MSI Twin Frozr II: 7850 or 6950

[gibbs007]

Hi, what card would you recommend for playing at high setting on 1920x1080p:
MSI Radeon HD 7850 2GB Twin Frozr OC (250&#8364
or
MSI Radeon HD 6950 2GB Twin Frozr II (235&#8364
What I'm asking is: is the 7850 worth the extra money, or should I go with the 6950 and try to unlock it to 6970?
Edit: The games I would play: Battlefield 3 multiplayer, NFS: The Run, Skyrim,...

 

[aaksheytalwar]

7850 overclocks about 30% with stock volts and results in a 20-30% performance increase. The 6950 doesn't overclock that much and results in no real increase in performance with overclock. So in most cases a Oced 7850 will be like 15-35% faster than a 6950 Oced or not

 

[dmoney1980]

plus the 7850 runs cooler and draws less power

 

[aaksheytalwar]

And twin frozr doesn't even unlock afaik

 

[lehtv]

7850, easily. Much lower power consumption makes it easier to maintain very low noise levels even when overclocking. And it overclocks better. And supports DX11.1 for what that's worth. It also does perform slightly better than 6950 at stock.

 

[gibbs007]

What about Gainward GeForce GTX 560 Ti 1280MB 448 Cores? In BF3 is faster, but is 1,2GB enough for future games?

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Once overclocked a 7850 nearly equals a gtx 580 stock. Nothing from nvidia except gtx 680 is worth buying ATM

 

[bigsnyder]

The lower power draw and heat with 6950 performance or better made the choice for me. I also went with the MSI 7850. Plus the card being shorter was an added bonus for me.

 

[gibbs007]

Taking a closer look, apparently the 7850 is Twin Frozr III. Is it different from TF II?

 

[lehtv]

Yes, TFIII is a slight improvement (surprise!)

 

[Zebo]

nm

 

[gibbs007]

The links are for 7950 not 7850!

 

[Zebo]

Opps sorry misread

 

[Don Karnage]

No point buying a 6 series card anymore

 

[aaksheytalwar]

No point buying a 6 series card anymore

This

 

[gibbs007]

Thanks guys. 7850 it is, I just don't know which one:
Gigabyte OC (975/4800)
ASUS DirectCU II (870/4840)
MSI Twin Frozr III (900/4800)
Sapphire OC (920/5000)
All of them have 2 fans and all cost around the same.

 

[lehtv]

Won't make much difference in the end. Like you said, all have 2 fans and cost around the same, and in addition they're all decent brands.

However if we get into details, it looks like Gigabyte is the highest factory OC but that doesn't mean it's the most overclockable or has the best cooling, it might just be Gigabyte's strategy. Each of the cards should OC beyond 1Ghz without much trouble. Possibly even 1.1Ghz, given that the reference card managed 1050MHz in guru3d review.

 

[AtenRa]

7850 +1

 

[bigsnyder]

I went with the MSI, the cooler seemed more robust than the Sapphire (three heatpipes and alum. shroud vs two heatpipes). The Asus card I believe has a longer coling unit which added to the overall length (a negative for me). Lastly, I just didn't like the looks of the Gigabyte card, the cooling seems "cheap". The XFX version is a killer looking card, but it uses a 7870 PCB (two power connectors) and same cooler as the 7870 model. As great as that sounds, IMO that defeats the purpose of the 7850. If I want a card that size, I would opt for the 7870.

 

[d3fu5i0n]

I went with the MSI, the cooler seemed more robust than the Sapphire (three heatpipes and alum. shroud vs two heatpipes). The Asus card I believe has a longer coling unit which added to the overall length (a negative for me). Lastly, I just didn't like the looks of the Gigabyte card, the cooling seems "cheap". The XFX version is a killer looking card, but it uses a 7870 PCB (two power connectors) and same cooler as the 7870 model. As great as that sounds, IMO that defeats the purpose of the 7850. If I want a card that size, I would opt for the 7870.

A perfect explanation. :thumbsup:

I, myself, would be upgrading from a 6950, however, due to not being able to resell a 6950 for much money to buy a new 7xxx card with no viable performance increase for the price difference, I personally feel that it's better to wait until the next generation of cards.

 

[bigsnyder]

Yeah, 6950 and 7850 too close in performance. Though with the GTX680 being out, I imagine AMD will drop the price on the 7900 series by summer (just a guess), that may be a worthy upgrade (or the GTX 680 itself) if that happens.