Sapphire HD 7970 OC Dual-X Pro Reviews

Overall the Sapphire HD 7970 OC edition held up as expected. It sat neck and neck with the XFX 7970 BE about all the way through with the exception of Civilization V, which I feel can easily be due to variation in gameplay. The Dual X cooler is really the bonus to this particular card; it is the real feature that sets it apart from not only other 7970s but also other high-end cards. Under full load it shows off its true colors as one of the best cooled cards on the market while remaining quiet (in a relative manner). With the fans at full it can dissipate quite a bit of heat away from the card to keep it cool and ready for more. It might dump a little more heat to the case at idle and run slightly "hotter" at idle, but it is much better than a constant vacuum cleaner noise coming from your case. With an overall nice appearance and lack of “lady parts” so to say on the card and a clean cut finish this card will surely appeal to anyone looking for a high performance GPU to crank up the “pretty” level in games. It is also one of the cheapest 7970 cards on the market, and when looking at the cards that are a few bucks cheaper, the Sapphire 7970 OC wins out with an upgrade from the stock cooler. It really is the win-win card -- it clocks as well as its competitors but cools better for a better price. It's hard to say why not to go with this card if you're looking for a 7970. Overall I'm satisfied with the card.

The Sapphire HD 7970 OC Edition is a solid card built from the ground up with nothing but ambitions of being the best. The Dual-X Cooling System provided cooler operating temperatures than the competition. The dual fans were also much quieter which allowed for higher operating speeds without a disrupting noise. Despite the higher power consumption that occurs during overclocking, the Sapphire HD 7970 OC Edition was relatively power efficient. It required less power than the reference Radeon HD 7970 in every game and still provided improved performance. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 is still the most power efficient video card here with its ability to change operating frequency depending on GPU load. Considering the Sapphire HD 7970 does not have a changing operating frequency it was still not guzzling energy. The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 had a hand up in performance on the stock Sapphire HD 7970 in every game. The Overclocked Sapphire HD 7970 OC Edition crushed the GeForce GTX 680 though in every game providing the best performance and gameplay experience. The biggest detracting factor for the Sapphire HD 7970 OC Edition may be the price tag. Because of this one contributing factor we feel this video card deserves our [H]ardOCP Editor's Choice Silver Award. The Sapphire HD 7970 OC Edition is currently priced at $580, placing it in the middle of the other Radeon HD 7970 competition. But NVIDIA has a much cheaper price on the GeForce GTX 680's which are currently going for $500 to $580. Otherwise, the hardware and combined total overclock of the Sapphire Radeon HD 7970 OC Edition is one of the highest overclocks we've had on a Radeon HD 7970. The Sapphire HD 7970 OC Edition is certainly at the top of its unique pack.

AMD rolled out the Radeon HD 7970 GPU in December 2011. Primed for the high-end of the graphics card market and now available from just over £400, our initial recommendation of the card has been tempered by the recent arrival of the excellent NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680. Given a direct choice between the two, and it's a close one, we'd veer towards the GTX 680. Sapphire Technologies is looking to change enthusiasts' thinking with the release of the HD 7970 OC Dual-X card, priced at around £470, or £40 above a reference card on which this model is based. Equipped with a quality heatsink-and-fan unit and shipping with reference-beating frequencies, available via two BIOS positions, there's plenty of good here.

GeForce GTX 680 has been lavished with bombastic praise since its arrival last week. Most of this is deserved, because it is a mighty fine high-end GPU. Our numbers and real-world playing also tell us that it would be foolish to dismiss the Radeon HD 7970, for it's also a very good enthusiast-orientated card. The corollary of this evaluation is startlingly simple: one cannot buy a bad high-end card right now. Yet spending £400 on a single graphics card entails making a hard choice. Knowing what we do and having played game after game and seen more benchmark results than are advisable, our advice would be to opt for the GeForce GTX 680, unless your particular game du jour happens to run better on Radeon hardware.

Superior cooling and instant overclocking make the Sapphire Dual-X HD 7970 a step above the usual reference based cards and having the protection of its dual BIOS makes it very overclocker friendly a show in for an Editor’s Choice Award. Sapphire did a good job here with enough features to satisfy, but not so much as to confuse them a fine balance indeed. At the end of the day if you are thinking about jumping onto a new AMD 7 series card and want more than just vanilla as your flavor, take a look right here at the Sapphire Dual-X HD 7970, it’s something a bit different than your standard fare. Thanks for taking the time to read this review, Peace!