and Barts Pro based Radeon HD 6870 and HD 6850 cards, but is rumored to offer a similar level of performance to the 6950 and 6970 graphics cards. Allegedly, the cards will utilize 2GB GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit memory interface. Further, the Pitcairn XT that will be the HD 7870 will have 1536 ALUs (arithmetic logic unit) at 950 MHz, 96 texture units, 32 ROPs (Raster Operations Pipeline), 24 SIMDs (single instruction, multiple data), and a 120 watt TDP (thermal design power). The HD 7850 on the other hand will be slightly scaled back with only 1408 ALUs at 850 MHz, 88 texture units, and 22 SIMDs. Also, the memory clock will be scaled back. The reductions in hardware will give the card a supposed lower 90 watt TDP.
Moving down the performance ladder, AMD will launch the Cape Verde XT and Cape Verde Pro based Radeon Hd 7770 and HD 7750 cards later this month on February 15th, 2012. BSN claims that the Cape Verde cards will use either 1 GB of GDDR 3 or GDDR5 memory and will be in the $100 and $160 price range (with the 7770 on the high end of the scale and 7750 on low end). According to this article over at Tom’s Hardware, the 7700 series cards will be much smaller than their bigger brothers at a bit over 8 inches in length. They will feature a 128-bit memory interface, 6 pin PCI-E connector, approximate 100 watt power consumption, and a Graphics Core Next GPU architecture.
The 7770 graphics card. (Image leaked from ChipHell)
The remaining card that is likely to be of interest to our readers is the dual GPU monster that is the 7990. This card will be based off of two 7970 GPUs. Unfortunately; however, further details and pricing are not known. There is speculation that the 7990 card will have 6 GB of GDDR5 graphics memory, 256 texture units, 64 ROPs, 62 compute units (CUs), and a massive number of stream processors at 4,096 based on the card being comprised of two 7970 cards. Also, the launch date is still listed as "To Be Determined."
Lots of information is still speculation, but if it holds true, AMD is looking to get as much of a lead on Nvidia as possible by getting as many of their 7000 series out of the gate as possible. Which 7000 series cards are you most interested in?
Mmmm, those 7800s look
Mmmm, those 7800s look tempting! Everything else on my computer is as good as I need it, so I might just splurge on one of those next year.
I got a 6870 that runs
I got a 6870 that runs everything on high. cannot do ultra on BF3 at 1920×1200. We’ll see how much memory GTA5 requires for max settings. Cause I may need to buy a card with 2-3GB RAM.
whats the cheapest card that
whats the cheapest card that will run skyrim on full (or near to)max price £100.
i like snow.
It’s difficult to be very
It’s difficult to be very interested when two generations earlier provide performance that the current generation and it’s coming pieces find hard to beat at the price they want – especially for AMD cards, since we’re told PhysX doesn’t matter and DX11 tessellation is overdone and overused in games and not really necessary.
The only thing I’m excited about it the fading hope that AMD solves it’s myriad of driver issues and delivers stable cards without an insane number of quirks and fatal driver issues.
When I see a non problematic stable card that red fanboys don’t have to defend by hating on Nvidia and claiming price is lower (it is NOT and hasn’t been), then I’ll become very excited.
Since 10% of the fail has been dumped out the Obama shovel ready job door, I expect some soon coming improvements.
PS- I am excited about 1-3
PS- I am excited about 1-3 watts low idle power usage with on board or rather on chip gpu (sandy bridge not an AMD clunker cpu).
Now, with all the crazy power whines we’ve had for YEARS bordering on INSANE since 12 or 20 bucks covers the entire years electric bill differences – the idea that the card nearly shuts down completely and the fan stops spinning IS EXCITING and a real development worth noting – F I N A L L Y.
I won’t have to hear about idle BS power whining and full load comparisons, since the differences there are often tradeoffs between brands and therefore it DEPENDS on how much you surf vs play games – etc.
So,yes total power down or darn near it is very definitely the only thing I’ve noticed and cared about.