AMD Radeon HD 7970, 7950, 7870 Price Cuts Inbound. 7970GE Available Next Week?
by Ryan Smith on July 14, 2012 7:30 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
- AMD
- Radeon HD 7000
For those of you in the market for a new video card, in case April’s round of AMD Radeon price cuts didn’t quite meet your desires, AMD has ordered up another round of price cuts that will be taking effect on Monday.
The Radeon HD 7970, Radeon HD 7950, and Radeon HD 7870 are all getting official price cuts. The 7970 will be dropping from $479 to $429, the 7950 from $399 to $349, and the 7870 from $349 to $299.
| Summer 2012 Radeon HD 7000 Series Price Cuts | ||||||
| Card | Launch Price | Spring MSRP | Summer MSRP | |||
| Radeon HD 7970 | $549 | $479 | $429 | |||
| Radeon HD 7950 | $449 | $399 | $349 | |||
| Radeon HD 7870 | $349 | $349 | $299 | |||
| Radeon HD 7850 | $249 | $249 | ~$239 | |||
| Radeon HD 7770 | $159 | $139 | ~$119 | |||
| Radeon HD 7750 | $109 | $109 | ~$99 | |||
With all of that said however, as we’re in the middle of a product cycle with partners shipping custom cards, in practice AMD doesn’t have a great deal of control over final card pricing beyond what they charge partners for parts. So unofficially these prices have been in effect for some time since partners and stores have not been holding to AMD’s MSRPs. Indeed as of Friday evening the cheapest cards on Newegg are already below AMD’s official MSRPs, so today’s announcement mainly serves to bring attention to price movements that have already happened.
| Summer 2012 GPU Pricing Comparison | |||||
| AMD | Price | NVIDIA | |||
| Radeon HD 7970 Ghz Edition | $499 | GeForce GTX 680 | |||
| Radeon HD 7970 | $429 | ||||
| $399 | GeForce GTX 670 | ||||
| Radeon HD 7950 | $349 | ||||
| Radeon HD 7870 | $299 | ||||
| Radeon HD 7850 | $239/$249 | GeForce GTX 570 | |||
| $199 | GeForce GTX 560 Ti | ||||
| $159 | GeForce GTX 560 | ||||
| Radeon HD 7770 | $119 | ||||
| Radeon HD 7750 | $99 | GeForce GT 640 DDR3 | |||
On that note, AMD sends word that their free game promotions will continue to be active for some time, including both the HD 7900 Series Three For Free promotion and their HD 7800/7700 series DiRT Showdown promotion (though Newegg seems to have deactivated it as of this writing).
Finally, we’ve been asking AMD about the status of the new 7970 GHz Edition, which has so far been missing in action. After originally being scheduled to have limited availability in late June with wider availability in early July, the 7970GE has slipped by at least a couple of weeks – an unusual thing to happen to what has otherwise been a punctual AMD. At this time AMD is telling us that most of their partners have decided to launch the 7970GE on their customized premium cards, which has resulted in availability being pushed back. If all goes according to plan, AMD is expecting XFX and Sapphire to have cards available early next week. However prices will bear keeping an eye on since it’s unlikely that partners will stick to the $499 MSRP if they’re using the 7970GE for their premium cards.
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StevoLincolnite - Sunday, July 15, 2012 - link
The 5770 was rebadged as the 6770 so it didn't change places, just the series number.But no, the 5770 should be compared to the 7770 or 7750 based on price.
CeriseCogburn - Tuesday, July 24, 2012 - link
Yeah I just went looking at the latest benches to see what driver updates have done and the 6950 is beating the 7850 half the time, the GTX560Ti is doing the same, the GTX570 is beating all those three.So what we have is amd making another card round that's almost the same as last time - that's why it was so, so, so important for the reviewer here to praise AMD for wiping out and getting rid of 6950 and 6970 stock before the 7850 and 7870 launch.
It's like amd had to price prop itself - as it's older 69xx were old news and languishing, so spit out two equivalents, dry up the fairly new old stuff, and sell the same thing for lots more $$ to start with, as the drooling fanboys wouldn't be able to resist and wail they have a new victory.
So, this many months later, the amd absolutists still have to claim everyone in should buy the 7850 for instance, because it "overclocks". It's so sad.
nVidia didn't waste everyone's time, money, and the world's resources, spitting out a couple internal clone parts just for some pie in the sky profit fantasy- just look to the still very available GTX570 (already declared dead and unavailable many months ago by the amd rave reviewers) - not to mention the now unmentioned GTX460.
It's amazing to me what I see online, so it was nice StevoLinconite to see someone with a lick of sense who buys amd.
raghu78 - Sunday, July 15, 2012 - link
"In any case, it's nice to see the MSRPs on the 7-series Radeons more accurately reflecting their stock performance. "corrected that statement. Everybody knows the HD 7950 OC cards are good overclockers and do 1 - 1.05 Ghz at stock voltage and 1.15 Ghz with voltage tweaking. Frankly you are not missing anything in performance and have got yourself a great deal. HD 7950 at 1.15 Ghz is going to win more games against a GTX 670 1.25 Ghz . HD 7950 at 1.15 Ghz will give you better performance than HD 7970 Ghz edition. whats not to like about that especially when you have got the card for USD 150+ cheaper than the soon to arrive Radeon HD 7970 Ghz. enjoy your card and good luck overclocking your card.
CeriseCogburn - Tuesday, July 24, 2012 - link
No need to correct a factual statement, the amd corporate pig trough has been slopping it down their evil giant gourd for far too long this time.CeriseCogburn - Sunday, July 29, 2012 - link
Nope. 670 wins easilyhttp://www.overclock.net/t/1256502/670-vs-7950-ove...
Sorry raghu, amd is a loser, better get used to it.
CeriseCogburn - Sunday, July 29, 2012 - link
Let's not forget what real people with real cards are saying:" And while we're on records, my Sapphire 7950 OC 950MHz didn't do 1100MHz on stock voltage. Stock voltage was 1.033v for my card and it took 1.093v for mine to be fully stable in games and benches at 1100MHz, beyond 1140MHz took was mostly impossible without adding too much voltage and creating too much heat. The Sapphire cooler really starts to struggle with these cards at 1100MHz+ and 1.1v+.
Unless you plan to watercool a 7950 and really ramp up the voltage, the 670 will perform better and do it quieter and cooler. "
Once again, reality is not the fantasy layout amd cheerleaders claim it is.
GeneralJava - Saturday, July 14, 2012 - link
"However prices will be bear keeping an eye on since it’s unlikely that partners will stick to the $499 MSRP if they’re using the 7970GE for their premium cards."There appears to be an extraneous "be" in the above statement, wordsmithing aside I must admit I am a little curious about the GE Edition.
All right, I got my skid lid on, I am ready to be thrown under the bus for nit picking.. :-)
StrangerGuy - Sunday, July 15, 2012 - link
Compared to their own ~$150 6870 their entire 7 series was/is priced as a joke to begin with for the needs of most people.Impulses - Sunday, July 15, 2012 - link
Last gen cards were priced incredibly well and offered a lot of bang for the buck, it's gonna take another generation of cards to completely obsolesce previous gen parts and/or give people a reason to upgrade. This isn't terribly uncommon tho, 'specially with the GPU market slowing down a bit.CeriseCogburn - Tuesday, July 24, 2012 - link
Last gen amd was a bloated dollar pig price up to the very moment this 7x series launched and suddenly they were unavailable. (save the lower 6870 6850)As was just pointed out the 6950 and 6970 make a mockery of the 7850 and 7870.
That's why this time, once again, nVidia slapped amd upside their corporate stupid greedy choppers and actually gave us gamers something new in the drivers!
Hello adaptive v-sync, hello target framerate, hello active now back to former series for those who already have the current horsepower in the line-ups.
( gtx 460, 560 560ti, 560 448, 570 580 - in case your mind is blank).
nVidia delivered, it's called DRIVER INNOVATION.
Once again, after the massive green paw slapping that pinko amd face redder, I am treated for months to hardcore amd fanboys all a flutter with their stupid overlcocking talk crap - so stupid it is as they pretend to themselves and anyone else dumb enough to listen that their current hotcore housefire smoking up the power lines is a geat thing to overclock, when moments before all they had to say for themselves was "power vs performance" as they squealed like a girl for amd cards - it's amazing really, the pretend stance that nVidia cards don't overlcock well, when they do better and more stable when run in that mode.
Now how many nVidia implemented features that amd utterly and completely lacks on every card level do I have to ignore to be an amd fanboy ? It appears the count is somewhere past half a dozen, though that is probably a lowball.
At least amd ripped off their fanboys, or left them wishing they had the money to pay their fanmaster, or gouged them moments before dropping the price on their crap cards, "again" and "again" since low sales demanded they do something... in that respect I am highly pleased- though no amount of market evidence will ever do for that bizaroo world the amd fan lives in - and is all to often readily able to point out just how trapped they are in it.
I'd just like to thank nVidia for their massive driver coup with the ultimate set of new features they have provided all of us, and it's obvious effects on amd's bloated pig corpo greed factor pricing amd led with, as amd concurrently slashed it's no doubt lowal fanboy employees to the bone with no care for them whatsoever.