AMD’s Radeon HD 5770 & 5750: DirectX 11 for the Mainstream Crowd
by Ryan Smith on October 13, 2009 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Meet The 5750
Below the 5770, we have the 5750, the other card being launched today. This is a 700MHz card with 1 SIMD disabled, and the memory clock at 1.15GHz(4.6GHz effective). This represents an 18% decrease in core clock and the performance of all units tied to that clock, and a 10% further reduction in computational and texturing power due to the loss of a SIMD, for a total theoretical performance reduction of 26%. The ROP count remains unchanged at 16.
The 5750 will come with either 512MB or 1GB of RAM, depending on the target price, with no change in memory clocks. As is the case with 5770, we find the choice of memory speeds interesting since vendors still have to use the same speed RAM on the 5750 as they do the 5870 (boy this stuff must be cheap). No one makes 1.15GHz GDDR5, so vendors have no choice but to equip it with something faster. Our samples are using Hynix 1.25GHz modules, which means the 5750 and the 5770 should be capable of some easy memory overclocking (bus capabilities withstanding). At the moment no one makes 1.2GHz modules, so this may persist for some time.
Compared to the 5770, gone is the expensive Phoenix shroud, replaced with what we’re calling the “egg”. The egg is a simple circular heatsink with a 2-pin fan embedded in it, which sucks in air and pushes it out along the fins. The egg shape is brought about by the plastic cover at the top of the heatsink – we’re not sure if it’s just for looks or if it’s accomplishing some specific function. The card length is 7.15 inches, with no shroud to extend that.
Once again we’ll see the same Eyefinity port configuration here; 1 DisplayPort, 1 HDMI, and 2 DVI. There’s still a half-slot vent here, but since the design of the cooler means that the card is blowing hot air in to the case instead of out the rear, it serves more as a window to look at the card. As a card with this performance level isn’t a good choice for gaming with Eyefinity, AMD is shooting at professional users with the Eyefinity capabilities of this card. We expect that this will be a bit harder of a sale, since Single Large Surface capabilities aren’t as critical with windowed programs, and the high price of DisplayPort->DVI dongles means that the dongle is as much as the card.
We should also note that it’s the desire to keep the Eyefinity port configuration that lead to the use of the egg cooler. For the second generation of cards, vendors are likely to drop the egg cooler for a single-slot cooler. Certainly the 5750 is cool enough at 86W TDP that it doesn’t need a dual-slot cooler.
For pricing, AMD is putting the 1GB version of this card at $129, and the 512MB version at $109. This puts it in competition with NVIDIA’s GTS 250 cards, and AMD’s 4850 cards. Unlike the 5770, the price here is certainly right, as we’ll see later.
As is the case with the 5770, the 5750 is expected to have “tens of thousands” of units available at launch, with any supply constraints likely to be the same between the two. The 1GB cards will come with DIRT 2 vouchers if the vender participates, the 512MB cards will not.
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7Enigma - Wednesday, October 14, 2009 - link
Because people are impatient and need instant gratification. This happens everywhere...erple2 - Wednesday, October 14, 2009 - link
That, and people walking into stores to buy computer equipment aren't generally looking for the best deal.Ananke - Wednesday, October 14, 2009 - link
I respect the MONEY :). Wasting money for something that doesn't quite fit my intention is not my way. But, people are different, I guess not everybody would do the same...My point is, better pay and get what you exactly want and need, otherwise later you'll regret. Now, if you have so much money to waste, buy anything :) that's different story.5770 with that anemic 128bit bus is worth less than $100, in my opinion. Above $100 it is just wasting money for getting nothing :)
just4U - Wednesday, October 14, 2009 - link
Thing is, people shopping for a new card probably do not have one of the latter cards.. or what they do have is fairly sub par. While they may have a good idea what they'd like to get...... alot of times you see them settle. Hell even those among us who are tech savvy have done that from time to time. Seems to me that's sort of what Nvidia's doing right now.
Hrel - Wednesday, October 14, 2009 - link
I need a new card, I want it to be DX11, but the performance isn't there. I want something about 10 percent faster than a 1GB 4870 for about 150 bucks, and something about 10 percent faster than a 4890 for less than 200 bucks; with DX11. Once I see a card like that, from AMD or Nvidia; I'll buy it. Stupid X1650Pro is REALLY limping along in modern games and I'm starting to get sick of low res and min settings.Ananke - Tuesday, October 13, 2009 - link
Really good cards.....not worth the money though :)Did I just summarized it well ?
snarfbot - Tuesday, October 13, 2009 - link
it would be nice to see some benches with crysis w/o aa.if they really are bandwidth limited that would make the difference.
also overclocked performance, if the memory is the limiting factor then the 5750 would probably be a pretty good bang for the buck.
Leyawiin - Tuesday, October 13, 2009 - link
The HD 5850 was "wow". The HD 5770 is a little "meh". Its great you have something that sits between the HD 4850 and HD 4870 in performance with such low power requirements and noise, but that price has to come down.silverblue - Tuesday, October 13, 2009 - link
I view the 5770 as a natural successor to the 4770/4830/4850 (so I wouldn't expect a 5830 to appear, for example) as opposed to a replacement for the 4870. By now I'd expect 40nm yields to be much better than a few months back when TSMC had issues producing the RV740 variants so hopefully any dies that are defective are only minimally so and ATI can put them on the 5750 cards. Makes me wonder about the lower-range cards due next year though.The Eyefinity ports are an enigma, however it could make for a very nice business class card assuming anyone can afford those dongles.
CarrellK - Wednesday, October 14, 2009 - link
If you are building an Eyefinity (EF) setup, you prolly don't have three monitors. You prolly have one or two. This means you will be buying at least one monitor. My advice: buy a DP monitor that matches the physical size & resolution of your existing monitors. That way you don't need to get an adapter.CarrellK