Radeon HD 4870 vs Radeon HD 6970

In this comparison between Radeon HD 4870 and Radeon HD 6970 you will find out which graphics card performs better in today's games. Bear in mind that third-party versions may have more efficient cooling and higher clock speeds. This will increase cards' performance, though not by much. In addition to raw power you should also take into account the dimensions. Thicker models simply will not fit into a small mini-ITX case. The resolution of your monitor also affects the choice, since 4K gameplay requires a more powerful GPU. And don't overspend on the graphics card. Other parts of your build may also need to be upgraded, save some money for the CPU or power supply. For some people Radeon HD 4870 will be the best choice, for others Radeon HD 6970 will be their preference. Study the comparison tables below and make your choice.

Main Specs

  Radeon HD 4870 Radeon HD 6970
Power consumption (TDP) 150 Watt 550 Watt
Interface PCIe 2.0 x16 PCIe 2.0 x16
Supplementary power connectors 2x 6-pin 1x 6-pin + 1x 8-pin
Memory type GDDR5 DDR5
Maximum RAM amount 1 GB 2 GB
Display Connectors 2x DVI, 1x S-Video 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort
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  • Radeon HD 6970 has 266% more power consumption, than Radeon HD 4870.
  • Both video cards are using PCIe 2.0 x16 interface connection to a motherboard.
  • Radeon HD 6970 has 1 GB more memory, than Radeon HD 4870.
  • Both cards are used in Desktops.
  • Radeon HD 4870 is build with TeraScale architecture, and Radeon HD 6970 - with Terascale 2.
  • Radeon HD 4870 is manufactured by 55 nm process technology, and Radeon HD 6970 - by 40 nm process technology.
  • Radeon HD 6970 is 17 mm longer, than Radeon HD 4870.
  • Memory clock speed of Radeon HD 4870 is 2225 MHz higher, than Radeon HD 6970.

Game benchmarks

high / 1080p 3−4 14−16
ultra / 1080p 1−2 9−10
QHD / 1440p 0−1 3−4
low / 720p 14−16 30−35
medium / 1080p 6−7 18−20
The average gaming FPS of Radeon HD 6970 in Assassin's Creed Odyssey is 216% more, than Radeon HD 4870.

Full Specs

  Radeon HD 4870 Radeon HD 6970
Architecture TeraScale Terascale 2
Code name RV770 Cayman
Type Desktop Desktop
Release date 25 June 2008 14 December 2010
Pipelines 800 1536
Core clock speed 750 MHz
Boost Clock 880 MHz
Transistor count 956 million 2,640 million
Manufacturing process technology 55 nm 40 nm
Texture fill rate 30.00 84.48
Floating-point performance 1,200.0 gflops 2,703.4 gflops
Length 250 mm 267 mm
Memory bus width 256 Bit 256 Bit
Memory clock speed 3600 MHz 1375 MHz
Memory bandwidth 115.2 GB/s
DirectX 10.1 (10_1)
Shader Model 4.1 5.0
OpenGL 3.3 4.4
OpenCL 1.1 1.2
Vulkan N/A
Bus support PCIe 2.0 x16
HDMI +
Bitcoin / BTC (SHA256) 273 Mh/s
Eyefinity +
Design reference
CrossFire +
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