Final thoughts and rating
XFX knows it is on to a winner with the Radeon HD 7970 GPU. Excellent underlying design and gobs of performance make it the best choice for the enthusiast who's not encumbered with budget constraints, and we'll have to wait until NVIDIA releases its next-gen part, Kepler, at the very least, before AMD's premier GPU is shunted down the pecking order.
And while the reference card is perfectly serviceable, XFX also understands that differentiation is key in garnering interest and sales. One of the first out of the gate with a custom-cooled offering, XFX's HD 7970 Double Dissipation Edition provides incremental improvements over the AMD-supplied model.
The heatsink-and-fan unit is a touch quieter and cooler than AMD's, a fact which is impressive given the extra 25W or so XFX's card pulls. Yet we'd have preferred XFX to have taken this opportunity to increase the HD 7970's frequencies above default levels on this 'cheaper' card - the cooler can certainly handle it - though it does do so on other HD 7970 models in the range.
Semantics aside, XFX's card, looking quite different, is an improvement on the reference model, which, right now, makes it the best single-GPU card we've seen. Other AMD partners will have their say in the coming weeks, but if you want something a little different from the norm, XFX's Ghost-cooled model deserves to make a shortlist, at the very least.
The Good
It's a Radeon HD 7970
Custom cooler is a touch better than reference
Small-ish price premium
The Bad
No pre-overclocking
Slightly thirstier when under load
HEXUS Rating
XFX Radeon HD 7970 Double Dissipation Edition
HEXUS Awards
XFX Radeon HD 7970 Double Dissipation Edition
HEXUS Where2Buy
The XFX Radeon HD 7970 Double Dissipation Edition graphics card is available to purchase from scan.co.uk*.
HEXUS Right2Reply
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