AMD Radeon HD 7750

Low-price video cards are generally more attractive in theory than in practice. It?s easy to fall for the idea of an affordable add-in that lets you power through all the latest games, but the products hardware companies usually deliver seldom work as well as you might dream. Such is the case with the AMD Radeon HD 7750, which is priced at a wallet-friendly $109 (list) but not the kind of performer you?ll want to email home about. It has trouble maintaining steady footing against competition from last-generation cards from both Nvidia and AMD, which cost only slightly more, and doesn?t offer a rich enough advanced feature set to compensate. Most users will be able to do better.

The 7750 is the latest in AMD?s Southern Islands line (aka the 7000 series), and the baby brother to the AMD Radeon HD 7770 GHz Edition in the 7700 series (code-named ?Cape Verde?). Like that card, and the higher-end new models that have preceded them (the Radeon HD 7970 and Radeon HD 7950), it is based on the new 28nm Graphics Core Next architecture. This design uses a revised instruction set, which gives each compute unit the ability to simultaneously execute instructions from multiple kernels and process more instructions per clock cycle per square millimeter of GPU space. Other features in the 7000 series include PowerTune, which intelligently monitors and adjusts each application?s power usage independently when the electrical and thermal headroom exist for doing so; and ZeroCore Power, which shuts down both the GPU and fan during long idle periods to reduce power usage even more. Previously introduced proprietary AMD innovations are here as well, such as Eyefinity, which gives you a hassle-free way to configure multiple-monitor setups, and HD3D, for stereoscopic 3D.

It?s with its specs that the 7750 starts differing drastically from the 7770. Its engine clock is 800MHz, compared with 1GHz. It has 512 stream processors, rather than 640. Compute performance is rated at 819 gigaflops; the 7770?s is 1.28 teraflops. It has 32 texture units and a 25.6GTps fill rate, whereas the 7770 has 40 and 40GTps respectively. The number of ROPs is the same in both cases (16), as is the amount of memory (1GB of GDDR5), the width of the memory interface (128 bits), the memory data rate (4.5Gbps), and memory bandwidth (72GBps). The 7750 has a predictably lower TDP of 55 watts (the 7770?s is 80 watts), too.

There are a few physical differences between the two cards as well. The 7770 is a traditional ?performance? card design, 8.5 inches in length, in need of a second six-pin plug from your power supply, and possessing a fan?heat sink assembly so wide, it blocks a second PCI Express (PCIe) expansion slot; the 7750 is much shorter (about 6.5 inches), doesn?t need any additional power, and has a thinner cooler that can stay within the confines of a single slot. You also have slightly different output options: one DVI, one HDMI, and one full-size DisplayPort (the 7770 has two Mini DisplayPort jacks instead), though you can connect up to the six monitors on both.

So how?s performance? Unexceptional, for the most part. At 1,680-by-1,050 resolution, we attained solidly playable frame rates only on DiRT 3 (30.44 frames per second, or fps) and HAWX 2 (66fps), and at 1,920 by 1,200 only HAWX 2 remained smooth (at 56fps). Granted, we test video cards with all the settings maxed, so you can squeeze more performance from some games at these resolutions if you scale back the eye candy: DiRT 3 at 1,920 by 1,200 (24.8fps) and Just Cause 2 at 1,680 by 1,050 (24.9) are prime candidates for this. But because this is almost a budget card, you?ll want to keep your expectations in check no matter how you configure your games.

About all the 7750 really has going for it is power usage, which continues to prove AMD?s 7000-series tweaks do the trick. We took power readings of a full system with the card installed, and the PC drew only 89.3 watts at idle and 140.9 watts under full load. That?s better than in-the-vicinity competitors from the last hardware go-around, like AMD?s own Radeon HD 6850 (106.9 watts when idle, 172.2 watts under load) or Nvidia?s GTX 550 Ti (97.4 watts when idle, 197.3 watts under load)?but both those cards outperform the 7750 in almost every case, and only cost about $20 more on the street. Even the Nvidia GeForce GTX 460, from two cycles ago and likewise still available, is superior in all ways except power draw, and it?s in the same pricing bracket as well. For what it?s worth, the 6850 is the unquestioned winner among the four here, and our recommendation; it turned out playable frame rates in each of our gaming tests at both 1,680 by 1,050 and 1,920 by 1,200 (though, in some cases, the detail settings had to be adjusted slightly downward).

Like many cards designed to hit a specific price point, the AMD Radeon HD 7750 becomes a slave to the numbers. Although we continue to applaud AMD?s dedication to improving power efficiency card over card and year after year?and we hope Nvidia continues to take its competitor?s lessons to heart?that?s just not a compelling selling point around $110. We?d prefer a model that could definitively outperform other, older offerings, and that?s just not this one. If you?re hankering for the newest hardware you can get and you?re watching every penny, it?s okay. But the other options out there, such as AMD?s own Radeon HD 6850, are worth sacrificing one more portrait of Andrew Jackson.

More Video Card Reviews:
??? AMD Radeon HD 7750
??? AMD Radeon HD 7770 GHz Edition
??? AMD Radeon HD 7950
??? AMD Radeon HD 7970
??? Nvidia Quadro 4000
?? more

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/YJ10Qe_O-Jw/0,2817,2400255,00.asp

war of 1812 war of 1812 jeffrey eugenides jeffrey eugenides volcker rule matthew stafford brady quinn