AMD launches dual-GPU Radeon HD 6990 graphics card

As I suspected a few days ago, AMD have just made it official (the first reader comment is a hoot) . Nice to XFX coming to the party, although that double lifetime warranty is going to cost them big.

dividebyzero said:
As I suspected a few days ago, AMD have just made it official (the first reader comment is a hoot) . Nice to XFX coming to the party, although that double lifetime warranty is going to cost them big.

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Oh I don't know Chef, I think your right about them being built like a tank. Unfortunately here again we have perception becoming reality. All AMD did is make it more convenient to OC the thing. It's no different than Asus providing me with Smartdoctor, but apparently yellow switches are where those who normally and whimsically void their warranty by OC'ing draw the line. The whole thing is ridiculous anyway. throwing the switch yields you what 2-3% The only reason you would need that 2-3% is if you were a hardcore enthusiast trying to eek another 25 points out of 3DMark11, in which case, you would not own one of these things anyway. You would opt for a pair of 6970's or 580's so you could get that 2-3% plus another 6-8%.
This whole affair reminds me of the T-mobile commercial where the AT&T sales rep waxes "it makes sense...if you don't think about it".

True enough, although I was under the impression that the main drawcard for the 880MHz BIOS is the 1.175v vcore, since 1.12v on the 830MHz nets you about a 5% oc max.
Not that it makes much difference in any case. Anyone buying the card probably is in need of psychiatric help.
As has been reported elsewhere, overclocking the HD 6900's nets you precious little in any case, which is why even though the GTX 570 has a smaller frame-buffer and suffers in stock performance at or above 2560x1600, it still represents a very good (if not better) alternative once the clocks start moving. The HT4U and ComputerBase reviews made the same findings before Kyle and Co got into the act.
It kind of makes you wonder why anyone would risk the cards, power draw and heat production.
I think I evinced the same viewpoint on lack of overclocking performance ( i.e. overclocking percentages not matched by performance gains) at the time of the HD6970 or 6950 review. These cards aren't a patch on the 5000 series for overclocked performance, let alone Fermi's.

My main problem with the 6990 was regarding the warranty transference. If the first owner of an XFX card for instance oc'ed the card, but when on-sold, replaced the sticker after switching back the BIOS. Any voltage circuit warranty claim thereafter-unbeknownst to the second user- is rendered void, since as now seems likely, that an AIB can detect whether the OC'ed BIOS has indeed been used as well as detecting a re-flashed BIOS.
The other point is that overclocking a card can invalidate the warranty- which is fair enough since it is being moved away from it's factory setting. The 880MHz setting is a factory setting.
In the end it amounts to AMD trying to have it's cake and eat it too- also fair enough. What seems stupid is to turn another product launch into a PR black eye. Why wait a week to confirm a warranty issue that could have been aired and understood at, or before launch?
Answer: Because AMD wanted sites to review the card at the overclocked (and beyond) setting without having to have an asterisk placed next to the results. Off the top of my head I can think of a few sites that posted the results of the unsupported setting and also did not mention that the unsupported setting would invalidate the warranty -Hexus, Guru of 3D, OC3D, Tech Report and ComputerBase come to mind. Do you think those same sites would have tested or at least carried a disclaimer had the info been in the press kit? It might be the same as overclocking in a sense, but I doubt many people would overclock by whacking the voltage from 1.12 straight up to 1.175v as a first step. Or maybe I'm just a little overcautious in my overclocking regimes.

I don't know about you but the whole episode seems fairly duplicitous and could have been avoided....if AMD chose to.