Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition vs FirePro W9100
Primary details
GPU architecture, market segment, value for money and other general parameters compared.
| Place in the ranking | 279 | not rated |
| Place by popularity | not in top-100 | not in top-100 |
| Power efficiency | 4.95 | no data |
| Architecture | GCN 2.0 (2013−2017) | GCN 1.0 (2011−2020) |
| GPU code name | Hawaii | Tahiti |
| Market segment | Workstation | Desktop |
| Design | no data | reference |
| Release date | 26 March 2014 (10 years ago) | 22 June 2012 (12 years ago) |
| Launch price (MSRP) | no data | $499 |
Detailed specifications
General parameters such as number of shaders, GPU core base clock and boost clock speeds, manufacturing process, texturing and calculation speed. Note that power consumption of some graphics cards can well exceed their nominal TDP, especially when overclocked.
| Pipelines / CUDA cores | 2816 | 2048 |
| Core clock speed | 930 MHz | no data |
| Boost clock speed | no data | 1050 MHz |
| Number of transistors | 6,200 million | 4,313 million |
| Manufacturing process technology | 28 nm | 28 nm |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 750 Watt | 250 Watt |
| Texture fill rate | 163.7 | 134.4 |
| Floating-point processing power | 5.238 TFLOPS | 4.301 TFLOPS |
| ROPs | 64 | 32 |
| TMUs | 176 | 128 |
Form factor & compatibility
Information on compatibility with other computer components. Useful when choosing a future computer configuration or upgrading an existing one. For desktop graphics cards it's interface and bus (motherboard compatibility), additional power connectors (power supply compatibility).
| Bus support | PCIe 3.0 | PCIe 2.1 x16 |
| Interface | PCIe 3.0 x16 | PCIe 3.0 x16 |
| Length | 275 mm | 274 mm |
| Width | 2-slot | 2-slot |
| Form factor | full height / full length | no data |
| Supplementary power connectors | 1x 6-pin + 1x 8-pin | 1x 6-pin + 1x 8-pin |
VRAM capacity and type
Parameters of VRAM installed: its type, size, bus, clock and resulting bandwidth. Integrated GPUs have no dedicated video RAM and use a shared part of system RAM.
| Memory type | GDDR5 | GDDR5 |
| Maximum RAM amount | 16 GB | 3 GB |
| Memory bus width | 512 Bit | 384 Bit |
| Memory clock speed | 1250 MHz | 1500 MHz |
| Memory bandwidth | 320 GB/s | 288 GB/s |
Connectivity and outputs
Types and number of video connectors present on the reviewed GPUs. As a rule, data in this section is precise only for desktop reference ones (so-called Founders Edition for NVIDIA chips). OEM manufacturers may change the number and type of output ports, while for notebook cards availability of certain video outputs ports depends on the laptop model rather than on the card itself.
| Display Connectors | 6x mini-DisplayPort, 1x S-Video | 1x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort |
| Eyefinity | - | + |
| HDMI | - | + |
| StereoOutput3D | + | - |
| Dual-link DVI support | + | - |
| HD сomponent video output | + | - |
Supported technologies
Supported technological solutions. This information will prove useful if you need some particular technology for your purposes.
| CrossFire | - | + |
| FreeSync | - | + |
API compatibility
List of supported 3D and general-purpose computing APIs, including their specific versions.
| DirectX | 12 (12_0) | DirectX® 11 |
| Shader Model | 6.3 | 5.1 |
| OpenGL | 4.6 | 4.6 |
| OpenCL | 2.0 | 1.2 |
| Vulkan | 1.2.131 | - |
Pros & cons summary
| Recency | 26 March 2014 | 22 June 2012 |
| Maximum RAM amount | 16 GB | 3 GB |
| Power consumption (TDP) | 750 Watt | 250 Watt |
FirePro W9100 has an age advantage of 1 year, and a 433.3% higher maximum VRAM amount.
HD 7970 GHz Edition, on the other hand, has 200% lower power consumption.
We couldn't decide between FirePro W9100 and Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition. We've got no test results to judge.
Be aware that FirePro W9100 is a workstation graphics card while Radeon HD 7970 GHz Edition is a desktop one.
Should you still have questions concerning choice between the reviewed GPUs, ask them in Comments section, and we shall answer.
Comparisons with similar GPUs
We selected several comparisons of graphics cards with performance close to those reviewed, providing you with more options to consider.
