Looking at new graphics cards

[Willzzz]

Hang on, XFX don't even make a 7870 Tahiti..

CAT, you could always flash your BIOS if you want higher power limit!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Hang on, XFX don't even make a 7870 Tahiti..

Its a limited run that XFX made(look on Aria). The PCB is weird one which is like an HD7950 one,but with solder points for 8 pin PCI-E power connectors,one Crossfire connector and less power phases.

CAT, you could always flash your BIOS if you want higher power limit!

I might need to do that at some point,although the PCB is non-reference.

Edit!!

Just checked,the application modifies the actual card BIOS.

[Willzzz]

Jeez, I mean I wouldn't trust XFX and I'd be a bit suspicious of the 7870 Tahiti, putting the two together just sounds like madness.

[Domestic_Ginger]

There are a couple of posts on the webz about people ordering the OEM 7870 and getting a different card (luckily they don't sell XFXs). I think the 7870LE definately need undervolting.

The biggest problem with the DD coolers is they have a really narrow slit for airflow across the vrms. http://diit.cz/clanek/nereferencni-c...ou-vzdy-vyhrou. Some people say they are fine; other detest them.

My other reluctance wit hth e660 is the last 1/2gg of ram is really gimped and has a very small bus much the same as the 8800gtx was. Its supposed to driver blocked.

Got loads of time at work at the moment. We're about to go into consultation here and no one is doing much work!

[Domestic_Ginger]

So in the end it was a PNY 660 or EVGA 660 (second choice) for 147 / 157 with metro and AC3. OEM 7870 from pixmania (no idea which card I was getting) 155 with B:I and tomb raider and probably FC3:BD.

I went for the 7870 LE (myst) with Bioshock, tombraider, FC3 and Blood dragon. I need somewhere to sell the games now. Should be waiting for me at home tonight. Will report back on any findings.

[Perskot]

Sorry to hijack that Thread, but unfortunately my PM function isn't working.

Yeah a little bit, hard to tell without a direct comparison at the same time though. I'll run some more tests later as the power difference does seem a lot haha.

EDIT - Running a bitcoin miner on the card gave strange results, undervolting from 1.2v to 1.0v only saw a drop of 5w. I'll download 3DMark later and see what that gives me.

I would be very interested to read the results, so if you had run those tests it would be nice and helpful if you could post them! Also it would be nice if you could post the total power consumption with bitcoin.