AMD Radeon HD 6990 Video Card Review

Conclusions

In our tests, the performance gain by having the switch set at “1” (overclocked BIOS) instead of “2” (default BIOS) was up to 8%. We don’t know why users buying this video card would leave video card at its default BIOS since you can have a bit higher performance by simply flipping a switch. Because of that, the comparisons below will be based on the results achieved with the switch positioned at “1.”

Compared to the fastest card from NVIDIA, the GeForce GTX 580, the Radeon HD 6990 was up to 85% faster, depending on the game and resolution: up to 31% faster on Call of Duty 4, between 24% and 69% faster on Crysis Warhead, between 28% and 54% faster on FarCry 2, 85% faster on Aliens vs. Predator, between 42% and 78% faster on Lost Planet 2, and between 73% and 84% faster on 3DMark 11.

The GeForce GTX 580, however, does not compete with the Radeon HD 6990. A competing system would be two GeForce GTX 570 video cards installed in SLI. Under this scenario, the Radeon HD 6990 was up to 17% faster, with the exception of Call of Duty 4, where the GeForce GTX 570 setup was 19% faster than the new Radeon HD 6990. The Radeon HD 6990 was between 6% and 10% faster on Crysis Warhead, between 3% and 10% faster on FarCry 2, between 15% and 17% faster on Aliens vs. Predator, between 4% and 6% faster on Lost Planet 2, and up to 8% faster on 3DMark 11.

The Radeon HD 6990 is truly the fastest video card ever built, targeted to the ultra (and rich) enthusiast who wants to have the fastest gaming PC in town. Add two of them in CrossFireX and the sky is the limit.