What do you think about X2-7950's vs getting X2-7970's

I'm currently shopping around for Dual 7900 series cards

I searched around on the AMD site and so far couldn't get a real positive answer to how much of a PSU is needed to run dual cards

I was under the impression that you needed atleast a 1000 watt PSU to handle dual 7970's

I run a 850 watt Corsair AX850 Gold

I searched Microcenter and Newegg I found MSI Twin Frozr 7950's for the price of 2 of those i can clock them pretty decent and it would be just as good right as having the 7970

My problem is now with my Power draw and Overclock
My specs are filled out below

Also these are the cards that were the least expensive but already come factory Overclocked and I happen to have a 6870 version of it as well

Anyway I have 2 Price points and well the higher one is Microcenter I can just go there in person the other is Newegg anyway if you have any better type cards with in the price range of the frozrs let me know

If anyone knows about the power consumption of these cards in crossfire or use them in crossfire what kind of PSU are you using so many questions before i decide to get them

bobkn said:

According to Sapphire:

Sapphire Technology Web Site#

An 850W PSU is the recommend minimum for two overclocked 7970s. Unfortunately, they don't list a PSU for dual 7950s.

A 7950 uses two 6 pin PCI-E power connectors rather than the one 6 and one 8 pin for the 7970. That means that the 7950 draws less than 225W; the 7970, 300W.

850W should be adequate.

A 7950 has 7/8 of the stream processors of the 7950, but it's a better deal.

I haven't tried Crossfire since an unpleasant experience with two 4870s a few years ago. I hope that AMD has gotten their driver act together since then.

Right now my crossfire set up is running well with the 12.6 driver

I was reading that the 12.7 driver would be the one to use as the other drivers are buggy for that card

my Psu is on there list but not sure if getting HD7950's would max me out but im thinking the power draw is about the same as my HD6870's so it should be fine which pan in at 151 watts so with my dual cards it should be the same correct ?

Guess I should be on Target Aparently the Cards im using now takes more power

I will Probally end up getting these since I want to go in person plus the price is 100+ dollars cheaper then new egg

I scoured the Internet and pretty much im able to CF these babies with my AX850 with an overclock there is a youtube video with a guy that has the same specs just he is running a Oc'ed I7 3930k 4.5Ghz

So im going to go this way since it would be a 30 dollar differnce from a CF-7950 in person

I've had good luck with Diamond i was going to go Twin Frozr but since this is cheaper and the same pretty much might as well get the big boys hopefully at the end of this week .........

I tryed to show a video of guy using a similar setup he was using 3930k overclocked
Im thinking his CPU alone draws more juice then mine and also he playing sweetly no lagging or bottlenecking

I had a youtube video i tryed to post but they made it unpostable so i decided to share the link instead http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjfdydjg22M BTW I tryed the right way to post this Vid I know how to post them just this one didn't let me so forgive me linking it because i can't post it Thanks

I'm going with Visiontek did some reading on there warrenty plus they are the cheapest as well net amount is 793.26

Lifetime warrenty sounds like a way better deal
I'm used to running Diamond and Msi

Anyway looking forward to my new Toys today

Nice job. Hope they work out well for you. I'll be looking for the maxed out Heaven score. That should be fun, maybe throw in a Mark 3d 11 too.

essenbe said:

Nice job. Hope they work out well for you. I'll be looking for the maxed out Heaven score. That should be fun, maybe throw in a Mark 3d 11 too.

Well i got a couple benches here lol

Just been checking the cards out i have pics of the cards but havnt extracted them yet

Nice job, I know you will like those bad boys.