stick with nvidia or go for a 7970m?

I am having my video card replaced by sager because it 'went out'. Should I just get another 485m or go for a 7970m? I was reading about the 7970m at this link and it appears to beat the pants off of the 485m SLI configuration and I want a part of that!

let me know what you guys think!

Oh yeah.... I don't use 3d or do any major video editing, so Radeon vs NVIDIA isn't as big of a deal for me.

 

Really?
Do you have to ask this :/

7970m is as powerful as 580m in Sli
Get 7970m, it will have much better resell value too

 

Well alrighty then..... ill go with the 7970m

 

Do you get a free upgrade or does it cost a lot. If its free you are getting a crazy deal as the 7970m is not only expensive but makes your 485m look like a low-mid range card. The 7970m scores 2x as much as your 485m chip on 3dmark11.

 

not that expensive. its a $500 card. or was until half of NBR sucked up the available ones

 

Where can I buy a 7870m card?

 

as far as I know, nowhere. A bunch of us got lucky and got 7970's rather early from a couple canadian sources

slickdude80 is testing one in an m17x r3 and has lots of screenshots and game benchmarks
table21 has one in an m15x
graz'zt has his up and running

widezu69, Geocake, myself and a few others should be up and running friday-tues

 

KC, which computer are you putting the 7970 into? btw, KC, check your UserCP

Keep us updated with the progress...I would love to expand my 7970m install guide with more knowledge

 

I am going to swipe my daughters 17r3 ( same as yours ) she needs an upgrade. I may try it in the Elitebook 8760W as well. and of course I will keep everyone posted, thank YOU for being the trailbreaker

 

thnx for the nice comments KC...

If you get it up and running on the 8760w, take some pics, i'll add it to my guide. You'll get full cred for the install

ajbutch, the difference between a 485 and a 7970 is like high school football compared to the NFL...you'd be nuts to not get a 7970m

 

Too bad! My laptop has 3.0A, so 7970M won't fit. I guess my chances of upgrading the video card are rather limited due to form factor constrains.

 

whats your laptop?

 

Best you can probably hope for is the 7700M for MXM-A. Would still be a nice boost over the 6770M.

I'm putting in an order for shipping on the 4th, so will be testing around the 8th for the 16F2.

It's already modded for higher power supply to the GFX, and I now have time to mod the heatsink to fit.

EDIT: Everything on the way

 

Dell Precision M4600 with Quadro 1000M. This card is quite weak for gaming.

 

since the quadro 2000m is a 75w gtx 460m with DDR3 ECC buffered, you could put a 75w card in there, the 7870m should be a good option

I dont know if the 25w tdp would make it or break it for you. but the mxm specs are the same

 

He said 1000M, not 2000M.

You would need to watch the heatsink and vrm circuitry on the card.

MXM-A wise then you would be covered for any new release though.

 

indeed he said that, but the m4600 can accept the 2000m as well, I checked dell site before posting

 

I would wait for Nvidia's secret announcement next week. Rumor has it that it could be a 690x!!

 

I would presume a 7970M would fit in a Sager P170HM?

 

Yeah positive on that one. Go for it.

 

Go with the 7970M's better value

 

Greetings,

l looking for a M18x or M17x r4 to buy .. the question is:
which GPU should i take? GTX 675M or AMD 7970 ? & why ? please guys help with maximum details. thanx
therefore, i NEVER used a AMD before, so i have no idea about them at all.

 

There are tons of threads out there on this right now.

The performance of the 7970M is significantly greater than that of the 675M - some say 40-50%, some say 100% faster - the different estimates are based on different tests, but you can safely bet on at least a 40% performance increase with the 7970M over the 675M. Really, for anyone buying a high-end gaming laptop right now, the 7970M is so vastly superior that it would be silly to even consider the 675M against it. It's possible that Nvidia's 680M might be even faster when it comes out, but that's not supposed to be for another month or more.

 

To add on to what Fat Dragon was saying, even if the 680m isn't faster than the 7970m, which isn't inconceivable based off of the benchmarks thus far, you'll be paying a premium for the Nvidia card. If it is faster, expect to pay even higher. IMO the price/performance ratio is very important, especially since after a certain point you have drastically diminishing returns and you're just throwing away tons of money for a few extra fps. The pricing and performance of the 7970m so far suggests that it will have a great ratio and will be hard to beat.

 

At this point, given the large upgrade the 7970m represents over the 675m, and the small price increase, there is no reason to even consider the 675m in the running.

The 675m is not a bad card, but its currently overpriced for what it does.

AMD deserves your business for the 7970m due to the performance it brings without the extra premium Nvidia usually requires.

Even if Nvidia ships a 680m with better performance, it won't matter as AMD has set the bar high enough where 7970m owners should be golden.

The 7970m is a no-brainer if you game on the go.

 

agreed 7970 is depending on mfgr, $50-100 more than 675 but offers the speed of 2 675's in SLI and almost touches a 580 desktop card at stock settings.

 

Youre still underestimating the importance of switchable graphics for some.
Enduro might or might not work. If it does the 7970M really is a no-brainer otherwise for some at least the 675M holds its value with Optimus which is confirmed to work on the EM series.

 

why would anyone get a 675m for optimus over a 7970m. Its actually laughable its like buying a pentium d 90nm cpu over a 65nm core 2 duo just for something like your optimus or in this case pentium d are higher clocked when they get spanked over 2x performance per watt and big oc capability.

 

If I'm not mistaken power consumption of 7000M at idle has been vastly improved, so having switchable graphics or not won't make such a difference.

 

I like how people that don't see things exactly your way are, as you've stated before, "stupid."

Maybe some people value battery life over outright performance. Maybe some people just want an Nvidia GPU over an AMD GPU. Maybe you shouldn't be so quick to judge.

 

I recently purchased an m17xR3. I have the 6990m installed now but i want to upgrade to the amd 7970m as well. Specs: 12GB ram ddr3, 1tb raid0, 1920x1080, i7-2670QM 2.2ghz. Any particular brand I should purchase?

 

if battery life was the most important thing, getting a large, heavy laptop with a 100w vid card is not the way to go...regardless if its Nvidia or AMD.

If you can even get one, i'd take whichever one you can get. There are really only 2 kinds...the dell or Clevo version. Because you have an alienware, you want a dell version cause it has the correct vbios on it, but the clevo version should work fine too...but the clevos won't overclock as far (if that matters to you)

 

Well let's be honest... Most people given the choice of 16-78% better performance (40-50% average) or optimus (2-3 more hours of battery from a 2-3 hour base) in a $1500-2000 gaming laptop will pick the performance.

While I can certainly see wanting the extra few hours of battery, most people do not buy a gaming laptop for its power efficiency. (not that its a bad thing, just not the primary purpose)

 

yeah, it is a no brainer, gaming laptop = gaming power = 7970m, forget about battery, you won't be unpacking the lappy on a bus to play on battery (impossible except for undemanding games, if you want such games then why to get a gaming laptop?)

 

Guys, as stated, that's his opinion and possibly others. Respect it and move on.

 

Oh, I completely agree, and I'd also get the 7970m over the 675m based on my criteria. In fact, I'm doing just that. All your posts on 7970m helped convince me to switch over.

My point is that it's a little much to say that someone with different priorities is stupid or made a laughable decision for going with the 675m.

 

Just to clarify, you are the only one that has used the word "stupid" in this thread. Please do not put words in other people's mouth, it only starts fires.

Going for the 675m may be laughable to nissangtr786 but you made a good counter-argument as to why somebody may want to go for it. No need to add the extracurriculars.

 

I am also an nvidia nut (even though I just fried my brand new 7970m), I can understand wanting nvidia card, but then please wait for another month, probably we will see the release of 680m by the end of may or early june

 

to me its all about value, if I can get a higher performing card for great money than that is fine with me. I have a amd card in my desktop now, I have an nvidia in my laptop.

 

where do you find the dell and/or clevo version of the 7970. who sells it

 

Just to clarify my position, that terminology was used in a different thread on similar subject matter, hence the reference.

I apologize for bringing it up again. I've said my piece and am done with the issue.

 

Just to clarify.. STFU AND STAY ON TOPIC, FOOLS!

Installed my 7970M

Generic VGA video card benchmark result - Intel Core i7-2920XM Processor,Alienware M17xR3 score: P5821 3DMarks



More: http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m17x/658084-amd-7970m-available-buy-77.html#post8474741

 

Hey no need to start a war over this i just pointed out some people might want Optimus if they care to get the extra hour or two of battery life even at the cost of the ~50% performance increase. There is still no confirmation Enduro works on the Clevos with thr 7970M and we still have no idle consumption figures (but i doubt it will be as efficient as the iGPU).
Also if you cant wait anymore all you can get atm (not counting getting samples) is 675M so some people chose it for that reason too. There are also still no proper drivers for the 7970M atm.
Im not saying im sticking with the 675M, infact i changed my order to the 7970M for now. Depending on the info in the next month and a half (week 24 is the P170EM with 7970M ETA from my reseller - NEXOC) my order still might change (waiting to hear about Enduro, idle power draw, 680M news and maby even 7990M?).
Nobody is arguing the fact the 7970M is a huge leap in performance, if its pure gaming potential youre after and dont care about the other details its the best you can get atm.
Again im neither a Nvidia nor AMD fan, i always try to get the all round best deal at the time.

 

But battery life is so important for you in the other thread, right?

 

Performance per watt is mainly important to me. a 7970m is 2x performance per watt over a 675m. There is no reason to get a 675m over a 7970m and I heard cost is similar and some places the 7970m costs less.

2010 type technology in quarter 2 2012 is the 675m. A 7870m should cost less then the 675m and more then holds its own against it while being a mid-high end card 45w?.

Price is another big factor but anyone buying a laptop with a 675m for high price will have its laptop depreciate big time anyway. I am actually amazed anyone would buy the 675m.

 

Has anyone ordered a laptop recently? I just put in an order for a sager np9270 with gtx 675s in sli... apparently 7970m is the way to go; i should amend my order...right?

 

what I don't get is why enduro would not work, that makes no sense to me, it should work in all laptops. I can understand if it didn't work till better drivers came out, that I could buy. anyway just wondering.

 

Again Enduro needs hardware, Bios and proper driver support (besides the GPU having it). If all those requirements arent met it wont work. Noone knows yet how Enduro needs to be wired or if Clevo will support it in their laptops. Drivers also arent available yet to see how its implemented there.

And Nissan the 7970M is not cheaper than a 675M. On average Clevo resellers are charging 100$ more for it (give or take). Alienware is the only one offering it cheaper but their systems are already overpriced for the hardware they contain so they can afford to do that.

Again im not defending Nvidia or suggesting the 675M is better but just get your facts straight.

 

But it is cheaper to buy the card itself compared to the 580m.

 

Nope, at least not OEM 7970M. 675M is quoted cheaper both separately or with a new system. And the OP is asking for purchase with an entire system so it would be irrelevant either way.