Graphics card round up March 2013

1. Introduction2. XFX R7770 Core Edition3. XFX R7770 (Super High Res Gallery)4. Sapphire HD7790 OC5. Sapphire HD7790 OC (Super High Res Gallery)6. XFX R7850 Core Edition7. XFX R7850 Core Edition (Super High Res Gallery)8. XFX R7870 Core Edition9. XFX R7870 Core Edition (Super High Res Gallery)10. Sapphire HD7950 Vapor-X Edition11. Sapphire HD7950 Vapor-X Edition (Super High Res Gallery)12. Zotac GTX65013. Zotac GTX650 (Super High Res Gallery)14. Gainward GTX66015. Gainward GTX660 (Super High Res Gallery)16. Gainward GTX660 ti17. Gainward GTX660 ti (Super High Res Gallery)18. Zotac GTX67019. Zotac GTX670 (Super High Res Gallery)20. Testing Methodology21. Unigine Heaven Benchmark22. Unigine Valley Benchmark23. 3DMark Vantage24. 3DMark 1125. 3DMark26. Alien V Predator27. Total War: Shogun 2 (DX11)28. Dirt ShowDown (DX11)29. Sleeping Dogs (DX11)30. Max Payne 3 (DX11)31. Thermal Dynamics32. Technical: Acoustics Performance33. Closing Thoughts34. View All Pages

The roundup today has highlighted that you don't need to spend £800 on a video card to get excellent gaming performance with high image quality settings at 1080p resolution. The current generation of budget to mid range video cards are capable of powering many Direct X 11 titles with the eye candy cranked, while maintaining a smooth frame rate on a 24 inch monitor.

When scoring these cards today it is important to factor in the cost, in relation to the performance. While the rich enthusiast user will be more willing to spend quite a bit extra for a minimal gain over a competitor card, the budget audience are entirely focused on getting the best bang for buck performance ratio.

This is why AMD and Nvidia keep dropping prices and releasing new video card updates every couple of months. Being competitive today requires constant adjustment to ensure partners sell as many cards as possible. In the sub £200 market specifically price is extremely important.

XFX HD7770 Core Edition

When AMD first released the HD7770 I wasn't that impressed. While the company clocked the card higher on the new manufacturing process, they also neutered performance by reducing the unified shader count from 800 to 640. When performance was analysed, it wasn't a huge upgrade from the last generation.

Luckily, when AMD partners got hold of the reference design, they improved the cooling and boosted the clock speeds. This XFX HD7770 Core Edition ships with the clock speed at 1GHZ and a custom, large, single centrally positioned fan which is very quiet.

There can be no argument that these cards are not the ideal solution for a die hard gamer who wants to maximise the image quality in the latest Direct X 11 titles … due to limited bandwidth they can run out of steam at 1080p. That said, for a media center, or in a Crossfire configuration they are very effective.

When the HD7770 was released they cost well in excess of £115 inc vat however prices have fallen in recent months. This particular card for example can be bought now from SCAN in the UK for only £93 inc vat. At this modest price point they are difficult to ignore, especially for a student, or younger gamer on a restrictive budget.

The benefits of buying the XFX HD7770 Core Edition are very low associated noise levels, a tiny demand on the power supply, and cost effective pricing. If you want to game at 1080p or above with high levels of anti aliasing with the latest Direct X 11 titles then you may need to look at a more expensive model, or saving to fund another HD7770 at a later date, for Crossfire.

Pros:

• Very quiet.
• physically small.
• low power demand.
• doesn't produce a lot of heat.
• decent performance.
• recent price drops.

Cons:

• runs out of steam with more demanding titles.

Sapphire HD7790 OC Edition

We reviewed the Sapphire HD7790 OC last week and our feelings since then haven't changed. The main positive we can take since our initial review is that prices have settled in the last week and you can pick this card up for £113.99 inc vat. This is actually good value for money and only £20 more than the XFX HD7770 Core Edition.

The Sapphire HD7790 OC Cooler is excellent and it reaffirms that Sapphire really do produce some of the best AMD based video cards on the market today. They tend to spend quite a lot of time optimising noise levels, and incorporate quality fans which all helps to improve the overall experience.

The biggest issue that the HD7790 OC faces is not only competition from Nvidia, but the current all time low pricing on the HD7850. We have seen HD7850's retailing for around £125 inc vat in recent weeks so there is certainly an argument to spend a little more cash for a lot more performance. The enhanced 256 bit memory interface really helps when running the latest demanding game engines.

All in all, this is an excellent card, and we are glad that AMD managed to get the pricing down to under £120 inc vat. It makes a lot more sense, but personally I would still spend the extra £10-15 and get the better equipped, more desirable HD7850.

Pros:

• very quiet.
• looks great.
• price point has settled under £120 inc vat.
• overclocks well.
• runs cool.

Cons:

• Stiff competition and for £15 more you can get a HD7850.

XFX HD7850 Core Edition

AMD's HD7850 has been a big seller for the company, especially as recent price drops have seen the card often available for less than £130 inc vat. This was the same price that AMD launched the weaker HD7790 at, last week. The HD7850 has decent shader power, and ships with a capable 256 bit memory interface to help improve performance when running at higher resolutions and image quality settings.

The XFX HD7850 Core Edition performs well, offering a balanced noise to performance ratio. The cooler isn't the quietest, and it is one of the hotter running cards on test today. If XFX had adopted a dual fan cooler for this solution, it would have been more effective in both areas, but sadly they cut costs a little by opting for single fan. The small circular heatsink looks great when you get the shroud off, but the performance is far from class leading.

Due to the slightly disappointing cooler, we would have scored this at 8 points out of 10, even though I am a big fan of the HD7850.  Thanks to the incredible pricing right now of only £126.94 inc vat at SCAN in the UK, it is a difficult solution to ignore,  so it earns an extra half point.

Even though the Sapphire HD7790 OC Edition has a better cooler and is quieter, I would still opt for the HD7850 Core Edition due to the increased performance characteristics especially with Anti aliasing enabled. It is only £13 more expensive than the Sapphire HD7790 OC Edition, which is the icing on the cake.

XFX's HD7850 at this price is one of the most cost effective gaming cards you can buy today. You could have two of these cards for only £250 inc vat and be getting similar frame rates to much more expensive single card solutions.

Pros:

• Great looking card.
• excellent performance.
• amazing price – only £126!

Cons:

• Dual fan cooler would have worked better.
• Runs a little hotter than we would like.

XFX HD7870 Core Edition

If the HD7850 isn't quite fast enough then the HD7870 is set to satisfy the audience who can't afford the high end HD7950. The HD7870 is noticeably quicker than the HD7850 and slots in between the GTX660 and GTX660 ti on a performance level. As an all round solution this XFX solution has plenty of positive traits.

The XFX HD7870 Core Edition is another single fan design incorporating the XFX Ghost Technology. Even though the XFX HD7850 cooler incorporated a single fan and was slightly disappointing, the HD7870 gets a proper full sized heatsink underneath the shroud with four thick copper heatpipes. This means the single fan can spin slower, reducing not only noise levels, but the thermal curve.

The cost of this card has dropped in recent months, and you can now pick it up for £166.54 inc vat from SCAN. At this price it is very tempting indeed and offers a great solution for a gamer who wants to play the latest titles at 1080p, even with some anti aliasing and higher image quality settings.

Is this card worth £40 more than the XFX HD7850 Core Edition? It really is a tough call. The XFX HD7850 Core Edition is one of the best value for money solutions you can get today, but if you need a little more horsepower to run at higher image quality settings then it is a wise investment. There is also the factor of futureproofing later this year.

Pros:

• Great looking card.
• excellent performance.
• price point is very good, although the XFX HD7850 Core Edition is £40 less expensive.
• Very quiet.
• Runs cool.

Cons:

• Dual fan cooler would have worked better.
• Stiff competition around £170.

Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X Edition

I initially reviewed the Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X Edition in August last year and I thought it was a fantastic card. Seven months later, the market has changed, however my opinion of the Sapphire solution hasn't.

The Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X Edition has dropped in price by around £60 since it was launched, to around £265 inc vat today. At this price it would be one of my favourite cards, delivering fantastic performance at a very tight price point. The Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X is faster than the Nvidia GTX 660ti and in a close second place behind the Zotac GTX670 we reviewed today. This only tells part of the story however.

With all this performance, there is often a trade off in regards to noise levels and the thermal curve under load. There is no doubt in my mind that Sapphire currently make the best mainstream cooling solutions, as evidenced by our testing today. The Vapor X cooler on this card didn't just outperform the Zotac GTX670 cooler, but it managed to score third place in the load temperature graph and top place in the noise emissions test. Considering it was up against lower performing, cooler running Pitcairn cards such as the XFX HD7850 and XFX HD7870 is recommendation in itself.

If you need a high performance AMD graphics card under £300, then we wholeheartedly recommend the Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X Edition. It is one of the quietest, coolest running high performance cards you can buy.

Pros:

• looks fantastic.
• one of the best coolers on the market.
• very quiet.
• runs extremely cool under load.
• Dual bios.
• excellent performance.
• can outperform HD7970 when overclocked.

Cons:

• Still rather expensive for most people.

Zotac GTX650

The Zotac GTX650 is an attractively designed little card, featuring a large orange fan and a contrasting black cooler. It looks ideal for a media centre until you factor in that the cooler is a dual slot design.

Performance is lacking in all areas and it is seriously outperformed by the HD7770. UK availability is limited, although we found it on Amazon via one of their partners for £81.32 inc vat. We really couldn't advise anyone to buy this card, not when the XFX HD7770 is only £10 more, and the Sparkle GTX650 ti can be picked up for around £115 inc vat. Asus also have a nice dual fan GTX650ti available for £113.58 inc vat from SCAN.

The Zotac GTX650 really has little going for it in our opinion. Spending a little extra (£10) will get you a much better gaming video card, and the fact this is dual slot alienates it from many media center builds, normally an ideal environment for such a low power demand graphics card.

We have some reviews coming soon of the new GTX650 Ti Boost Edition, but they didn't make this particular review. As it stands the standard GTX650 is one we feel you should miss completely.

Pros:

• great looking little card.

• it should be silent, but its not.
• not dual fans.
• weak performance.
• dual slot.
• You can buy a lot more performance for only £10 extra.

Gainward GTX660

I really like the Gainward GTX660. Is is an impressive little card that slots in between the HD7850 and HD7870 in regards to performance. Throughout testing it managed to produce playable frame rates at 1920×1080 even with the image quality settings set high.

I have to admit I was slightly disappointed with the cooler. There are only two heatpipes attached to a tiny heatsink and the single fan is clearly audible under load. It finished around middle of the pile in regards to both acoustics and thermal performance. It is not a failure, but the design could have been improved.

These cards are available from buyer priced at £152.99 inc vat. We mentioned earlier that the performance rests between the HD7850 and HD7870, and fortunately so is the price. For another £10 you can get the faster HD7870 and this would have to be our recommendation.

That said, this is still a very good graphics card, although the cooler design is slightly disappointing. The price is very competitive and if you don't like AMD hardware or drivers, then this is an excellent value for money investment.

Pros:

• compact little design.
• good performance.
• competitive pricing.

• the cooler is slightly disappointing.
• needs a bigger heatsink.
• stiff competition from the HD7870, at only £10 more.

Gainward GTX660 ti

The Gainward GTX660 Ti is a monster card and is our joint favourite today. The price in the UK is a very competitive £221.50 inc vat from ebuyer. This card consistently performed just behind the Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X and Zotac GTX670, and is priced accordingly.

Nvidia's GTX660Ti is possibly the best graphics card you can buy today, when factoring in the cost v performance ratio. It is perfectly capable of powering the latest demanding Direct X 11 engines at 1080p with the image quality settings set very high. It doesn't quite have the gaming prowess of the overclocked Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X, but it is priced around £40 less meaning it targets a wider audience.

It is also worth pointing out that the GTX660 ti are formidable cards when configured in SLi, they can give the high end flagship cards a run for their money with many of the most demanding titles at a fraction of the cost. This is why they are one of the best selling graphics cards on the market today.

If you are building a new system and want to ensure the system has plenty of future-proofing then investing in a GTX660 ti is a good move.

Pros:

• superb performance.
• Priced well.
• class leading performance in SLi.

• The cooler could be improved.

Zotac GTX670

Zotac's GTX670 was the fastest card in our tests today, slightly outperforming the Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X at the top of the charts.There were a couple of games when the results were reversed, but generally the GTX670 took the top position. If the price was right, the card would have earned a higher award, but unfortunately this is not the case.

The Zotac GTX670 is rather exorbitantly priced in the UK today, available from ebuyer at £340.49 inc vat. This is £120 more expensive than the Gainward GTX660 ti, and £85 more expensive than the Sapphire HD7950 Vapor X Edition. There is no doubt it is a fantastic gamers weapon, but the price point just doesn't make sense to me. If Zotac managed to get these cards reduced to £299.99 inc vat it might make a little more sense.

To make matters worse, the cooler is markedly inferior to the Vapor X cooler on the Sapphire HD7950. Load temperatures are a whopping 22c higher, and it was the loudest card on test today as well, into the bargain.

If you must have more performance than we recommend saving up another £50 and picking up a GTX680, it makes more sense. Nvidia seem to have huge partner pricing variances with their GTX670 cards. For instance, you can pick up this Palit GTX670 for only £290.40 inc vat. If you can find the Zotac GTX670 for around £299.99 inc vat however it would be a good buy.

Pros:

• fastest solution we tested today.

• cooler could be improved.
• this particular GTX670 is overpriced.

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