ATI HD 4770: 40 nm, RV740 -- SPCR reviewed

They make noise, too.

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silo
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Post by silo » Tue May 12, 2009 3:31 pm

yep, it does look super trashy, but strangely it was the better option here:

$145 = 4770

$230 = 250gts (512mb!)

$160 = 4830 (?)

$135 = 9800GT

+ its "fits" my s1 :lol:

Image

rei
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Post by rei » Tue May 12, 2009 10:53 pm

spcr is the only one to mention pcb length. won't fit for me in my silent3 since it's 20cm and my max is 19cm.

silo
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Post by silo » Wed May 13, 2009 12:52 am

edit- problem fixed ( fkn artic screws ... hint use the original retention bracket when mouthing the s1)

CA_Steve
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Post by CA_Steve » Wed May 13, 2009 6:41 am

Phoronix has a review for you Linux types.

Directeur
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Post by Directeur » Thu May 14, 2009 10:18 am

Anyone tried putting a larger fan on the retailheatsink? I'd really like to buy this card, but the (noisy?) retailcooler is holding be back atm. Since I have a spare 80mm Nexus fan I'm really thinking of putting this on top of the retailheatsink (removing the stock fan first ofcourse). How large is the stock fan anyway?

pedrofdmp
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Post by pedrofdmp » Thu May 14, 2009 10:47 am

Directeur wrote:Anyone tried putting a larger fan on the retailheatsink? I'd really like to buy this card, but the (noisy?) retailcooler is holding be back atm. Since I have a spare 80mm Nexus fan I'm really thinking of putting this on top of the retailheatsink (removing the stock fan first ofcourse). How large is the stock fan anyway?
I've bought the card a few days ago. The retail hsf is very quiet while the card is idle, i can't even hear it over my system fans (artic cooling). While gaming i can hear it but it's not very loud.

Mats
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Post by Mats » Thu May 14, 2009 2:35 pm


Directeur
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Post by Directeur » Fri May 15, 2009 12:51 am

Mats wrote:Yeah who said the retail fan was noisy anyway?
So it's not really loud, even quieter than the mediacooler. I'll probably go for it. Just for the record: what's the size of the retailheatsink fan?

Would anyone advice me a particular brand (better warranty, more features etc.)?

Mats
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Post by Mats » Fri May 15, 2009 1:35 am

Directeur wrote:Would anyone advice me a particular brand (better warranty, more features etc.)?
That's a good question, especially since most cards are identical, with identical coolers.

steppert
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Post by steppert » Fri May 15, 2009 3:50 am

well i suppose its asus? 3 year warranty and smartdoctor with voltage control. But correct me if i am wrong ;)

Mats
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Post by Mats » Fri May 15, 2009 4:27 am

steppert wrote:well i suppose its asus? 3 year warranty and smartdoctor with voltage control. But correct me if i am wrong ;)
Now I realize I'm more interested in the experience customers have of different manufacturers support, and not just the actual warranty.

AZBrandon
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Post by AZBrandon » Fri May 15, 2009 6:37 am

rei wrote:spcr is the only one to mention pcb length. won't fit for me in my silent3 since it's 20cm and my max is 19cm.
You can measure the video card on your computer screen too. I know it sounds dumb, but I've done it plenty of times since my case makes it tough to fit cards over 9.5 inches. All you need is a good top-down photograph of the card - preferably of the back of the card but either works. For example, here's a stock photo from nvidia.com of a 9600GT viewed from the back. I overlaid a green and blue line to help illustrate.

Image

The distance from the back of the PCB to the point where the indent in the PCB is (shown by the green line) always measures 5.5 inches (140mm). This is always true because the PCI-E standard has to be the same on every motherboard, period. Thus, you can hold up a small ruler to your screen and measure that distance and start building a proportion.

For example, when I hold a small ruler up to my computer screen, the green line measures 82mm long. Next, you measure from that point to the other end of the PCB (shown by the blue line). On my screen it measures 52mm. Then you just do the math:

(blue * 140) / green = blue line's real length
(52 * 140) / 82 = 89

So in real life, the length of the area marked by the blue line is 89mm. Add that to the 140mm of the green line and the total card length is 229mm, or 9.0 inches. Sure enough, that is exactly what this card is supposed to be in length. Since you need a card that's only 190mm in total length, I'd suggest using photographs and the above proportion to make sure you're getting a card of the right size before you buy.

pedrofdmp
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Post by pedrofdmp » Fri May 15, 2009 10:05 am

steppert wrote:well i suppose its asus? 3 year warranty and smartdoctor with voltage control. But correct me if i am wrong ;)
You can flash any of the cards avaiable with the bios of the asus 4770 top:

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/sho ... p?t=223573

silo
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Post by silo » Fri May 15, 2009 12:23 pm

buy the cheapest, they,r all the same. btw, my 4770 idles at 29C with the castrated s1 + low speed fan, ( 8600gt >41c with full s1) this baby runs cool ( that spc poster was wrong)

josephclemente
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Post by josephclemente » Fri May 15, 2009 5:24 pm

silo wrote:buy the cheapest, they,r all the same. btw, my 4770 idles at 29C with the castrated s1 + low speed fan, ( 8600gt >41c with full s1) this baby runs cool ( that spc poster was wrong)
How many watts is your 4770 consuming at idle/load?

silo
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Post by silo » Fri May 15, 2009 8:34 pm

sorry, don´t know. I guess as much as yours @ silentpc review, any other 4770 out there. all i know is that is running ice cold, but i do not use that CCC garbage so actually it might be even higher. btw did you use the " x clamp thingy" of the original cooler when mounting your s1? without it my 4770 dsnt even boot.

josephclemente
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Post by josephclemente » Sat May 16, 2009 12:38 am

silo wrote:sorry, don´t know. I guess as much as yours @ silentpc review, any other 4770 out there. all i know is that is running ice cold, but i do not use that CCC garbage so actually it might be even higher. btw did you use the " x clamp thingy" of the original cooler when mounting your s1? without it my 4770 dsnt even boot.
I didn't try it. That sounds like a good idea, though. I didn't realize that part was compatible with the S1 assembly.

silo
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Post by silo » Sat May 16, 2009 8:30 pm

yep, it works like a charm, as long as you use the s1 screws, and not the stock ones that are rather small@short. i did it like this.

( s1 + stock metal springs + stock X clamp + s1 screws and plastic clips )

anyway, i don't think is necessary, unless you are having problems like i had (the stock clamp has like some soft silicone under, with the old setup- i presume- something was making contact, or my installation was shitty)

Directeur
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Post by Directeur » Sun May 17, 2009 10:01 am

Does the retailheatsink fanspeed ramp down automatically or do you have to do this manually?
I still haven't found out what the size of the retail fan is. Does anyone know?

josephclemente
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Post by josephclemente » Sun May 17, 2009 3:05 pm

silo wrote:yep, it works like a charm, as long as you use the s1 screws, and not the stock ones that are rather small@short. i did it like this.

( s1 + stock metal springs + stock X clamp + s1 screws and plastic clips )

anyway, i don't think is necessary, unless you are having problems like i had (the stock clamp has like some soft silicone under, with the old setup- i presume- something was making contact, or my installation was shitty)
I took a look at mine and even the Accelero screws don't seem long enough if using the stock X clamp. Did you have to make yours really tight before the screws would reach? I'll probably leave mine alone as you said, since I'm not having any issues.

I did notice that the included Accelero plastic spacers could possibly be too large to get enough pressure on the GPU. I could see how slight variations on cards and/or the spacers themselves could cause issues.
Directeur wrote:Does the retailheatsink fanspeed ramp down automatically or do you have to do this manually?
I still haven't found out what the size of the retail fan is. Does anyone know?
Yes, the fan speed will change depending on the temperature. If you switch to Manual Fan Control, then the speed is constant. I think an 80mm fan would fit, I am not certain though without taking the cooler apart.

Praxis1452
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Post by Praxis1452 » Sun May 17, 2009 4:07 pm

Mats wrote:
sampo wrote:
thejamppa wrote:I would really want the review sample
XFX has first premium 4770. Mem heatsinks and extra condensators seem to missing though.

Image
Yeah, well where are the heatpipes? It looks like something that's supposed to look like the review cooler, but it is't AFAIK. So I'm not totally sure.

Here's the review cooler, you can clearly see the heatpipes:
Image
I have bought and received that XFX card. There are no heatpipes. Kinda makes me dissapointed as a better cooler that exhausts heat outside case is what I wanted. Still, I haven't tested the card much yet but atleast it exhausts heat out. hopefully it'll still perform just as well as the other reference cooler. That cooler has a hole for the heatpipe to fit into, XFX just did not add one. Kinda deceptive in a way.

silo
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Post by silo » Sun May 17, 2009 4:21 pm

Did you have to make yours really tight before the screws would reach?

not really, they seem to reach out effortlessly- easier than a vf700 installation- but i did tighten the screws as much as i could afterward, and then a bit more :lol:

Image

Image

mattthemuppet
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Post by mattthemuppet » Sun May 17, 2009 11:01 pm

AZBrandon wrote:
rei wrote:spcr is the only one to mention pcb length. won't fit for me in my silent3 since it's 20cm and my max is 19cm.
You can measure the video card on your computer screen too. I know it sounds dumb, but I've done it plenty of times since my case makes it tough to fit cards over 9.5 inches. All you need is a good top-down photograph of the card - preferably of the back of the card but either works. For example, here's a stock photo from nvidia.com of a 9600GT viewed from the back. I overlaid a green and blue line to help illustrate.

Image

The distance from the back of the PCB to the point where the indent in the PCB is (shown by the green line) always measures 5.5 inches (140mm). This is always true because the PCI-E standard has to be the same on every motherboard, period. Thus, you can hold up a small ruler to your screen and measure that distance and start building a proportion.

For example, when I hold a small ruler up to my computer screen, the green line measures 82mm long. Next, you measure from that point to the other end of the PCB (shown by the blue line). On my screen it measures 52mm. Then you just do the math:

(blue * 140) / green = blue line's real length
(52 * 140) / 82 = 89

So in real life, the length of the area marked by the blue line is 89mm. Add that to the 140mm of the green line and the total card length is 229mm, or 9.0 inches. Sure enough, that is exactly what this card is supposed to be in length. Since you need a card that's only 190mm in total length, I'd suggest using photographs and the above proportion to make sure you're getting a card of the right size before you buy.
very clever, neat little guide :)

Entropy
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Post by Entropy » Tue May 19, 2009 7:53 am

The Radeon Bios Editor RBE 1.21 supports control of the HD4770 fan speeds.
Link

Ant6n
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Post by Ant6n » Tue May 19, 2009 1:31 pm

Here's my experience with the ati hd4770 (powercolor reference card), replacing a geforce 7600gs. These are the wattages out of the box

Geforce7600gs:
idle - 58w
prime95 - 77w
furmark - 94W
prime95+furmark - 106W


hd4770 (with fan)
idle - no driver - 100w
idle - driver - 79w
prime95 - 97w
furmark - 148w
prime95+furmark - 161w

assuming 14 Watts to run the 7600gs in idle, this means the hd4770 uses 35W while idle, and up to around 78 Watts on load. This is a nice result, because it lets me run the entire system on a pwm200, although the idle power does seem a bit high. Btw, this appears to be the same power consumption as the Geforce 8800 gts 512, so the new geforce 250 is probably a better buy after all (albeit more expensive).

The only thing that's really annoying is that the card doesn't recognize my lcd's native resolution, and when "forcing" the actual resolution of 1680x1050, it actually outputs 1440x900 and uses panning.

Mats
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Post by Mats » Tue May 19, 2009 2:42 pm

Ant6n: Don't forget the power loss in the PSU. 20 W difference probably means 15 W or less.

silo
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Post by silo » Tue May 19, 2009 7:36 pm

@idle - no driver ? > explain ! > you mean no CCC, no display driver, what?

Ant6n
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Post by Ant6n » Tue May 19, 2009 7:54 pm

Mats wrote:Ant6n: Don't forget the power loss in the PSU. 20 W difference probably means 15 W or less.
Oh, true. On the other hand I have a 220w dell brick, so I hope for a bit more efficiency than 75%. So let's say ~27w on idle and ~62w on load at the card.

@idle - no driver ? > explain !
Well, you can boot up windows without the driver installed (ati catalyist), it'll fall back to some vesa mode or something. I was trying to see whether the driver shuts down parts of the gfx card by default (i.e. power play), and it does seem to 'save' 20w.

josephclemente
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Post by josephclemente » Wed May 20, 2009 7:39 pm

Ant6n wrote:assuming 14 Watts to run the 7600gs in idle, this means the hd4770 uses 35W while idle, and up to around 78 Watts on load.
Are you able to get power consumption measurements of the system without any video card?

78 watts on load seems low when your prime95+furmark (4770 installed) consumes 161w while prime95 (7600gs installed) is 77w. That's an 84 watt difference compared to when the 7600gs was installed and it is still unknown exactly how many watts the 7600gs was consuming on top of that. If the 7600gs was consuming 14 watts during the prime95 test, that would have the 4770's load consumption at 98 watts. Or am I wrong?

Ant6n
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Post by Ant6n » Wed May 20, 2009 9:45 pm

I went through the calculations again, and can't reproduce them. Maybe this works:

Geforce7600gs:
idle - 58w - (system: 44, gpu idle: 14) )
prime95 - 77w (system: 44+18, gpu idle: 14)
furmark - 94W (system: 44+18, gpu load: 32)
prime95+furmark - 106W (system: 44+28, gpu load: 32)


hd4770 (with fan)
idle - no driver - 100w (system: 44, gpu w/o driver 55)
idle - driver - 79w (system: 44, gpu idle: 35)
prime95 - 97w (system: 44+18, gpu idle: 35)
furmark - 148w (system: 44+18 , gpu load: 86)
prime95+furmark - 161w (system: 44+28, gpu load: 89)

prime95 or furmark alone don't seem to be able to utilize all of the cpu. Taking into account the efficiency of the power supply (the wattmeteris probably not very accurate, either), it should be around 33,80, no?

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