As expected, AMD has released its brand new HD6000 generation dual GPU graphics card, the Radeon HD 6990. The company has squished two Cayman GPUs (HD 6970s) into a single enclosure, and in so doing has released the world’s fastest graphics card. Sadly for AMD, the odds are against the HD 6990 holding this title once Nvidia releases its GTX 590, which is rumoured to be arriving next week.
Still, for now it is the world’s fastest graphics card.
We all know that this sort of title doesn’t come cheap, and AMD has given the HD 6990 a local recommended retail price of around R7,300. This will of course vary between manufacturers, so it may be possible to pick one up for around R6,500 from one of the cheaper makers. In comparison, an equivalent setup using two HD 6970s in crossfire would set you back at best around R7,200, so in terms of scaling with the HD 6970’s price tag, the HD 6990 offers reasonable value.
However, R7K+ is a lot to spend on a single component, and this is just the sort of thing that console gamers love to tease PC gamers about. Of course, the same console gamers are still waiting for full HD gaming to become standard.
Features
Before we get to performance, it is worth briefly looking at the HD 6990’s feature list, which most notably includes its external BIOS switch which allows you to switch between two different BIOS profiles. The first is the default profile, which runs the core clock speed at 830MHz, and the second is an overclocked profile, which bumps it up to 880MHz, also giving it an appropriate voltage boost.
It’s a nifty touch, although in all honesty, if you are spending this much money on a card, you’re probably an enthusiast who knows their way around overclocking software.
The HD 6990 comes standard with 4GB of graphics memory. This makes it ideal for super high resolution gaming or heavy anti-aliasing settings. In fact, the HD 6990 is the ideal card for a monster Eyefinity setup, and comes standard with four miniDP ports and one DL-DVI Port. It also ships with 3 adapters: mini DP to SL-DVI Passive, mini DP to SL-DVI Active, and mini DP to HDMI Passive.
Because the graphics card makes use of two high performance GPUs, not to mention more RAM than many gaming PCs, it generates a fair amount of heat. For that reason, it comes standard with dual vapour chambers to keep temperatures in check.
Performance
By my own admission, the Radeon HD 6990 is not ideally suited to a 1920×1200 resolution monitor. To really get the best out of it, you will want something with more pixels, or even three full HD monitors running as an Eyefinity setup. However, I still pushed it as hard as possible with the hardware available.
Benchmarks
All benchmarks were run on the same PC, with the only changing variable being the graphics card. CCleaner along with Driver Sweeper were used to make sure there were no left over files clogging up the registry. Each of the benchmarks were run three times to ensure consistent results. All benchmarks were run at 1920×1200, with all settings set as high as possible, including anti-aliasing settings in order to push the cards as hard as possible. The scores in the graphs below indicate the average frames per second achieved in each benchmark.
Benchmark rig
AMD Phenom II [email protected], 8GB DDR3 1333MHz RAM, Gigabyte GA-MA790FXT-UD5P motherboard, Windows 7 64-bit
Battlefield: Bad Company 2
We used a specific timed sequence in the beginning of the single player campaign in conjunction with FRAPs to get an average score in Bad Company 2. DICE’s Frostbite engine is one of the most impressive pieces of technology in gaming today, and Bad Company 2 scales quite nicely with different hardware.
On maximum settings at 1920×1200 (full AA), the HD 6990 is the only card we have tested that managed to break the 100 fps mark, and convincingly. It comfortably beat our previous performance king, Nvidia’s GTX 580.
Batman: Arkham Asylum
Arkham Asylum uses the Unreal Engine 3.5, making it an important game in these benchmarks given the popularity of this engine in modern gaming.
The Unreal engine scales nicely with mid range cards, and even the HD 5770 manages 90 frames per second at max detail settings. The HD 6990 basically provided an identical experience to that of the GTX 580, which suggests that we may be looking at a CPU bottleneck, or some sort of frame rate limiter at 190 frames per second.
Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising
Dawn of War II: Chaos Rising was one of two games we tested which seemed not to benefit from the second GPU (the other being StarCraft II). Either that, or we are looking at a frame rate limiter of some sort which caps the game at just under 60 frames per second (yes, V-sync was off).
Dirt 2
I was actually quite disappointed with my Dirt 2 results. While the HD 6990 was able to outstrip its single GPU counterpart by a few frames per second, it was bested by the cheaper GTX 580, and even the GTX 570 managed to deliver more frames per second.
STALKER: Call of Pripyat
Like Bad Company 2, the STALKER: Call of Pripyat benchmark scales nicely with different graphics cards, showing noticeable differences between them. The HD 6990 came out tops, beating the GTX 580 by a handful of frames per second, and putting a good distance between itself and the HD 6970.
StarCraft II
StarCraft II, along with Dawn of War II has proved the least interesting of our benchmarking games, with the HD 6990 putting just 18 frames between itself and the budget friendly HD 5770. While its great that moderately speced PCs are able to run the game easily, it would be nice if there was more overhead for high-performance graphics cards to shine.
We may be looking at a frame rate limiter imposed following early reports of StarCraft II burning out graphics cards, as we were able to achieve far higher benchmarks when the game was first released.
StarCraft II seems not to make use of the second GPU on the HD 6990, offering identical performance to the HD 6970.
Performance conclusion
Overall, our benchmarks found that while certain games were able to harness the power of the second GPU, others simply did not provide a tangible performance increase over the HD 6970. In fairness, as previously mentioned, the card is not intended for 1920×1200 resolution gaming. For higher resolution benchmarks, check out Guru3D’s review.
You will want to make sure you have a monster CPU to keep up with the HD 6990, as there was evidence of our high-end Phenom II 970 possibly bottlenecking the system in certain instances. Something along the lines of an i7 965 would probably be ideally suited to the HD 6990.
There is no doubt that the HD 6990 is a beast of a card. In fact, it is fair to call it the fastest graphics card in the world, however, whether or not it will be able to hold this title following the launch of the GTX 590 remains to be seen.
You can add a performance increase of around 4-10% when running the card in “unlocked mode” using the previously mentioned BIOS switch.
Noise, heat and power consumption
When idling in Windows, the HD 6990 is basically inaudible over the sound of other system fans and components. Naturally, when it needs to perform, it gets quite a bit louder, and unless you have a good set of noise cancelling headphones, or a monster sound system which you have the luxury of using at high volume, the fan noise will probably annoy you while playing games.
It is significantly louder than Nvidia’s GTX 580 and GTX 570, as well as AMD’s own HD 6970.
Unlike the GTX 580 and HD 6970 which each require a 6-pin and an 8-pin PEG power connector, the HD 6990 requires two 8-pin connectors, so make sure your PSU has two of these. It requires an estimated 330 Watts of power to itself, which is a lot for a graphics card, but expected for a high-end dual GPU solution. You can add around 50 Watts to this figure if you plan on running it in “unlocked” mode.
You will essentially want a good quality PSU with no less than 750 Watts to run this card comfortably.
As expected, the HD 6990 runs hot. At idle it sits at around 40 degrees C. Under load it gets up to around 85 degrees C, which makes it thermally speaking very similar to the GTX 580. You will want a large case with good air flow to keep the card running optimally for extended periods of time.
Conclusion
The HD 6990 is currently the world’s fastest graphics card. The GTX 590 is rumoured to be released later this month, so if you’re looking to spend this much money and you want something that can drive games at super high resolutions, then you should probably wait to see how the two dual GPU behemoths compare.
As for the card itself, it is nothing short of beastly, and various reviews from around the web indicate that it scales very nicely in high resolution gaming. It is also the best option for anyone who wants to run a high resolution multi-monitor Eyefinity setup.
If you have a monitor of 1920×1200 resolution or below, then you will not see noticeable performance enhancements when comparing the HD 6990 to far more moderately price products such as the HD 6970 and GTX 570.
Pros
– World’s fastest graphics card
– Dual BIOS makes overclocking easier than ever
– 4GB RAM and dual GPUs ideal for high resolution gaming
– Reasonable thermal footprint for a dual GPU monster
Cons
– Expensive
– Requires high resolution monitor or Eyefinity setup to make the best of
– Loud under load
– Needs a decent 750W power supply and high-end CPU to keep up with it
– Massive card, make sure you have plenty of case space
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