Worth the upgrade from a 7870xt to a 7970 or 7950

I'm doing a bit of switching back and forth between litecoin/bitcoin/feathercoin with the card I have which is the 7870XT. Right now I manage to get around 518mh/s under bitcoin and under feathercoin or lightcoin I get around 340kh/s with my clocks at around 1200/1600.

As I'm still within the 30 day return window I'm wondering if it is worth it to upgrade instead to the 7950 or 7980. I've been trying to find information on either one but it seems most I find is regarding people running 2+ of each of them not running them solo. How much of a difference can I expect if I was to swap this card out for one of the above? This has to be done all air no liquid cooling or anything like that. It's not a dedicated mining rig either but I don't mind throwing a little extra money to a faster card if it makes it worthwhile.

What kind of hash rates do either of those cards manage to get once overclocked and what kind of clock speeds can I expect using them?

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Mining_hardware_comparison

Probably not much more. You might as well run both if you are getting another.

You should also consider the hash-rate loss that you will have during the time you return your card and get a new one, unless you have the extra cash to buy the new one before sending back the other one. But then, you will still loose hashrate and income since you would have two cards available, only to ship one away and loose its hash power.

Time is money, and it is even truer in cryptocurrencies than in the physical world Wink

I run my 7950 time to time and it does 460 at default clocks

have not tried any other miners or flags or stuff

7870XT is good for bitcoin mining, but not so for litecoin. 7950 is good for both.

My Sapphire factory OC 7950 at stock clock 950/1,250 makes around 500Mh/s. If I turn the clock up to 1,050 it makes around 600Mh/s, but the fan goes 100%. Also, in case you didn't realise, for mining Bc your memory clock is not a big factor - according to my wall power monitor, if I still run 950Mhz, but turn my memory clock down to 800, the card uses about 200W vs 220W at stock memory clock. Interestingly, it also hashes slightly higher - at around 520Mh/s!

FYI I run an A10-5800APU and use my onboard video as well - and it contributes an extra 100Mh/s @ 800Mhz!

Quote from: Nytcrawler on May 07, 2013, 11:55:59 AM

My Sapphire factory OC 7950 at stock clock 950/1,250 makes around 500Mh/s. If I turn the clock up to 1,050 it makes around 600Mh/s,
FYI I run an A10-5800APU and use my onboard video as well - and it contributes an extra 100Mh/s @ 800Mhz!

That onboard video ,wow!, props!

What software do you use though?

I personally wouldn't consider investing in anything else than an ASIC based miner...

Yeah upgrade to a 7950 Cheesy

From the sounds of it though the 7970 just isn't worth it at all here. I'll talk then to the store see if I can swap them out.

Quote from: lostmoogle on May 07, 2013, 09:08:57 AM

Probably not much more. You might as well run both if you are getting another.

Only have two PCIe slots and one is being used by my raid controller. Sadly I can't use both at at this point. That and the wife would kill me if I tried.

Quote from: giorgiomassa on May 07, 2013, 12:35:43 PM

I personally wouldn't consider investing in anything else than an ASIC based miner...

Thinking about that also but I'm having a hard time thinking about doing that when I don't see them really shipping many of them at this point and I'm not sure when I will get one. Even more so being they have had delay after delay and I believe they originally planned to start shipping sometime last year. I'm afraid of spending the money for them to only go belly up. For price to performance it wins but also limits what I can do from there with the hardware if bitcoin goes south as well.

Quote from: PrintMule on May 07, 2013, 12:16:54 PM

Quote from: Nytcrawler on May 07, 2013, 11:55:59 AM

That onboard video ,wow!, props!

What software do you use though?

cgminer

works a treat

In my opinion its definitly worth it, even though mining is becoming less and less profitable a strong better rig will put you ahead of the game.

7950 Here
Switched from guiminer podcm to cgminer at 960core/1250mem = 460MHs
Set clocks to 1050core/910mem = 502MHs
Set intensity to 9 = 560MHs

But seeing 7870 is same gen as 7970 and having same power consumption ratios it all boils down to prices in your area

I would consider getting the 7970 but not the 7950. the performance between the 7870xt and the 7950 we too close to me to compared against their price difference. but that's only me based here in the CZ. probably cheaper in the states.

Just stick with the 7870xt.