AMD rebrands Radeon HD 5700 series as 6700

[Matthew DeCarlo]

First appearing in 2009's Radeon HD 5700 products, AMD's Juniper graphics processor has reemerged with a fresh disguise courtesy of the "new" Radeon HD 6700 series. Although we've known since earlier this year that the Radeon HD 6750 and 6770 would be rebranded 5750 and 5770 cards, it was believed that they would remain exclusive to system builders. Apparently, that isn't the case as a flurry of AMD's board partners have just unleashed consumer versions.

AMD says the 6700 cards will replace the 5700 products at the retail level over the coming weeks. As you can see by the table below, the main specifications between the Radeon HD 5750/5770 and Radeon HD 6750/6770 haven't changed at all. This is also reflected by the fact that the prices haven't been increased -- at least judging by the current PowerColor and Sapphire 6700 boards available through Newegg. The 6750 is set at about $105 while the 6770 is $120.

	HD 5750	HD 6750	HD 5770	HD 6770
Fabrication	TSCM 40nm	TSCM 40nm	TSCM 40nm	TSCM 40nm
Transistors	1.04B	1.04B	1.04B	1.04B
Die size	170mm²	170mm²	170mm²	170mm²
Stream processors	720	720	800	800
Texture units	36	36	40	40
ROPs	16	16	16	16
Core clock	700MHz	700MHz	850MHz	850MHz
Memory clock	4.6GHz GDDR5	4.6GHz GDDR5	4.8GHz GDDR5	4.8GHz GDDR5
Memory bus	128-bit	128-bit	128-bit	128-bit
Memory size	1GB	1GB	1GB	1GB
Power rating	86W	86W	108W	108W

Despite being rebadged versions of their numerical predecessors, AMD has added a few extra features to the 6700 series. The new cards have received support for HDMI 1.4a connectivity and hardware-accelerated Blu-ray 3D video playback. It's also worth noting that AMD isn't exactly trying to hide Juniper's identity crisis. The company has admitted that it wants to update the branding of the products from ATI 57xx to AMD 67xx to reflect their standing among the current generation.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/43538-amd-rebrands-radeon-hd-5700-series-as-6700.html

 

[spydercanopus]

Sweet. Free upgrade and I don't have to do anything.

 

[Steve]

spydercanopus said:
Sweet. Free upgrade and I don't have to do anything.

What do you mean? How exactly?

 

[Leeky]

I was under the impression the firmware could be re-flashed to that of the new card... Least I thought I read it somewhere (P.S. haven't read the article on this occasion so I'm sorry if its been covered in there already).

 

[gwailo247]

spydercanopus said:
Sweet. Free upgrade and I don't have to do anything.

LOL. They'll just send you a sticker of a "6" to put over the "5" on your old card.

 

[Leeky]

LOL. They'll just send you a sticker of a "6" to put over the "5" on your old card.

Tip-ex, or your favourite marker = job done!

 

[Chazz]

Steve said:

spydercanopus said:
Sweet. Free upgrade and I don't have to do anything.

What do you mean? How exactly?

His 5770 just became a 6770, 1000 bonus points for doing nothing! it was sarcasm, naturally.

 

[dividebyzero]

Give it a few days. TPU will no doubt upload the 6750 and 6770 BIOS's to their database.
UVD 3 functionality is entirely a firmware/driver solution (added instruction set)
HDMI 1.4a functionality, likewise is firmware update.

At the present time I'm not sure if DisplayPort 1.2 functionality is completely firmare based (for any card so equipped-most seem HDMI only), or whether there is a hardware update component. I suspect-like HDMI- it comes down to firmware. All will become clear once the 6750 and 6770 BIOS's become available and could result in some added functionality for any 5750/5770 owner wishing to add 3-D Blu Ray support to their card ( pretty much the only additional feature set being offered by the 6750/6770).

 

[Guest]

Cool. I love how the 5770 has always been a good-bang-for-buck video card and it can still max out most games coming out right now.

 

[fpsgamerJR62]

Old hardware with a fresh coat of paint. If I had one of these 5700 cards, I think a Sharpie would be sufficient to change it to a 6700 card easy, cheap although not exactly elegant.