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Which 5870 is better

C

_craven_

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Feb 4, 2009
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I don't have any personal experience with Gigabyte products(I'm an Asus fan myself), but I haven't heard any widespread problems with their cards. As for the two choices you've listed, I would go with the factory overclocked one as long as it wasn't to much more expensive($30+) compared to the stock clocked one.
 
Most of HD5870 reference cards can be overclocked to 950MHz on stock voltage (1.162V). They all have software voltage control, exhaust fan, digital VRM, etc. So, if you are aiming at 950MHz better get some stock Asus or MSI, because their overdrive limit is set in BIOS to 1200/5600MHz (Core/Mem). This is the best choice for water-cooling too, because full cover water blocks are made only for reference boards. Better be safe with reference board, than sorry with non-reference one - no voltage control, high ambient temp in closed PC case and so on.
 
The Gigabyte nonreference boards actually look pretty nice with the double fans. I'd think that would do a better job of cooling than the reference single fan configuration?
 
A4i said:
Most of HD5870 reference cards can be overclocked to 950MHz on stock voltage (1.162V). They all have software voltage control, exhaust fan, digital VRM, etc. So, if you are aiming at 950MHz better get some stock Asus or MSI, because their overdrive limit is set in BIOS to 1200/5600MHz (Core/Mem). This is the best choice for water-cooling too, because full cover water blocks are made only for reference boards. Better be safe with reference board, than sorry with non-reference one - no voltage control, high ambient temp in closed PC case and so on.
Click to expand...

Isn't the reference card more noisy because it has only 1 fan compared to these? I think I'm not going for water cooling near future :D
 
_craven_ said:
Isn't the reference card more noisy because it has only 1 fan compared to these? I think I'm not going for water cooling near future :D
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well more noisy under what conditions. it pretty hard to ramp my 5870 fan up from idle even when gaming max.also since ref design only blow air out it keep the whole system cooler. the 5870 reference design also have necessary component for voltage boost for oc. some non reference design this was left out to make it cheaper.
 
coldstorm said:
well more noisy under what conditions. it pretty hard to ramp my 5870 fan up from idle even when gaming max.also since ref design only blow air out it keep the whole system cooler. the 5870 reference design also have necessary component for voltage boost for oc. some non reference design this was left out to make it cheaper.
Click to expand...

More noisy under full load. Is the reference design blow the air through the rear of the case or just out of the card but still inside the case?
 
_craven_ said:
More noisy under full load. Is the reference design blow the air through the rear of the case or just out of the card but still inside the case?
Click to expand...

The reference cards push the air out the back of the card.

As for the 5870s, the MSI "lightning" card will allow voltage regulation via Afterburner, as will their standard reference card.
ASUS has SmartDoctor for voltage regulation.

All other reference cards can be voltage regulated (what I mean by that is VCore of the chip can be adjusted higher for more OC) by MSI Afterburner.

Any revisions by the individual AIB partners are generally not able to adjust VCore.

Honestly, I have ASUS cards currently and they are fine, but I also had XFX cards and I think they were very good......and they overclocked very well.
 
_craven_ said:
More noisy under full load. Is the reference design blow the air through the rear of the case or just out of the card but still inside the case?
Click to expand...

only thing that really ramp up my fan is furmark. none of my other games even get anywhere near 50% on the 5870 fans while i am play.
 
Thank you for your reply. What about the reference card cooling performance in Crossfire set up? Are there any heat problem to the 1st card because its fan is blocked by the 2nd card?
 
GV-R587SO-1GD is clocked higher and probably has some different specs. Read the specs in the bottom of the pages.
 
I knew the SO has faster clock speed but the Ultra Durable should can achieve the same clock as the SO. My question is which one is better to buy?
 
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