AMD’s Radeon HD 6870 & 6850: Renewing Competition in the Mid-Range Market
by Ryan Smith on October 21, 2010 10:08 PM ESTKicking things off as always is Crysis: Warhead, still the toughest game in our benchmark suite. Even 2 years since the release of the original Crysis, “but can it run Crysis?” is still an important question, and the answer continues to be “no.” One of these years we’ll actually be able to run it with full Enthusiast settings…
For reasons we’ve yet to determine, Crysis continues to do a very good job serving as an overall barometer for video card performance. Much of what we see here will show up later, including the order that cards fall in.
As we’ve been expecting, the 6800 series cannot keep up with the 5800 series – Barts is still a “rebalanced” Cypress after all. The performance gap isn’t too severe, and it certainly couldn’t justify 5870 prices at today’s prices, but the 6870 and 6850 definitely aren’t perfect replacements for their 5800 series counterparts.
Focusing on 1920x1200, we have a 3-way race between the GTX 470, EVGA GTX 460, and the 6870. The 6870 comes out ahead, with the EVGA and then the GTX 470 bringing up the pack at under a frame behind. Meanwhile near the 6850 is the GTX 460 1GB, and it’s 2fps behind; while even farther down the line is the GTX 460 768MB, which officially is only $10 cheaper than the 6850 and yet it’s well behind the pack. As we’ll see, the 6850 will quickly assert itself as the GTX 460 1GB’s peer when it comes to performance.
Meanwhile taking a quick look at Crossfire performance we see an interesting trend: the 6800 series cards are much closer to their 5800 series counterparts than they are in single card mode. Here the 6850CF even manages to top the 5850CF, an act that nearly defies logic. This is something we’ll have to keep an eye on in later results.
Moving on to our minimums, the picture changes slightly in NVIDIA’s favor. The 6870 drops to the bottom of its pack, while the 6850’s lead narrows versus both GTX 460 cards. Meanwhile in CF mode now both 6800 series cards top their 5800 series counterparts. Crysis’ minimum framerate has always been a bit brutal to AMD cards due to how AMD’s drivers manage their memory, a problem compounded by Crossfire mode. Perhaps something has changed?
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Setsunayaki - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
There was a graph where a 4XXX series card beat the 6XXX series card...There were many where the 5XXX series was higher...Tesellation performance is higher on the 460 GTX and SLI scales better than crossfire...What the tesselation performance graph really means is that if you were to take an 460 GTX and 6870 and turn off tesselation and play a game....the 6870 gets a higher framerate, but if you turn on Tesselation on Both cards and go full force with Tesselation and other features (considering that Nvidia has support for PhysX and most games now have some physics implementation)...the outcome shows the 6870 taking such a performance hit that as far as framerates go....a 460 actually matches it or beats it outright.
What ATI/AMD really needs to work on is Integrating more technologies on its card to actually have more options during a game. No physics processing, Just an optimization on AA and AF...and tesselation performance that doesn't come close to a 460, along with horrible linux support...I really wonder and hope that their flagship card shows something steller....
Not to argue against it, but for the deserving ATI/AMD fans who have stuck with them over the years. ^_^
Alilsneaky - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
Prices are high for both in my country (Belgium).199 Euro for the 6850 and 279 euro (in the cheaper shops, upto 350 in others) for the 6870.
Very bland release for us, nothing to get excited about at that price point.
I also take offense to the naming scheme, why pick a name that will inevitable deceive many people into buying a sidegrade.
Pastuch - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
There was not nearly enough discussion on DTS HD MA and TrueHD pass through in this article. Gaming is 50% of the reason to upgrade, the rest of my focus is HTPC use. Please compare the GTX 460 vs the 6870 regarding bit-streaming, video quality and hardware decoding.Thanks.
P.S. Nvidia usually does a pathetic job on anything not related to gaming.
Scootiep7 - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
I think you guys are a little off on calling the 6870 the $200 price point King. The cheapest retail for the card right now is $239.99 for any model and then you have to add in another $5~10 for shipping. That sticks it at $245 - $250. That's no where near the $200 price point. And with most GTX 460 1GBs sitting at about $170 - $190 (w/ shipping), this card is not competing with them on price at all. Maybe in a few months if prices drop, but not now. It's more in the GTX 470 range and that is much tougher competition. I'm sorry, but the 6870 is NOT the $200 price point King. It's not even close.Lolimaster - Sunday, October 24, 2010 - link
HD6850 offers better performance tha 460 1GBHD6850 costs $175
HD6870 kill both of them, and also 470 performance/power consumption (80w less)
Scootiep7 - Sunday, October 24, 2010 - link
Ok, I'm sorry, but I have to laugh at this. Where the hell are you finding a 6850 for $175. The cheapest ANYWHERE is $199 and you still have to factor in #8ish shipping. Re-read my post and realize that the prices I quoted are accurate and you're still looking at a $30 price difference between the 6850 and the 460 1gb. Yes the performance is better, but it's not amazingly better and I don't think it justifies it. Hey, I'm all for the red team this time around. I picked up a 5770 which is an amazing bang for the buck card. I'm just saying that calling the 6870 or the 6850 the new $200 price point king is wrong. Too many variables.orthancstone - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
I'm especially pleased to see the 4870 included in some benchmarks. As someone who owns one and who was never impressed with the performance boost/cost ratio of the 58/59xx lines, I've been wondering how the 6xxx line would compare to the two generation old stuff. I'd love to see it included in the third party 6xxx reviews.Edison5do - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
As a owner of a HD 4850 was planning to get an HD 5770 but at this point it looks like HD 6850 looks like a better option with a few more bucks.. or wait to see if the HD 5770 will drop price a little more....Sando_UK - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
Anandtech is one of my favourite review sites and it's a real shame to see what's happened here. I don't know the reasons why you guys needed to include the 460 OC in this review (does sound like a fine card btw, but this wasn't the place for it) - can't see any reason this wouldn't have been much better compared in a separate article. The fact Tom's hardware did a very similar thing makes the whole thing fishy...New generations/architectures don't come along very often and deserve proper comparison and coverage - I'm not an AMD or Nvidia fanboi (happy to go with whichever is best price/performance/extras at the time) but we rely on you guys to give us the facts on a level playing field. I'm sure you have in this case, but even the suggestion of impropriety damages you (extremely good) reputation, and I think it's something you should really try to avoid in the future - be it AMD or Nvidia reviews.
Otherwise, thanks for all your hard work.
Natfly - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
It's sad to say, but this review fucking sucks. UVD and the display controller have been overhauled but you make no mention of any of the changes. Are there still only 2 RAMDAC clocks? Or can you now use passive DP converters while using both of both DVI ports?And including an OC'd card because nVidia pushed you into it? Way to take a shot to your credibility. And no mention of its clocks or price... AND no overclocking numbers for these new cards when you are specifically comparing it to an OC'd card? I mean wtf, this review is not up to previous Anandtech standards.