Powercolor HD6970 PCS+ Review – silent and deadly

Review Score:
Zardon

AMD’s HD6970 has been a strong seller since it was released on December 15th 2010. The combination of class leading performance and competitive price point has served AMD’s partners well. Today we are looking at the new PowerColor HD6970 PCS+ which receives a high level of TLC, with enhanced clock speeds and a striking dual fan heatpipe cooler.

The Powercolor HD6970 PCS+ is shipped with some noticeable speed improvements. The GPU core speed has been increased from 880mhz to 940mhz and the GDDR5 memory now operates at 1425mhz (5.7 Gbps effective), up from 1375mhz (5.5 Gbps effective).

Product AMD HD6970 PowerColor HD6970 PCS+
Core Clock speed 880mhz 940mhz
Primitive Rate
2 prim/clk
2 prim/clk
Shader Architecture
VLIW4
VLIW4
Stream Processors
24 SIMD/1536 ALU
24 SIMD/1536 ALU
Texture Units 96 96
ROPs/Z-Stencil 32/128 32/128
Frame Buffer 2GB GDDR5 2GB GDDR5
Memory Width/Speed 256 bit, 5.5 Gbps 256 bit, 5.7 Gbps
Power Connectors 8 pin & 6 pin 8 pin & 6 pin
Display Outputs 2xDVI + 2x mDP + HDMI 2xDVI + 2x mDP + HDMI
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Rating: 5.0/5 (1 vote cast)
Powercolor HD6970 PCS+ Review - silent and deadly, 5.0 out of 5 based on 1 rating

15 Comments
  • Tech Head
    February 3, 2011
    #1
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    Some very nice hardware this week Zardon. thanks man.

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  • Hank
    February 3, 2011
    #2
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    Great pictures of the board, great looking card that, very hefty

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  • Dave
    February 3, 2011
    #3
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    I always like their PCS+ cards, but I never know what their UK warranty is like, so I buy sapphire everytime.

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  • Colin
    February 3, 2011
    #4
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    That is fucking killer looking ! those heatpipes are wicked. Are yoyotech going to stock it?

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  • kOrn
    February 3, 2011
    #5
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    Dual fans always works for me, better coverage and slower speeds. makes sense to everyone.

    Apart from AMD.

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  • Manny
    February 3, 2011
    #6
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    As much as I love Sapphire and XFX, I think PC get ignored a lot and its not really fair, some of their designs are just as radical as sapphire. I think this card is brilliant, those noise levels are class leading

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  • Thomas
    February 3, 2011
    #7
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    The cooler is awesome, really works well. I think their balance might be a bit in favour of noise though, but I suppose you could set up a manual profile for a little more noise for slightly lower temps

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  • Ned
    February 3, 2011
    #8
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    Its all good. apart from the free game. seriously, its over a year old now, can none of these manufacturers clear stock? how about Dead space 2 or something people really want?

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  • Jeff
    February 3, 2011
    #9
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    WHats the price? dont see it anywhere :(

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  • AMD4EVER
    February 3, 2011
    #10
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    I dont think its out yet man. probably £20-30 more, as usual. worth it. I might sell my 6850 cf setup and get one of these, to lower the noise levels, as my system is quite bad atm

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  • Tim
    February 3, 2011
    #11
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    Seems its quite near the core limit. wonder why they went with such a relaxed memory timing, clearly that hynix is way capable of more. that OC was very good indeed.

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  • rickshaw
    February 4, 2011
    #12
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    Hmmm, looking at the cooler taken out from the video card. I am wondering what is cooling the memory chips and other components?

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  • Tech head
    February 4, 2011
    #13
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    @rickshaw – the dual fans are. Clearly indicated by the huge oc potential on the memory.

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  • Jacky
    February 8, 2011
    #14
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    Nice~~~ Powercolor has done it again, cant wait to get one of those

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  • Andres
    February 15, 2011
    #15
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    Wow, just wow, ultra heavy wow! After my comment on the PCS+ 6870, this was exactly what I was expecting, and that’s why I asked you to ask them for a sample to review.

    I’m going to buy it right now. Enough said!

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