14 DAY TRIAL // With all the announcements about NVIDA's GTX 560 Ti, AMD's own partners resolved not to go by unnoticed, so PowerColor, for one, figured the time was ripe for the release of a certain, factory overcloked iteration.
AMD's Radeon HD 6900 series may have already been around for a while, but that doesn't mean AMD's partners have stopped developing new models.
In fact, while the market is waiting for the arrival of the dual-Antilles Radeon HD 6990, PowerColor delivered a new Radeon HD 6970.
The newcomer bears the name of PCS+ Radeon HD 6970, where PCS stands for Professional Cooling System.
Basically, it utilizes a dual-slot cooler, with two 92mm fans and three 8mm copper heatpipes, which is supposedly able to drive temperatures lower by 20% than the stock model allows.
That said, the outfit was definitely pro some serious factory overclocking, pushing the GPU (graphics processing unit) well beyond the 880 MHz stock, to 940 MHz.
Meanwhile, the card has 1,536 Stream Processors and 2 GB of GDDR5 VRAM, the latter operating at a clock speed of 5,700 MHz instead of 5,500 MHz.
Needless to say, CrossFireX is supported (for multi-GPU configurations), while displays can connect to the board via a pair of mini DisplayPort 1.2 outputs, a pair of DVI and an HDMI 1.4a.
"Ultra cool, Ultra Performance is the gaming experience we want to deliver to all users of the PCS+ series," said Ted Chen, CEO of TUL Corporation (TUL owns the PowerColor brand).
"I believe the PowerColor PCS+ HD6970 provides the performance that satisfies the hardest, of hardcore gamers," Chen added.
Like so many other recently-revealed devices, the PCS+ Radeon HD 6970 card will launch sometime in February, 2011. It will sell with or without a copy of the 2009 FPS game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, but no prices were given.