7970M vs. 680M - review showdown!

That's what they used to do before Optimus came along and screwed it all up.

 

Exactly. There is absolutely no way in holy h3ll the 680M is worth $300 more for a yet-to-be-seen marginal performance advantage. Anyone who says it is is either a fanboy or has no concept of price/performance ratio.

 

Well it comes down to is it worth more than getting an ssd or more ram or a better screen?

 

I made the choice to go with a large 512GB SSD (the Crucial M4) and am opting for the 7970m. But the driver issues still concern me.

 

Pretty glad I changed my order from a 680M to a 7970M right now. It seems they will both become obsolete (my definition being unable to run smoothly at high settings, pfft no medium for me thank you very much) at roughly the same time and the benchmarks there suggest the difference in games and in general performance wise will be very marginal =)... My face would be red seeing such values after receiving it, but each to their own!

 

Really hope you don't run into driver issues, since you seem to be so paranoid about it.

 

for single 7970m cards, there are no driver issues. 99% of driver issues are user errors. I haven't had a single hiccup and i've tested every single beta that has come out in the last 2 months for the 7970m

Xfire 7970m is not working well right now so unless you're getting 7970m xfire, you don't have to worry.

and for those that are thinking that the 680m will be trouble free, you should realize that there isn't an official driver out for this card yet...in fact, kepler is just being officially supported on the mobile platforms in the latest beta driver. People have had 650m for months with no official driver support...both teams are guilty of this...however, SLI is better than xfire because SLI support is better.

 

I'm gonna flip a coin, just to see what side luck is one "at this moment"

Result : Tossed 10 times...... 5 times for HD 7970M, 5 times for GTX 680M
Seems like "luck" doesn't want to spend $300 for GTX 680M LOL!!

 

I'm not paranoid, just don't want to spend money if it's going to cause performance issues.

I was waiting to see how the 680m faired mainly. Seems there's little benefit for performance of the 680m over 7970m, especially $300. I've just been reading issues with 90C+ temps and frequent unexplained FPS dips.

I'll likely be placing my order end of this week, beginning of next with 7970m.

 

That's why you always have a best-of-odd-number series. No one won the Stanley Cup in a best of 6 or 8!

Either way, both cards are an amazing leap ahead of anything we have seen on any mobile platform ever in both performance and generation gap. The fact that we are getting desktop 570-580 performance on these chips is absolutely ridiculous, and had someone told me this last year when I bought my 6970M, I would have laughed at them.

At the end of the day, we will all be playing our games maxed out on 1080p resolution, and won't have to sacrifice fidelity for performance into the near future. Is the price difference worth it? That has obviously become a completely subjective issue on these boards; so what, to each their own.

Enjoy your games guys! I know I will!

 

well im very very happy about my 7970M, but sadly i have to admit that there are applications and games that still struggle to work as they should. My fear is that AMD won t solve these issues anytime soon (talking about 30% GPU usage in games....) and im very worried about not being able to disable Enduro, cause as we coulld learn from that review, Alienware without Enduro performs better than Clevo with Enduro.....such a shame that after soooo many years of experience ATI still fails so uch at drivers development, and who is talking is a guy who has always owned an ATI card in his desktops, and now in laptops too....

 

The whole Enduro topic isn't a matter of software, it is a hardware limitation. Unfortunately, Clevo is the one who ed up here, not AMD.

 

The problem is that ATI isn't part of the "The way its meant to be played" program. Nvidia has the upper hand much of the time because they are working with the game devs to ensure compatibility. They are paying big bucks to game devs to be part of this "the way it's meant to be played". So AMD has to wait till a game comes out and then tweak. This is the issue.

Now that said, I've had the 7970m for 2 months. There isn't a single game out there that my laptop won't eat up.

I mean check this out: We are getting 50+ fps on crysis 2 maxxed

http://forum.notebookreview.com/gaming-software-graphics-cards/672507-crysis-2-benchmark.html

I still don't understand all this talk about driver issues. Enduro will get fixed. Optimus was terrible when it first came out too.

interesting...can you elaborate?

 

So glad to see the 7970m keep up with the 680m.
I hope AMD keeps up with this kind of quality hardware for the price.

 

yep, on a dell 7970m where enduro can be disabled

 

or on a HM machine without iGPU

 

All this talk about hardware preventing them from fixing this is pretty silly. The driver controls which chip does what under what circumstances. Can they bypass the iGPU completely or turn it off? Apparenlty not in this design, however a driver can tell the iGPU to handle 1% of the activity and the AMD chip the other 99%. A driver can absolutely fix this and will in time.

 

Hmm are you working for any of the major GPU manufacturers with their driver development? Just curious how you can be so sure of all this.

 

I'm a software developer. I don't write drivers, but I'm familiar with how they work.

 

So you are saying, that no, you don't know what you are talking about. Thanks.

 

Wow, you're ignorant.
There is some circumstance right now that cause the AMD card to fire up to 99% utilization, be it a game, or a utility or whatever that is running. It's not magic telling the card to do that, it's the video driver software. That's how drivers work guy, they respond to whatever they're coded to respond to that behavior changes when they are updated.

 

His rationale does make sense. And your snark shows a lot about you. You been writing device drivers for how long now? Where? Where did you go to school? What degree? Bachelors? Masters? PhD? (1 week programing class?) Oh, then YOU are talking from your .

 

Man you just try and lend a hand. Been in development for almost 15 years now, but don't let me stop you, enjoy and hate on.

 

So about those graphics cards.

Are yields for the 680M going to be pretty good or are they going to struggle with supplying the market? It seems like they've "lost" this round from a value perspective at the very least, but I'm wondering if they're able to increase supply the price will come down. You know, those economics supply and demand charts.

 

I think there will be enough yield. nVidia ALWAYS charges more for even marginal performance improvements over AMD/ATI/Radeon (whatever). The 580m was the same shenanigans vs the 6990m.

 

...Just like a certain Cupertino, CA company...

 

cough* apple cough*

 

I'll be opening my checkbook (well PayPal eCheck) on Friday for an NP9150 with 7970m. Just have to wait for funds to be deposited into my bank account before I make the transaction.

 

Fanboys aside... If one of us were considering buying a new card, would one believe the greatness of the 7970, the issues with the 7970, the greatness of the 680 or the possible unknown issues with the 680? It seems to be " Pick a Thread" time. This one claims supreme greatness, the next one can't get over 30 fps, the other one is over clockable to infinite measure, then that one says it is great except for the bsod, won't boot or only works with TS ( which is for your CPU). So does the CPU throttle the GPU, does the driver issue cause problems? Are they both great, or do they both have issues. I can't figure which of the 29 threads on these new cards are most reliable.

Actually, I have seen this too many times before. Whomever gets the card first claims victory, then when the other comes out, it is more stable. Then back and forth. It can be interesting for a while, but after a month of following so many unbiased claims and reviews (sarcasm intended), It really becomes repetitious. Same claims, same reviews, same arguments as last year, the year before, and the year before that. That is why I wait ( and have for several years now) until the cards are out, show they are stable, and then I can get them for a lot cheaper than when they first come out. I have seen many people buy early claiming "future proofing" and then 6 months later a newer, bigger, better, faster card comes out, and some of those same people then want/ need to upgrade their "future proof" cards.

If I follow this thread, it would seem the 7970 is the fastest thing alive, but on that thread, once the 680 comes out it will be as fast, use less power and rub my feet for me. But on this other page, everyone has driver issues causing the card to underperform, but on this thread, it OC's like crazy. And even though the CPU doesn't really affect the GPU in games now, using a CPU software like Throttlestop helps.

It amazes me that card manufacturers can release new cards, and then so many will buy, wait, and then wait some more to see if drivers will come out to fix the issues. Once people realize that once they quit condoning this poor business practice with their hard earned money, the manufacturers will start making sure their cards work out of the box.

I fully expect maybe a half a dozen people to get what I am saying, and about 4 hundred to flame. It is the half dozen I will be interested in hearing from.

And if you look at my sig, I have both products (red and green). Both work great and have not been any problem for me in any way.

Sorry for TL;DR. Long day and raging headache.

 

I am one of those 12 who are sitting on the fence chewing their nails to stubs.

 

If all I was doing was playing games, I'd definitely go for AMD at this point. But, because I need CUDA for some applications, I think I'll be going for the 680M. Both are amazing for gaming, one just is insanely overpriced >_>. Luckily, I already have the RAM and SSD + HDD to transfer, so I can still get a machine and save on those parts.

 

I agree with you. I got the 7970 not because I *need* it or have PC-nis Envy, but because for $200 extra it was a whole lot more card. I am waiting for my (now shipped) 9150 to arrive (w/7970), and fear these stability issues with the driver. This is a WORK machine, and so I MUST have stability (it seems there is a way to make it stable for business tasks whilst waiting for non-beta drivers).

Imagine if, for example, the first Lasik corrective eye surgery laser machine had similar drivers. BSOD would be tantamount to throwing razors into a patients eyes. Hell, what about control systems in cars (oh wait, Lexus could tell you about that). Bugs are inevitable, but there is a certain level of stability that should be the standard.

Now a question:
If I don't care at this point about whether BF3 is at 50 or 10 FPS at any level, *IS* there a stable driver, or do I leave the graphic card uninstalled for now (from device manager) and use Intel only? That is important - work machine.

 

If you aren't gaming chances are the AMD card will never activate, and the HD4000 will take over all duties at that point and it will be like all is well, I'm not sure why you are acting so paranoid over potential driver issues, I've never had a beta AMD driver lock up my system since I first got my 4890, and I've used every beta driver since.

 

Oh well if you can afford to wait for several years.... i dont see why do you even need to check out the latest tools to play the latest games :/

 

I'd be very interested to see what the 680M is really like when it's into quite a few people's hands on this forum. Always good to get opinions, but there shouldn't be any reason to feel buyer's remorse. We always make the best decision based on the most current information at that time.

This happens a fair bit when it comes to photography gear as well where companies up the megapixel count all the time and add new features. I'm still using a 6MP and a 10MP camera. Neither of them has video and one of them doesn't even have autofocus. It is nice to have the latest and greatest, but there is absolutely no need, really.

Before getting my current P150EM, I was working off a Macbook Pro that was over 4 years old, and that was starting to test my patience a little when it came to running games. I'm so happy with the new P150EM which I have used for little over 3 weeks, and haven't had a single problem so far (a real blessing since I'm super dumb with computers).

 

now if only AMD will release HD 7990M, that would be epic! I'm guessing nVidia's repley would be GTX 685M. Then again this would never happen.....

 

Not anytime soon. 7970m is still on high demand and will be for a couple more months. Maybe before the end of the year or early next year there will release it.

 

OTT:

A Leica M8?

 

Unless the process improves enough to allow them to introduce a small boost clock then no it wont be.

7970M is fully unlocked so there is no easy way to get more performance from the same TDP.

 

There is actually a way. Over the months the production process improves and cores become better made, as a result they can support better clocks without any noticeable increase in TDP or other factors.

This is the same reason why Intel after 6 months of a new CPU generation, releases a refresh with the same CPUs clocked a bit higher.

So, yes, we will have slightly better cards in a few months if AMD/Nvidia want to, but nothing major, usually 5-10% performance increase at max.

 

Haha, indeed, a 'vanilla' M8. The other camera is a Fuji S5. Both are woefully old cameras, but by no means bad. They're fantastic and I love using them!

 

You answered your own complaint here. Graphic card generations have been approximately 6 months for a long time now. There is no time to wait until you have perfect drivers before releasing the hardware. If you insist on perfect drivers you will always be at least 1 generation behind. That is fine if that is what you want to but you will have a fraction of the horse power of the current hardware. As far as games go most are very forgiving of outdated graphics cards right now due to consoles having outdated graphics hardware. Whenever new consoles do come out you will see the hardware requirements for current games spike. The more severe problems you mention are most likely due to operator error.

 

580M vs 6990M all over again

 

I just need to know if Enduro is causing any significant issues. I've read some say yes and others say no. What is it!? Some say BF3 drops to 30fps from 60 on a whim while others say its consistent. Also, many say 90C+ temps while others claim under 80C. There's no consistency here.

 

Honestly, I haven't had any serious trouble with Enduro or my 7970. The only time I reach temps of 90c are when I play Crysis 2 on Ultra + Direct X11 and even then, It's only around 91c or 92c max. Playing games like Skyrim will keep it in mid to low 80s. As for frame rate, it very smooth unless an extremely hectic moment happens in the game and then it will drop a little bit. Other than that, this computer is fantastic. Hope I could help. :]

 

Temps can vary from many other issues. BF3 single player plays fine on mines but is barely playable going from 60 FPS all the way down to 25 FPS on multiplayer.

 

Nice catch, I should have been clearer, and you should have checked my siggy. My 485 is just a little over a year old. When I said I wait ( and have for several years) the context was I wait until I can see the card is stable, then buy it. This usually means it is a good month or two into its cycle, so I can read reviews and get feedback from actual users. I certainly gave too much credit that everyone would be able to see I did not wait years for a card.

I don't just go by the initial reviews from the same revenue driven mags and bloggers. I prefer to see what real users say, because they/ we are the ones that use the hardware in real life scenarios.

And I don't use the cards so much for the latest games. I use them for work. As one of the half dozen posted earlier, it is about the speed and reliability we need for how we make our living. When I buy any hardware, I am not as concerned about the hype by the manufacturer. I need it to actually deliver. If my new card is cheaper but works as it should, great. If it costs more and delivers, still great. But neither work if they don't deliver on their promise. I don't care how much cheaper something is, if it doesn't give me what it says it will, it is a fail.

 

I don't require perfect drivers, just stable ones. I seriously doubt all or even most of the issues with heat, low frame rates and inability to turn off the IGPU are operator error.

I have waited between 1 and 2 months before upgrading hardware to see from real users how it actually performs. So yes, I lose the thrill of the cutting edge, but I do get performance out of the box when I need to upgrade.

Disclaimer: although I love to game, I need my cards and all hardware to perform for my living. In short, if it don't make dollars, it don't make sense.

 

hey guys, notebookcheck just updated their article with some overclocking results for the 680M.

max. possible OC was at 834/2260 core/mem, whereas max stable clocks were at 810/2025 core/mem. at that, the card scored 12% better in unigine heaven with a max temp of 89C

 

Hmmm, in my opinion, that 810 is not viable at 89C.
It would be if they ran furmark/CCTP for 10 minutes and got 89C.