Unlocking 6950 to 6970

[ihaveaproblem]

Anyone here got a AMD 6950 card and unlocked it to a 6970?
I was thinking of doing it but not sure how much difference it will make on a game like bf3 for example

[nephilim]

big difference...the higher the end 2 digits on AMD cards the better

5870 will perform better than a 6950 for example
5790 will perform better than a 5870 for example

[ihaveaproblem]

big difference...the higher the end 2 digits on AMD cards the better

5870 will perform better than a 6950 for example
5790 will perform better than a 5870 for example

Might give it a go or just wait for bf3 to arrive and see how it performs
I'm hoping to be able to play at high setting ( Without AA I guess )

I have

cpu = intel i5 sandybridge
ram = 8gb
gfx = amd 6950 2gb

If I can play at high settings smoothly with that (30 fps+ im happy with ) I guess I wont try to unlock my card

[ihaveaproblem]

Nice avatar btw lol.
Made me laugh

[jamesfed]

I've got a 6950 and I can't complain with its performance in any game that I've tried (Crysis 2 included) so I don't think I'd even bother

[sonofsanta]

big difference...the higher the end 2 digits on AMD cards the better

5870 will perform better than a 6950 for example
5790 will perform better than a 5870 for example

Au contraire mon ami - the 6950 should outpace the 5870, where the 6870 would match it.

AMD used to use a fairly straightforward naming technique (as these things go) - XYZZ where X was the series number, Y was broadly the market segment/price point, and ZZ was the model number inside that segment, where higher is indeed better. e.g. 4870 was the 4th series, the 8 range, and the 70 model, which was better than the 4850 at release but outpaced by the 4890 a few months later.

As series went up, performance generally increased by a market segment e.g. the improvement from the 4870 to the 5870 was the same as the gap between the 5770 and the 5870 (stay with me here).

However, they mucked it all around with the 6th series so that the 6870 is more or less the same performance as the 5870, albeit at a lower price point. The 6900s, therefore, are a generation ahead of the 5800s. If they'd continued their past naming practice, the 6800s would be 6700, and the 6900 would be 6800.

Simples!

So the numbers decrease in importance, generally. The higher the first digit, the more modern the architecture & process. The higher the second digit, the more powerful the chip. The higher the third digit (as the 4th is always 0), the better performance relative to other cards with the same first and second digit. What this really boils down to is the higher the number the better the card within a generation of cards, if you just read them as actual numbers. 6970 > 6950 > 6870 > 6850 > 6770 etc. The complication just arises from different series.

The easy way to work all this out is to just look at price though, as the market is very carefully segmented. Or look up any of the gazillion benchmarks out there and realise that for anything short of a 30" monstrosity of a monitor, most cards these days will run anything you can throw at them perfectly happily.


OP: if you have one of the original 6950s then do it, it's a free performance gain, and a pretty significant one (boosts your card to the model higher, effectively). If it's a more recent purchase though you may not be able to do it anymore. But a 6950 is a marvellous card anyway and I doubt you'll be upset by its performance in anything


EDIT: good lord that turned out to be a wall and half of text didn't it? sorry!

[Arthur]

I was thinking of doing it but not sure how much difference it will make on a game like bf3 for example

Not sure, but with Call of Duty 4 you get an additional 3.7 to 14.6 FPS (and a higher electricity bill).





Source: www.techpowerup.com/articles/overclocking/vidcard/159