AMD expands its 8000 series of mobile graphics circuits, this time with a new flagship called HD 8970M. The card targets enthusiasts and the performance top with its Graphics Core Next architecture, 1,280 streamprocessors and Turbo Boost up to 900 MHz.
The circuits marks the start of the 8900M series of mobile graphics circuits that will cover the enthusiast segment of the 8000M series, which currently starts with HD 8500M and goes up to HD 8800M. The primary target is Nvidia’s top models GTX 680M and GTX 680MX, and the ace up its sleeve is the turbo mode up to 900 MHz.
The difference in specifications is not unsurprisingly significant over other circuits in the 8000M series, HD 8800M. HD 8970M is made with 28 nanometer technology, with 1,280 streamprocessors and 850 – 900 MHz GPu clock frequency. The memory operates at 1,200 MHz, or the effective 4,800 MHz. All of these numbers are very familiar from the older HD 7970M, sans the turbo mode at 900 MHz.
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AMD says 8970M will perform better than GTX 680M in most games. This includes 54 percent better performance in Tomb Raider, 42 percent in Bioshock Infinite and 12 percent in Crysis 3, and that these titles are part of AMD’s “Never Settle” campaign is hardly a coincidence. AMD also presents comparisons with a few more titles, but without pointing out the difference in percent. There is no comparison with GTX 680M, but AMD is confident enough to present HD 8970M as the world’s fastest mobile graphics circuit.
MSI GX70 throws the first stone
The first to use HD 8970M is a new gaming laptop from MSI called GX70. The laptop is partly equipped with HD 8970M, but also a quad-core A10-5750M-APU with support for up to 32GB DDR3 memory. The model comes with 17.3″ screen with 1 920 x 1 080 pixel resolution, Eyefinity support, Blu-ray, Steelseries keyboard and a Killer network card from Atheros.
There are no details regarding the price or availability of GX70, but it should become available shortly. You should count on around €1,100 for the entry level version, with a higher price for the fully equipped model with more memory and SSD.
So far GX70 is the only to use AMD Radeon HD 8970M, but more computers like GX70 should appear in the near future. Not the least as a reply to Intel’s coming launch of Haswell and the big stream of notebooks that is expected to launch with it.
