AMD's Radeon HD 5870: Bringing About the Next Generation Of GPUs
by Ryan Smith on September 23, 2009 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
The First DirectX 11 Games
With any launch of a new DirectX generation of hardware, software availability becomes a concern. As the hardware needs to come before the software so that developers can tailor their games’ performance, it’s just not possible to immediately launch with games ready to go. For the launch of DirectX 11 and the 5800 series, AMD gave us a list of what games to expect and when.
First out of the gate is Battleforge, EA’s card-based online-only RTS. We had initially been told that it would miss the 5870 launch, but in fact EA and AMD managed to get it in under the wire and deliver it a day early. This gives AMD the legitimate claim of having a DX11 title out there that only their new hardware can fully exploit, and from a press perspective it’s nice to have something out there we can test besides tech demos. Unfortunately we wrapped up our testing 2 days early in order to attend IDF, which means we have not yet had a chance to benchmark this title’s DX11 mode or look at it in-depth.
We did have a chance to see the title in action quickly at AMD’s press event 2 weeks ago, where AMD was using it to show off High Definition Ambient Occlusion. As far as we can tell, HDAO is the only DX11 wonder-feature that it current implements, which makes sense given that it should be the easiest to patch in.
The next big title in AMD’s stack of DX11 games is STALKER: Call of Pripyat. This game went gold in Russia earlier this week, with the English version some time behind it. Unfortunately we don’t know what DX11 features it will be using, but as STALKER games have historically been hard on computers, it should prove to be an interesting test case for DX11 performance.
DIRT 2 is a title that got a great deal of promotion at AMD’s press event. AMD has been using it to show off their 6-way Eyefinity configuration, and we had a chance to play it quickly in their testing labs when looking at Eyefinity. This should be a fuller-featured DX11 game, utilizing tessellation, better shadow filtering, and other DX11 features. Certainly it’s the closest thing AMD’s going to have for a showcase title this year for the DX11 features of their hardware, and the console version has been scoring well in reviews. The PC version is due December 11th.
Finally, AMD had Rebellion Games in house to show off an early version of Aliens vs. Predator. This was certainly the most impressive title shown, with Rebellion showing off tessellation and HDAO in real time. Unfortunately screenshots don’t really do the game justice here; the difference from using DX11 is far more noticeable in motion. At any rate, this game is the farthest out – it won’t ship until Q1 of next year at the earliest.
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SiliconDoc - Friday, September 25, 2009 - link
LOL - you won't find me arguing, but that performance per dollar here is absolutely FAMOUS for guess whom, ati !Congratulations, for the first time someone other than myself conplained about it, of course, only when ATI has been implicated as a disaster in it.
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PS - I think what the chart is saying is, use some common sense, not go for 9500, but in your range you hope to purchase, the chart can be handy for picking between several.
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Also, the chart tells us, the 5870 is not bang for the buck.
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So, so sorry, it upset you so badly, the tips above for proper useage should be fine.
KaarlisK - Wednesday, September 23, 2009 - link
Actually, far more developers care about the next version of DirectX (pc-industry-wide vendor-independent development platform) than about PhysX (single vendor, low uptake currently). Not that PhysX would be unimportant.SiliconDoc - Wednesday, September 23, 2009 - link
Not quite time yet, you can "pre-order" one of 3 versions at tiger..LOLThis is not a "hard launch", this is a red RUSE !
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http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTool...">http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTool...
SiliconDoc - Wednesday, September 23, 2009 - link
Ok, hurry, the paper launch finally "cracked" a bit and there's one card of 4 5870's on newwegg that is suposedly "available for purchase".http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Sub...">http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi...1&na...
It's 1:33pm on the 23rd, so no guarantees there's more than 0 for actual sale....
Good luck on getting something other than paper. :-)
jabroni619 - Wednesday, September 23, 2009 - link
I'd better not get paper... I was able to place an order at newegg at midnight when they were available and 18 hours later it's showing a status of shipped. ;)SiliconDoc - Wednesday, September 23, 2009 - link
7:08PM CST Wed. Sept 23rd, 2009 -Out of the 9 "reviews" by "customers" on newegg for the 5870 card, only ONE of them has the revealing:
" This user purchased this item from Newegg " in blue by their name on the customer reviews tab.
LOL
So it looks like 8 posers and you. Hope you enjoy the XFX 5870,
"WoostaR"
WoostaR - Friday, October 2, 2009 - link
Thanks man, I actually went with 2 5870's. I know it's bit of overkill, yet future proof is better =)anyways, I have gotten over 17000 of 3dMark06. That's with Cpu.
I am running Core i7 @ 4 ghz
6GB of Gskill ram
Dual 5870 @ CF
750W Corsair.
EVGA 3x SLI
jabroni619 - Thursday, September 24, 2009 - link
Oh, and I didn't get the XFX, I got HIS. XFX wasn't even showing up when I placed my order. Only Sapphire, ASUS and HIS were, both the Sapphire and ASUS were OOS.jabroni619 - Thursday, September 24, 2009 - link
I haven't written a review yet as I haven't gotten the card. (hate it when people do that) I was a little worried up until just a few minutes ago when my UPS tracking# actually had some data. Estimated Delivery of 9/24/09. Hopefully it's waiting at the front door when I get home from work. I just spend the last 2 hours moving all the guts of my PC into a larger case to accommodate the card.SiliconDoc - Friday, September 25, 2009 - link
Apparently your luck is immaculate.http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/15673/1/">http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/15673/1/
" We talked to partners and some of them might have a few cards next week and October is the month when things should get better.
The big guys such as Newegg and Tigerdirect don’t have them, and in EU, a hundred plus cards are listed here, but none of them are available.
A launch partner in the UK got 20 cards ...
We hope that Radeon 5870 is not what AMD management calls a hard launch "
ROFL - At least one place doesn't have to censor itself