HD 8000 OEM cards rebadged HD 7000

pwnmachine said:

"why does my 8970 not perform as good as..."

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Or for those of us who factor the selling price of our current cards into our budgets for the next cards having to deal with lowball offers who link the same damn card and offer half the price because of the lower number .

OEM Versus Retail?

AMD Raden HD8970 Specifications
http://www.amd.com/us/Documents/AMD_Radeon_HD_8970_Feature_Summary.pdf

AMD Radeon™ HD 8970 GHz Edition GPU Feature Summary (OEM)
1GHz Engine Clock (up to 1.05GHz with boost)
3GB GDDR5 Memory
1500MHz Memory Clock (6.0 Gbps GDDR5)
288GB/s memory bandwidth
4.3 TFLOPS Single Precision compute power
1.07 TFLOPS Double Precision compute power
GCN Architecture1
32 Compute Units (2048 Stream Processors)
128 Texture Units
128 Z/Stencil ROP Units
32 Color ROP Units
Dual geometry units
Dual Asynchronous Compute Engines (ACE)

AMD Radeon HD7970 GHz Edition Specifications
http://www.amd.com/US/PRODUCTS/DESKTOP/GRAPHICS/7000/7970GHZ/Pages/radeon-7970GHz.aspx

1GHz Engine Clock (up to 1.05GHz with boost)
3GB GDDR5 Memory
1500MHz Memory Clock (6.0 Gbps GDDR5)
288GB/s memory bandwidth
4.3 TFLOPS Single Precision compute power
1.01 TFLOPS Double Precision compute power
GCN Architecture
32 Compute Units (2048 Stream Processors)
128 Texture Units
128 Z/Stencil ROP Units
32 Color ROP Units
Dual geometry units
Dual Asynchronous Compute Engines (ACE)

(Reference AMD Radeon HD7970 Specifications)
http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/7000/7970/Pages/radeon-7970.aspx#/3

Up t 925MHz Engine Clock
3GB GDDR5 Memory
1375MHz Memory Clock (5.5Gbps GDDR5)
264GB/s memory bandwidth (maximum)
3.79 TFLOPS Single Precision compute power
947 GFLOPS Double Precision compute power
GCN Architecture
32 compute units (2048 Stream Processors)
128 Texture Units
128 Z/Stencil ROP Units
32 Color ROP Units
Dual Geometry Engines
Dual Asynchronous Compute Engines (ACE)


Based on what I'm seeing above, the only difference between the 7970 GHz Edition and the 8970 GHz Edition is the 8970 has 0.06 more TFLOPS. These aren't Mobile parts. That may be explained either as a typo by the person entering the information on their website, or they refined the core a "smidgen", at best.

Now...I understand companies rebadging products since I've seen it hundreds of times over the last 25+years, but I have never seen an instance where a product marketed as "Product A", an "Enthusiast" level product has X performance as an OEM part and the exact same make and model has 40% higher performance because it's marked as a "Retail" product, (even though it's the same model of product.)

That'd be the equivelant of selling a Bugatti Veyron SuperSport, capable of 258MPH, as an "OEM" version of the car while the exact same model of Bugatti Veyron SuperSport, now specified as a "Retail" version, suddenly now does 361MPH

This being the case, the "Retail" 8970 had better be shipping with a minimum of 500MHz faster Core and Memory if they expect to see a 40% improvement in performance...and if it is shipping with 500MHz more on the core, can it, in all honesty, really be called the same "model" of video card?

notarat said:

Based on what I'm seeing above, the only difference between the 7970 GHz Edition and the 8970 GHz Edition is the 8970 has 0.06 more TFLOPS. These aren't Mobile parts. That may be explained either as a typo by the person entering the information on their website, or they refined the core a "smidgen", at best.

Now...I understand companies rebadging products since I've seen it hundreds of times over the last 25+years, but I have never seen an instance where a product marketed as "Product A", an "Enthusiast" level product has X performance as an OEM part and the exact same make and model has 40% higher performance because it's marked as a "Retail" product, (even though it's the same model of product.)

That'd be the equivelant of selling a Bugatti Veyron SuperSport, capable of 258MPH, as an "OEM" version of the car while the exact same model of Bugatti Veyron SuperSport, now specified as a "Retail" version, suddenly now does 361MPH

This being the case, the "Retail" 8970 had better be shipping with a minimum of 500MHz faster Core and Memory if they expect to see a 40% improvement in performance...and if it is shipping with 500MHz more on the core, can it, in all honesty, really be called the same "model" of video card?

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you're misunderstanding the conversation completely.

The 8970 OEM IS a 7970 renamed. Thats why you don't see any difference in the specs. there is no difference. they just renamed it. This is what the thread is about.

The actual 8970 coming out this year will feature (according to it's supposed specs) something in line of a 25%-40% boost in performance over the 7970... which means there will be 2 types of 8970 floating around on the aftermarket. The HD8970 OEM and the HD8970... with a difference in performance in line of 25%-40%... this will make ebay and craigslist a pain in the butt to navigate for the enthusiast and kill the aftermarket value of the 8xxx series; unless they break their naming convention for the new chips and go with hd9xxx or step out of the xx50-xx70 naming process and really confuse the picture, by making the new 89xx chips something like an 8980 and 8975 or something. that would be really annoying.

This is they type of crap NVidea is famous for. it's a crying shame to see AMD sink deeper into this level (they did this last year too, only not as brazenly). what bugs me the most about this, is they were saying the next gen APU lineup will sport an HD8XXX GPU core. AMD already pulled this rebranding name game with the last gen APU calling it a 7660 core (the previous OEM HD 7660 was a renamed 6670), when in reality it was a 6670. What are they going to do with this one? claim it's an HD8760 meaning it's really a HD7770?

don't get me wrong, an hd7770 core would be a huge jump in performance over a 6670... but it's just agrivating the games they are playing with these names.

Nothing new. OEM stuff is usualy rebadged "old generation stuff", so where is the news?!?

It wont affect the true 8000 series, thats the important thing to tell. We dont buy OEM, most of us, so there isnt much hit.

The OEM buyers dont truly care, most of them got no clue whats inside. All they see is "oh 8000, nice nice, its a even higher number it must be good", and then they gonna buy it. Its how OEM buyers behave, just accept reality and no need to intercept. They get what they are looking for, a high number, nothing else. Reality is, how did companys such as Apple grow that powerful? Because people are believer, most of them are not critical, all they want is to believe in some kind of image or name. Apple for example usualy was providing average hardware specs at a insane price (produced inside a usual Foxxcon facility, such as all the other stuff). The only stuff truly exceeding all the others was the outstanding software but nowadays some other companys are slowly catching up to them but Apple is still hard to beat because of theyr image.

So, power does matter to performance users and enthusiasts but it does absolutly not matter to most OEM buyers. AMD can use the 7000 series and grant them the image of the 8000 series. Nvidia will do the same stuff, im almost certain.

its a good way of moving stock

trekky said:

its a good way of moving stock

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A sly way of moving stock.

pwnmachine said:

I still take issue with them renaming old cards simply due to the fact that people who buy OEM systems can't tell the difference. Not to mention the influx of threads we will get asking "why does my 8970 not perform as good as..."

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Xenohitsu said:

A sly way of moving stock.

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How about instead of dogpiling AMD, you put some blame on the OEMs - the companies that are actually selling (and probably demanded in the first place) the "fake" 8xxx series.

i agree its probly mostly Dell, HP etc who does this
cheap GPUs because of age AMD whats space because of the new 8xxx and Dell and HP etc wants to buy them and sell them for close if not Full price
business wise is a Win Win
AMD wins by selling old GPUs
Dell,HP etc wins by selling old GPUs to ppl who dont any better that have deep pockets

petteyg359 said:

How about instead of dogpiling AMD, you put some blame on the OEMs - the companies that are actually selling (and probably demanded in the first place) the "fake" 8xxx series.

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I wasn't dissing AMD- I was writing about the rebranders in prebuilt systems.

pwnmachine said:

^^ That's a pretty slimy move imo, seems like they are preying on the misinformed people who buy those systems to begin with...

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Funny how Apple bases its whole business model on exactly that, but when another company does the same thing, it becomes a bit of a witch hunt.

First time I've seen this kind of thing from AMD. Pretty standard from Nvidia (rebadging kings?). I'm disappointed to see it from AMD too now

Bobnova said:

First time I've seen this kind of thing from AMD. Pretty standard from Nvidia (rebadging kings?). I'm disappointed to see it from AMD too now

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well it's the vendors of prebuilt systems calling them that, unless i'm mistaken and AMD is giving the cards an official seal of rebadging.

Bobnova said:

First time I've seen this kind of thing from AMD. Pretty standard from Nvidia (rebadging kings?). I'm disappointed to see it from AMD too now

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Once more: It's more likely that the OEMs were the initiator of this "problem". Sure, AMD could have told them to eff off, but that'd be a really stupid business decision. Let ignorant fools buying pre-built systems without knowing a thing about the hardware be ignorant fools, and do your best to educate those you can. I'd rather see ignorant fools with old "current-gen" GPUs than AMD bleeding worse (by having a bunch of unsellable inventory) than they already are. The $2.67 stock price is killing me

Xenohitsu said:

well it's the vendors of prebuilt systems calling them that, unless i'm mistaken and AMD is giving the cards an official seal of rebadging.

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AMD doesn't have to do anything other than permit vendors to change the identification strings in the BIOS. As above, AMD could probably have told them "no", but that would be silly from any viewpoint.

You know guys the more I think about this the more I'm thinking we are all looking at this in the wrong light.
AMD needs to stay liquid in this business. They have to roll with the punches and give what the customers(us and the OEMs) want or they'll sink. "The customers always right" as they say.
We want new tech, but the OEMs want deep discounts for volume buying. How do they do it? By re-branding.
I don't think it's really AMDs intention to "prey on the misinformed" so much as it is to just give us all what we want. End users and the OEMs. Win, win.
HP, Dell...etc have the kind of buying power to strong-arm companies like AMD to do what they(OEMs) need. The reality is it's just smart business at both ends.
The kind of people that buy OEMs "generally" don't really care if it's a true 8970 or a re-baged 7970. They're more interested in the warranty and after purchase customer service...
We all "in the know" so we know better than to buy OEM. We know exactly what we're looking for when buy new cards.
AMD and Nvidia are both only doing what needs to be done to stay ahead. Taking care of customers on both ends.

@TonyMc I can agree with your statement like 90% my only thing is this. Rebranding is necessary some times but DONT give the rebrand the same part number as another off the shelf part thats using totally different tech. I think calling it an 89(40/60) for the OEM stuffs would make alot more sense and prevent the (very small) number of upsets a customer with an OEM 8950 who suddenly decides to go crossfire that are going to happen.

ssjwizard said:

a customer with an OEM 8950 who suddenly decides to go crossfire that are going to happen.

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That customer is going to be sending it back in to Dell for that upgrade, or purchasing the upgrade part from Dell, and is probably afraid to buy anything without the Dell sticker on it. It's highly unlikely they'll somehow end up not only figuring out what Crossfire is, but also buying a $500 card that they know nothing about, and attempting to install it themselves.

if this is really true about the 8970 being a rebadged HD7970, at least they might have a higher clock speed that we can overclock our 7970s to the 8970s clock speed.

remember what nvidia did with the Nvidia Geforce 5200? they overclocked it, threw it in a box, and sold it with the name "Geforce 5500"

I did note that its a very small number of people who will encounter said issue. In general I don't have a problem with rebranding.

I'm kinda thinking this is mainly the OEMs doing. They are very doubtful of windows 8 sales (we've all at least seen the reports) and tablets are starting to be the only thing the general public cares about, wo they need to find any way of increasing sales. I'm willing to bet that if windows 8 was more welcomed and tablets weren't taking over everything then this whole thing would probably not have occurred, or at least so boldly.