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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GullLars - Saturday, October 23, 2010 - link
One sollution would be to to move away from pure number based naming, and do something like:AMD/nVidia AG#S# ([Maker]_[Architecture][Generation][# generation of architecture][Market Segment][# of relative performance within segment 1-9]
Or possibly AMD/Nvidia Architecture Gen# S#
Example:
AMD EG1E9 or Evergreen Gen1 E9 = 5970 (Enthusiast)
nVidia FG1E9 = 480
AMD Evergreen Gen2 G5(?) = 6850 (Gamer)
AMD Evergreen Gen1 V7 = 5770 (Value)
AMD Evergreen Gen1 M5 = 5350 (Media)
These are just early floating thoughts, which could be refined by marketing monkeys.
Exelius - Saturday, October 23, 2010 - link
Marketing monkeys have no intent on making it simple to understand; if you don't know exactly what you're buying, it's easier to sell it to you for more than they would be able to otherwise.It's not an accident that the numbering is confusing; if you don't know what you're looking at then a 6870 at a lower price than a 5870 looks like a great deal.
MonkeyPaw - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
Big deal, I say. The card is a few % slower, but is more efficient and is cheaper. People who will actually notice the drop off will probably read reviews first. Besides, if the x900 series is for dual GPU designs, then the naming might not be far off.Also, if I had to pick between the 5800 or the 6800, I'd probably get a 6800.
therealnickdanger - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
Don't forget improved image quality!It's only disappointing because with a new moniker, I expect new tech, but then again, how long did NVIDIA push G92? 3 generations as different products? LOL
Rafterman - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
What exactly have NVidia got to do with this, no fanboyism please.morphologia - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
They are a comparable company with comparably ridiculous naming conventions. How do you go from 9000 to 200?Talk about fanboyism...claiming irrelevancy when it's totally relevant reveals your fanboy decoder ring quite clearly.
Alilsneaky - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
I hated nvidia for doing it, why should amd now be forgiven for resorting to doing the same bullshit just because nvidia did it before them?I had someone tell me earlier 'that's business'.
WHAT? No it's bloody not, a scam is a scam, when people start equalling questionable practices like these to business then something is really wrong with today's society.
Mr Perfect - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
What Nvidia did was simply rename the 8800 cards to 9800 card. Same exact chip, same exact clocks, same exact board(at least initially). There where owners of 8800GTs who simply edited the name in the BIOS of their card and had a 9800GT!The reason AMD is getting a pass from most people is because this isn't a purely renamed card. It's a redesigned chip on a new PCB with a poor name. If, on the other hand, AMD renames the 5750 and 5770 to the 6750 and 6770 you can expect them to get nailed to the wall right next to Nvidia.
pcfxer - Saturday, October 23, 2010 - link
It was very clear why he mentioned NVIDIA. You should read his post...snarfbot - Friday, October 22, 2010 - link
at least all the iterations of g92 improved performance over their predecessor.compare this launch to the x1xxx series of ati products, the x1800 was replaced by the x1900 which was replaced by the x1950. all of which improved performance over their predecessor. all the while on the same process 90nm.(save for the 1950pro and gt, which were mainstream parts.)
imagine if they named the x1900 the x2900, and somehow it actually performed worse than the x1800.
thats what they did here, and thats why it fails imo.
if they just called it hd5790 and kept it at the same price people wouldve gobbled it up anyway, without sacrificing their integrity.
just a bunch of numbers, but what it means in mindshare is important, and all most people will remember about this generation, is that it was worse than the 5 series and worse than nvidias.
all aboard the fail boat. honk honk.