The question I always find myself asking is when it comes to my next graphics card purchase, what is more important? Is it processing core count or clock speed? The answer is often not clear with so many options on the market. Especially in the highly contested $150 – 200 price range. AMD has taken a side on the question for now as they are phasing out older cards with a new architecture that may have fewer stream processors, but much higher clock speeds. Today we are putting a card that follows this new trend and they call it the Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC. Let’s put it through its paces and see if this new approach to performance is the right one.
Features and Specifications
The Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC is based on the 28 nanometer GCN Architecture with 10 Compute cores (640 Stream Processors), 40 Texture Units, 64 Z/Stencil ROP Units, and 16 Color ROP Units. As with all GHz Edition AMD HD 7770 graphics cards, it is designed for at least 1 GHz core speed and 1125 MHz (4500 GHz effective) GDDR5 memory across a 128-bit bus. The Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC is the single fastest card in this category with a core speed of 1.15 GHz (1150 MHz) and 1250 MHz (5000 MHz effective) speed for the 1 GB memory onboard.
The Sapphire GHz Edition OC has plenty of connectivity as well with 1 x Dual-Link DVI, 1 x HDMI (with 3D), and 2 x Mini-DisplayPort. The DVI port is capable of 2560 x 1600 at 60 Hz. The HDMI supports full 3D stereoscopic 7.1 high bit rate audio. These ports can be combined to support AMD Eyefinity for up to four monitors. The Sapphire HD 7770 itself also has support for CrossfireX with one additional video card.
The Sapphire HD 7770 brings all the weapons the AMD 7000 series of graphics cards brings to the table as well. It has support for OpenGL 4.2, Enhanced Quality Anti-Aliasing (EQAA), 16x angle independent anisotropic texture filtering, ZeroCore power management, supports OpenCL™ 1.2, DirectCompute 11, Microsoft C++ AMP, and built for PCI Express 3.0 interface.
All of this can be found for around $149.99 US at retail. In this range are cards in AMD’s own stable which include the fairly abundant HD 6850 and the nVIDIA equivalent, GTX 550 Ti editions.
Whats in the Box?
The content of the box is what you should expect from a mid-range graphics card with a few bonuses that pander to folks that may not have the most up to date systems. This is why Sapphire includes a DVI to VGA adapter and a PCI 6-pin to molex 4-pin adapter, making it easier to use your older monitor or a slightly older power supply. In addition you will have your user manual, driver installation disk, product registration information, CrossfireX bridge, and Sapphire case badge.
In addition to the above items that help out with people upgrading from older systems, there are a few bonus here that I believe are above and beyond the bare minimum. The Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC also includes an HDMI cable and mini-DP to full sized DisplayPort adapter. This is great as these items are often considered optional and are often the first things companies remove to cut cost and lower the price. While it is true you can find a few other HD 7770 GHz Edition cards on the market for less, it’s worth noting that those units are slower and do not come with these bonuses.
Test Setup
Hardware
The test system for the Sapphire 7770 GHz Edition OC has not changed since our original GIGABYTE 990FXA-UD7 review. The only real difference between the two test setups were updates to related test software which I will address in detail.
- Graphics Card: Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC & AMD HD 6850 1 GB Reference
- CPU: AMD FX-8150 AM3+
- CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D14
- Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-990FXA-UD7
- Memory: G.Skill Ripjaw 2133 MHz 8 GB (2 x 4 GB) 9-11-10-27 T1 @ 1866 MHz 9-10-9-27 T1
- Power Supply: Antec High Current Pro 850 Watt 80+ Gold
- System Drives: Patriot Pyro SATA III MLC 60 GB (Sandforce 2281 controller)
- Case: SilverStone TJ04-E Evolution
Software
The software used this time around is limited to what is needed for testing the graphical performance. There have been several driver updates and the Windows 7 AMD FX patches since the last time I documented the AMD HD 6850 1GB performance. To ensure accuracy, the HD 6850 1 GB was retested across the board at my monitor’s maximum resolution of 1920 x 1080.
- FRAPS
- EA Origin
- Battlefield 3
- Steam
- Metro 2033
- AMD Catalyst Control Center
- FurMark GPU Stress Tester 1.91
Now that our system is setup with the right parts and software, let’s start off with an adventure in overclocking…
Adventures in Overclocking
Overclocking the Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC was impressive but futile. This version of the Sapphire HD 7770 has a factory overclock of 1150 MHz core and 1250 MHz memory. This places it just north of some of the best overclocking numbers reached by other cards which often stopped at 1100 MHz. When I began to push the clock rate up, I found that Sapphire has already squeezed every drop of power that they could already.
I was ultimately able to get the Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC to perform some tasks such as media playback and converting video files at 1190 MHz; however, any attempt at 3D tasks such as gaming results in an immediate crash. AMD CCC allowed me to add up to 50 % power to the card which is the only way I could even get the HD 7770 to reach 1190 MHz. The issue was not related to heat as the card stays well within specs during these attempts.
The best speed I could reach with 100% stability and the ability to play a 3D game (Battlefield 3 in this case) for several hours with no worry was at 1170 MHz and 1275 MHz memory. The question would then be is it worth it to overclock the Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC any further. Well lets find out!
Synthetic Graphical Performance (3DMark11)
We will start with getting a general idea of what we can expect from the Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC with 3DMark11. This should give us a good idea of the in game performance which is ultimately why most people will spend $100+ on a new graphics card of any kind.
There is a slight advantage over the HD 6850 in all tests with overclocking the HD 7770 bumping it up a fraction more. It would seem that low end games should run better on the HD 7770 with performance between it and the HD 6850 leveling out the more demanding the games become. Lets see if this holds true with real games.
Real World DirectX Performance (Resident Evil 5 & Alien Vs. Predator)
First I would like to see the performance of the Sapphire HD 7770 across all three DirectX versions. In the AvP portion we should also get a good idea about how tessellation performance has been improved or not. Resident Evil 5 is tested using the variable benchmark with settings maxed out, frame rate unlocked, and VSync disabled. AvP was tested with its default settings which includes DX11, more moderate tessellation, and high graphical detail.
The Sapphire HD 7770 falls behind the HD 6850 by 11.5% in DX9 and by 19% in DX10 at stock settings; however, it pulls ahead in DX11 testing by 2 %. Overclocking the memory and core as little as I could does give an extra frame or two per second of improvement, but nothing significant and surely nothing that one should go after as it may risk stability or reliability long term.
High Performance Gaming (Metro 2033 & Battlefield 3)
The Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition seems to have an advantage with DX11 games. This could very well be true as the GCN architecture was intended to be forward thinking. Lets confirm that and see if the older game engines perform better or worse with the new architecture of the HD 7770.
Metro 2033 was tested with all settings maxed out using FRAPS in the same section for both cards. Battlefield 3 was tested using FRAPS on Kharg Island during a full 64 man game of conquest on the same server. I did my best to ensure I fought in the same flags during each test to minimize variables. I tested 10 minutes of gameplay spending time spotting aircraft, driving vehicles, as well as engaged in small and large scale ground fights.
I was not surprised to see performance improve when switching from Metro 2033 to Battlefield 3 as Metro is notorious for its demanding game engine. I was shocked to see how much the modern engine of BF3 does improve performance on the same hardware. As you can see, the Sapphire HD 7770 has a higher average and minimum frame rate, but loses a lot of ground in maximum frame rate.
I also noticed during gameplay that the HD 7770 played much smoother. As noted earlier, the minimum framerates are higher which can lead to a much more fluid gaming experience. The 960 Streaming cores of the 6850 can produce more frames per second, but can’t maintain it when incidental graphical demands come into play. This includes explosions, fire, smoke, movement of other player sprites, etc. One has to wonder if the clock speed may be the limiting factor for the older card.
While the HD 7770 only has 640 Streaming cores, the near 400 MHz clock speed advantage seems to make up for this short coming. It could also be a clear sign the new GCN architecture is simply more powerful per core.
Media Converting (Media Espresso 6.5)
Lets take a look at how the Sapphire HD 7770 performances doing something other than 3D gaming. In this test I took an H.264 720p five minute video and converted it to be resized and playable on an iPhone 4 mobile device. This test was done using the built in presets and full hardware acceleration.
The Sapphire HD 7770 completes this test at exactly 2 minutes (120 seconds) in all four runs. The HD 6850 completes the same task in 2 minutes 3 seconds (123 seconds) in both of its runs. The HD 7770 comes out on top, but not by very much.
Now let’s look at some other factors that affect the overall performance of the card like power consumption, cooling, and then we’ll take this review on home.
Power Consumption
Speaking of power, lets see home much power was being consumed by these graphics cards during full load. These test were done by using FurMark GPU stress test to ensure 99% to 100% usage of the GPU core. Idle testing was observed once the card reached its minimal temperature and sat unused for at least 10 minutes. Please note that the computer was not running any programs, but was not allowed to enter sleep mode either.
The Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC takes a very distinct advantage here. At idle the HD 7770 uses 13.4 watts less power. At full load, it uses 21.6 watts less power at stock and 11.5 watts less overclocked. This brings to light a very simply fact: Overclocking the Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC any further is not worth it. You only gain 1 or 2 FPS for a full 10 watts at load. I personally would rather just save money on the power bill and increase the lifespan of my hardware.
Cooling Performance
Now lets see how well these room area heaters perform keeping things toasty in the winter. This test is simple as I simply took the temperature readings directly from AMD CCC while I was testing power consumption. These temperatures matched with with FurMark as well.
There is simply no competition here as the Sapphire HD 7770 is 16 degrees C cooler at idle and 15 degrees C cooler at full load. Even when overclocked further it still holds a commanding lead over the HD 6850. Once again though the 50% additional power requirement to gain the meager 20 MHz/25 MHz is just not worth the extra 6 degrees. While not much, coupled with the 10 watts of extra power being burned for virtually no gain is just pointless.
Noise Production
Testing the amount of noise created by the Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC proved to be more difficult than expected. While enclosed within either of two cases I tried, neither card produces enough noise to heard over case fans. When I attempted to test the cards with the case fans disabled and the side panel removed, only the reference 6850 1GB produces enough noise to register on my meter’s minimum of 30 dBA at full load.
While I could not get the proper test results to visualize this, the Sapphire HD 7770 is less noisy than the HD 6850 Reference card at full load. I believe the noise at idle for the HD 7770 is lower as well, but I cannot be sure enough to state that as a fact. I can say the noise the HD 7770 does create is more mellow and easier on the ears, and for the most part, is a non factor.
Final Thoughts
The Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC is the best in its class, but still not very impressive in the grand scheme of things. Don’t get me wrong here. At the price point of $149.99 it is a great buy for those building a new mid range system or those upgrading from any previous generation card that is a 6790 or lower. Even if a similarly priced AMD GPU matches performance, it will still be at a clear win in power consumption, noise, and cooling for this card, as illustrated by its battle with its closest sibling still on the market, the HD 6850.
If you can only spend $150 on a new card I would give some consideration to the Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition, Sapphire HD 7770 GHz Edition OC, and the Nvidia GTX 550 Ti (or the GTX 460 Ti which has come down a lot in price and can still be found in stock at many retailers). The Sapphire HD 7770 OC is not the best price to performance ratio card, but is no slouch either. Sapphire creates value for it by including extras and providing a nice overclock over stock.
I personally would not consider this card, but I am also one who normally spends around $300 on each GPU upgrade at a time. It is a market that something with the HD 7770 capabilities could never compete in; however, I could easily recommend this to anyone looking to add a little punch to a pre-built system or a budget gaming rig. There are still many games that will run at optimum frame rates that are very popular such as Counter Strike and Starcraft II.
On the other hand, It would also be a great card for a work system that needs multiple monitors. The connectivity is quite extensive at this price point.
There really is nothing bad to say about the card itself, but it does fall a little short when you factor in what is available for the same price in the marketplace, when you are looking at gaming cards. nVidia has a few options as mentioned and even something as old as the GTX 460 Ti, is still available at retailers for around the same price.
In the end, it really isn’t the fault for the mediocrity of this card. Sapphire has done all they can with the HD 7770 GPU. Until some of the old vets start disappearing from the market, the good of this GPU just isn’t good enough for the asking price.
Pros:
- Low Power Usage
- Low Noise
- Solid Performance in demanding Games
Cons:
- More Expensive than Other 7770 GHz Edition Offerings
- Virtually No Additional Overclocking Headroom
Overall Score: 8.0 / 10.0
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