AMD’s Radeon HD 6670 & Radeon HD 6570: Two’s Company, Sub-$100’s A Crowd
by Ryan Smith on April 19, 2011 12:01 AM ESTMeet The Radeon HD 6670 & Radeon HD 6570
With the Redwood cards (5670 & 5570), we saw two distinct reference designs even though both used the same GPU. The 5670 was a full-profile card while the 5570 was a low-profile card intended to fill a higher performance low-profile niche. With the Turks cards however, this kind of stratification is gone.
Look closely and you'll see the ATI logo. AMD is using spare 5570 coolers for the 6570 reference design, which means these coolers predate the AMD rebranding. Retail cards won't be like this, however.
Instead both reference cards are low-profile cards. The PCB for both cards is quite similar, but not identical. In practice with only a 6W difference between the two cards, we can’t imagine too many partners will roll different PCBs for the cards. The difference between the two cards really comes down to the cooler used – the 6570 uses the same AMD reference cooler we’ve seen on the 5570 and 6450 (it is in fact a spare 5570 cooler), while the 6670 uses a new low-profile double-wide cooler. This is how AMD managed to get the 6670 out as a low-profile card as opposed to a full-profile card like the 5670: it’s shorter, but it’s wider.
Our 6670 is equipped with 4 2Gb 5GHz Hynix GDDR5 memory modules. This marks the first time we’ve seen 2Gb GDDR5 on anything other than a high-end card, which is a good sign that we should expect to see more cards using 2Gb GDDR5 in the near future. Both the 6670 and 6570 measure 6.61” long, the same length for that matter as the 6450.
Display connectivity is the same as with other AMD low-profile cards. On the PCB are a single DVI-DL port and a DP 1.2 port, while on the bracket is a VGA port attached with a ribbon cable. With partner cards we’d expect a number of cards to drop the DP1.2 port for an HDMI 1.4 port on both cards. But on that note, one thing we’re still trying to get confirmation on from AMD is whether Turks can drive more than one DVI-type display at once. We have no specific reason to believe this, but Barts did drop a DVI-DL port for a DVI-SL port, so if anyone is going to drop down to supporting a single DVI-type display at once, it’s AMD. In any case through the magic of DP1.2 MST hubs, the 6670 can drive four displays. Meanwhile the 6570 can drive three displays.
As was the case with the 6450, AMD’s reference design is only for engineering and sampling purposes – it’s not going to be used in retail cards. We don’t have any pictures of retail cards as of press time, but we’d expect 6670 and 6570 designs to resemble 5570 designs with a larger cooler more suitable for Turks. As such our temperature/noise results are a decent approximation of the cards that will be on the market, but they won’t match any specific retail cards.
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Ryan Smith - Tuesday, April 19, 2011 - link
Yes, they do. So does the 6450, which is why I suspect 6450 is going to be the best HTPC card for most people.SteelCity1981 - Tuesday, April 19, 2011 - link
I got a 5670 and the 10% increase in performance isn't worth me spening an extra 100+ dollars on a 6670. See what AMD has in stores with the Radeon 7 series.tomoyo - Tuesday, April 19, 2011 - link
Yep, it's not for anyone with a current 5xxx. For me, I may go for this card because I want something low power for htpc + casual gaming, and it should be silence-able as well with the low idle power usage. Also hdmi will be nice with audio when connecting to tvs :)G-Man - Tuesday, April 19, 2011 - link
RyanAre there any plans to do articles where you "revisit" old conclusions and see if they still hold true? Like for Radeon 5670, it wasn't priced well at launch and suffered for it in the review, but after price cuts it's pretty much recommended everywhere in the price segment. It's often hard to understand exactly what Anandtech recommends at the moment, as opposed to at launch.
Thanks!
tomoyo - Tuesday, April 19, 2011 - link
Sounds like one of the only useful things from tomshardware, the video card price guide. I'd say you could always look there if you want to know the best current price/performance cards.789427 - Wednesday, April 20, 2011 - link
Ding, Ding...I enjoy both sites as both provide me with news and different perspectives but Mr Smith, kindly refrain from bad-mouthing your colleagues.
Let me provide you some insight that seems to refute Anandtech and Tomshardware *shared* claims about the latest and best in graphics...
Both sites focussed on noise as being the decision criteria for adopting one top end card over the other. Availability is more pertinent in the case of the high end cards.
To focus on noise as the deal-breaker seemed quite moot when Nvidia doesn't intend shipping 590 cards in volume.
Furthermore, a reference design at this level is simply a speed showcase - I don't for a second think that the majority of cards will be sold based on the reference design but at this level, manufacturers will listen to their client's desires (or to the noise the card actually makes and make some changes;))
In this particular instance, I was amazed at how much your opinions overlapped.
The reason that I've gone to such lengths with this particular example is to highlight what the most useful thing about Anandtech and Toms actually is - a difference of opinion that better highlights the truth often shaded by opinions and preconceptions.
Your comment above should seriously be reconsidered as I believe that as a genre, both sites have actually contributed to each other's success far more than any individual, including yourself, has.
My 2c.
Finally, about the cards... I find both fill a market. new purchasers of 1080 screen non-gamers will be satisfied with the lower offering and people that just want good performance without changing PSUs, heating a room and generally want good bang for the buck. How many people pay MSRP online? So the launch price tends to be higher... Just state the price that you'd recommend it and save us from reading the same old comments over again...
So, the 5750 is going to become an outmode as soon as the 7 series is out. and there are cards to replace it that are cheaper to make and run cooler. Not quite news but good to see in the flesh. Wasn't the real story of the 6 series that AMD finally got crossfire to scale right? ah well...
Soulkeeper - Tuesday, April 19, 2011 - link
I'd like to see the stats tables include the memory bandwidth so I don't have to calculate it myself each time I read one of these.thanks
AstroGuardian - Thursday, April 21, 2011 - link
+1Arnulf - Tuesday, April 19, 2011 - link
This not only goes to show how much hardware has improved over time but it also gives owners of older cards, perhaps with a rattling fan or some other issues, plenty of incentive to upgrade. My X1950Pro gave up on me recently so I went for Vapor-X version of HD5770. New card is virtually silent compared to that old beast.Keep up this practice and consider including comparable models from BOTH manufacturers ! :)
vavutsikarios - Tuesday, April 19, 2011 - link
There are 2 things I want to say, both a bit sideways the topic.First, about the paperlaunched 6450, I dont get it. The card is for sale, retail, at various shops here 2 weeks now. Doesnt look like a paperlaunch from where I stand, and this is not the most central part of the world (i live in greece)
Second, and more important, there is an upcoming game I d like to see in reviews. I am talking about might and magic heroes 6, scheduled to launch on June 23.
There is an interesting twist about it, most probably. I mean, if the game is anything like its predecessors, its going to be much more useful as a CPU than as a GPU benchmark. I mean, you can easily play a turn based strategy while on 15-20 fps. They are enough. But when I run the 6 years old heroes 5, with all the graphics details on high, no problem there, I still have to wait for the AI to complete their turn. The game is CPU limited SIX YEARS after it was released!!