Futuremark 3DMark 11
Performance Preset
ASUS Radeon HD 7870 DirectCUII TOP 2GB
GDDR5: 6,958
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 6,879
HIS Radeon HD 7870 IceQ Turbo 2GB GDDR5:
6,884
MSI Radeon HD 7870 Hawk 2GB GDDR5: 6,855
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 6,612
AMD Radeon HD 7870 2GB GDDR5: 6,425
AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5: 6,641
AMD Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5: 5,680
AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB RDDR5: 4,417
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB RDDR5: 6,380
Extreme Preset
ASUS Radeon HD 7870 DirectCUII TOP 2GB
GDDR5: 2,213
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 2,183
HIS Radeon HD 7870 IceQ Turbo 2GB GDDR5:
2,183
MSI Radeon HD 7870 Hawk 2GB GDDR5: 2,185
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 2,094
AMD Radeon HD 7870 2GB GDDR5: 2,031
AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5: 2,247
AMD Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5: 1,849
AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB RDDR5: 1,389
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB RDDR5: 2,084
3DMarks (higher is better)
3D Mark 11
On both the Performance and Extreme
presets, there wasn’t much separating the custom Radeon HD 7870 cards, with all
four cards performing within 1% each other. Meanwhile, ASUS led the pack thanks
to its marginally higher memory clock speed, while Sapphire’s slightly slower
core clock saw it fall behind by about 2%. Against the reference card, the
custom models showed roughly a 7% increase in on average. Surprisingly, all of
the overclocked 7870 cards were able to outperform the Radeon HD 7950, with the
reference 7870 behind by about 3%.
Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (16 x AF, 8 x
AA, HBAO On)
1920 x 1200
ASUS Radeon HD 7870 DirectCUII TOP 2GB
GDDR5: 77.9
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 77.5
HIS Radeon HD 7870 IceQ Turbo 2GB GDDR5:
77.1
MSI Radeon HD 7870 Hawk 2GB GDDR5: 78.5
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 75.3
AMD Radeon HD 7870 2GB GDDR5: 73.9
AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5: 81.0
AMD Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5: 75.9
AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB RDDR5: 59.2
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB RDDR5: 94.3
2560 x 1600
ASUS Radeon HD 7870 DirectCUII TOP 2GB
GDDR5: 50.2
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 49.7
HIS Radeon HD 7870 IceQ Turbo 2GB GDDR5:
50.3
MSI Radeon HD 7870 Hawk 2GB GDDR5: 49.4
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 48.7
AMD Radeon HD 7870 2GB GDDR5: 47.1
AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5: 54.4
AMD Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5: 50.2
AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB RDDR5: 38.1
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB RDDR5: 59.1
Average FPS (higher is better)
Battlefield: Bad Company 2
Battlefield: Bad Company 2’s DX11 Frostbite
1.5 engine may be getting a bit old, but it’s still a fairly taxing test,
particularly at stressing a GPU’s geometry shading power. Within the HD 7870
camp, we saw the custom cards improve on the reference score by about 5%, while
scoring within 1% of each other, with Sapphire again trailing slightly behind.
However, unlike with 3DMark 11, this time the Radeon HD 7870 cards were unable
to keep up with the Radeon HD 7950, which was about 4% better than the custom
cards and 9% better than the reference HD 7870. In terms of actual gaming experience
however, this difference was not all that noticeable.
All five custom graphics cards are
put to the test. Which card will come out a winner?
Crisis 2
(Ultra-High Settings, 4 x AA)
1920 x 1200
ASUS Radeon HD 7870 DirectCUII TOP 2GB
GDDR5: 29.8
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 29.9
HIS Radeon HD 7870 IceQ Turbo 2GB GDDR5:
29.7
MSI Radeon HD 7870 Hawk 2GB GDDR5: 29.3
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 29.3
AMD Radeon HD 7870 2GB GDDR5: 29.9
AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5: 29.9
AMD Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5: 26.2
AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB RDDR5: 20.6
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB RDDR5: 29.8
2560 x 1600
ASUS Radeon HD 7870 DirectCUII TOP 2GB
GDDR5: 22.1
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 21.5
HIS Radeon HD 7870 IceQ Turbo 2GB GDDR5:
20.8
MSI Radeon HD 7870 Hawk 2GB GDDR5: 20.9
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 19.8
AMD Radeon HD 7870 2GB GDDR5: 20.3
AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5: 22.8
AMD Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5: 17.7
AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB RDDR5: 11.6
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB RDDR5: 18.4
Average FPS (higher is better)
Crisis 2
Crisis 2’s Ultra High setting puts GPUs
through their paces with a grueling test of tessellation, parallax occlusion
mapping, water rendering, and particle motion blur and shadowing. The custom
cards did not show much improvement on the reference design here, with every
current generation card scoring within 1% of each other at the resolution of
1920 x 1200 pixels. At the highest resolution of 2560 x 1600 pixels, we saw a
slight improvement, with the custom cards outperforming the reference unit by
about 8%, while falling behind the Radeon HD 7950 by 3%.
Futuremark 3DMark 11
(Overclocked)
Performance Preset
ASUS Radeon HD 7870 DirectCUII TOP 2GB
GDDR5: 7,718
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 7,598
HIS Radeon HD 7870 IceQ Turbo 2GB GDDR5:
7,514
MSI Radeon HD 7870 Hawk 2GB GDDR5: 7,780
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 7,560
AMD Radeon HD 7870 2GB GDDR5: 7,334
AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5: 7,937
AMD Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5: 5,680
AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB RDDR5: 4,417
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB RDDR5: 6,380
Extreme Preset
ASUS Radeon HD 7870 DirectCUII TOP 2GB
GDDR5: 2,584
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 2,430
HIS Radeon HD 7870 IceQ Turbo 2GB GDDR5:
2,406
MSI Radeon HD 7870 Hawk 2GB GDDR5: 2,610
Sapphire Radeon HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5: 2,436
AMD Radeon HD 7870 2GB GDDR5: 2,363
AMD Radeon HD 7950 3GB GDDR5: 2,781
AMD Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5: 1,849
AMD Radeon HD 6870 1GB RDDR5: 1,389
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 1.5GB RDDR5: 2,084
(3DMarks (higher is better)
Overclocking
While we were able to gain an extra 15% out
of the reference card by raising core speeds to 1180MHz with memory up to
5800MHz DDR, we were only able to squeeze out 10% extra. This was despite being
able to raise the clock speed much higher, all the way up to around 1250MHz to
1300MHz. Out of all of the custom cards, MSI was able to achieve the highest
speeds and scores, which may be due to its secondary GPU Reactor PCB, which
helps regulate voltage for more stable overclocking. Our custom cards were
unable to keep up with an overclocked HD 7950, trailing behind by about 1-2% at
the Performance preset, and about 6% at the Extreme preset, despite being
overclocked as well.
