Have Radeon 6950's unlockable to 6970 all dried up?

O

odditory

Supreme [H]ardness
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I know I'm late to the party on this one and from what I read it seems you can't really buy an unlockable Radeon 6950 2GB anymore, that what most places carry in stock are the newer BIOS-locked versions, but if anyone has had some success buying a 6950 recently and unlocked to 6970 please chime in what model and where you got it. Thanks!
 
Pretty much although you could get lucky. I remember a few months ago I was looking for some and had to settle for HIS non-reference. I returned the pair of 6950's for GTX 570's anyways because I couldn't stand AMD drivers. Took 5 mins for CCC to load for me :eek: among a few other issues I experienced.
 
TwisedGenius said:
Pretty much although you could get lucky. I remember a few months ago I was looking for some and had to settle for HIS non-reference. I returned the pair of 6950's for GTX 570's anyways because I couldn't stand AMD drivers. Took 5 mins for CCC to load for me :eek: among a few other issues I experienced.
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I hear you loud and clear on the driver issues and the only reason I'd switch to ATI is some tremendous bang for buck. I'm brand agnostic and have owned both over the years but historically ATI just stumbles more when it comes to drivers (every release seems to fix some things, and break others). Yet another case in point was RAGE yesterday, fine on my GTX 570 but hell for ATI owners to get working, waiting for new drivers, etc.

I've got a single GTX 570 SC right now and the choice is between getting a second identical card to SLI and overclocking to GTX 580 specs, or finding a couple 6950 2GB's and unlocking/overclocking to achieve 2 x GTX 580 like performance - that was the hope.

Mainly what I'm trying to avoid is selling my GTX 570 and sinking $1000 into a pair of GTX 580's just to play BF3 maxed on my 30" monitor. It's starting to look like I might just get another 570 and OC them.
 
I don't know about in the US, but in Australia, small retail shops still have reference cards laying around. Instead of checking on the huge, multi-billion dollar websites, check out the little guys down the road who don't have the customer flow to refresh their stock lineup every week.
 
Uh....2x 6950 2 GBs are NOT going to approach 2 x 580 performance. Even overclocked and unlocked.

The 560 Ti is competitive with the stock 6950, and the 570 is competitive with the 6970.
 
MavericK96 said:
Uh....2x 6950 2 GBs are NOT going to approach 2 x 580 performance. Even overclocked and unlocked.
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I've seen several benchmarks that say otherwise and a couple of overclocked 6950's unlocked to 6970 and overclocked did land neck-and-neck with 2 x GTX580's in a lot of metrics, but I'd agree that generally speaking you still get what you pay for and that means more brute pixel pushing power on the higher end cards, especially in metrics where its more evident like minimum framerate.
 
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your best bet of getting a 6950 that can be unlocked is the sapphire toxic 6950 or the msi frozr III 2gb version, these 2 cards seem to be your best bet as with the flip of a switch they become 6970's, the only problem though is they are constantly out of stock.
 
Ive see a few on Ebay, and Ive got a HIS 6950 shader unlocked and overclocked to 950x1500. Id put it in the for sale section but dont have the required post count yet...I dont know if its against the rules, but if it isnt, you can send me a PM with an offer. Ive had it sitting in a box replaced by a 580 3gb for a while now.
 
The suggestions for The Sapphire Toxic or MSI Twin frozr 3 are solid as both of those cards have a very VERY good chance of unlocking. Also there is a good deal on a sapphire 6970 at newegg for $299.99 after MIR which is close enough to 6950 pricing to simply pass up.
 
Most cards are unlockable, there's a guide to bypassing the bios lock.
You can unlock non reference cards too
 
I have 2 twin frozr 2's i got from frys for $230 AR, both unlocked and running in crossfire.
 
I would so order from frys but they dont accept paypal and I dont think they ship to canada :(
 
Damn those twin frozr 2s are unlocking like mad. What's the difference between the twin frozr 2 and twin frozr 3 coolers?
 
Lord_Exodia said:
Damn those twin frozr 2s are unlocking like mad. What's the difference between the twin frozr 2 and twin frozr 3 coolers?
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twin frozr 3 has the same fan I believe, however it has a dual bios switch, also I have heard of many twin frozr 2's failing, most probably cause of the unlocking who knows.
 
MendeZ said:
twin frozr 3 has the same fan I believe, however it has a dual bios switch, also I have heard of many twin frozr 2's failing, most probably cause of the unlocking who knows.
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I don't see how unlocking shaders can cause a card to fail.

OC'ing the GPU/memory and adjusting voltages is a risk, but unlocking shaders and running everything else stock should be completely safe..
 
Dude, I have 2 Radeon 10000's rigged up to do 14 GHz. My neighbors are like "whoa." I'm sure you can find dinky little 6950's to do your bidding.
 
The sapphire toxic 6950 is in stock at tiger direct for $280 after rebate ... The sapphire 6970 at newegg is only $ 20 more, however ($300 after rebate ... also the corsair AX850 is $38 off when bought in combination).
 
svgamer said:
I don't see how unlocking shaders can cause a card to fail.

OC'ing the GPU/memory and adjusting voltages is a risk, but unlocking shaders and running everything else stock should be completely safe..
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I thought it was running the higher voltage from the 6970 that was causing the issue, but I could be wrong. Flashing with the 6970 BIOS raises the volts from 1.1 to 1.175.
 
Bbq said:
Most cards are unlockable, there's a guide to bypassing the bios lock.
You can unlock non reference cards too
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"Show me the money"

Sapphire 2gb 6950 "Dirt3 Edition" no unlock, no bios flash, nada. I have tried everything...
 
MendeZ said:
I would so order from frys but they dont accept paypal and I dont think they ship to canada :(
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I picked up a Powercolor 2Gb from NC IX (Vancouver store purchase, not internet), non-reference last Saturday, that unlocked just fine using the RBE method. Still a crap-shoot though.

Didn't buy it for the unlock, just wanted the cheapest 6950 NC IX had in stock ($249) so I could CF it with my "old" 6950 reference board for BF3, the fact that it unlocked was just gravy.
 
samuelmorris said:
I thought it was running the higher voltage from the 6970 that was causing the issue, but I could be wrong. Flashing with the 6970 BIOS raises the volts from 1.1 to 1.175.
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On some cards (like my MSI Frozr II) you unlock the shaders but keep the default 6950 voltage values.
 
In respect to that there's a difference between flashing to a 6970 bios (which has higher voltage) and flashing to a shader unlocked 6950 bios (which keeps stock clocks/voltages).

Though, I have heard of people bricking their cards from having their 6950's flashed to 6970s, but not from flashing a 6950 with a shader unlocked 6950.
 
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