SAPPHIRE DUAL-X Radeon HD 6970 2GB GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 Graphics Card 100314-4L

Pros: -Excellent GPU cooling. I added this card to my system to crossfire it with a preexisting XFX 6970 I had, and the temperature of the Sapphire lingers around 73 degrees under heavy load. My XFX 6970 equipped with a stock 'blower' style cooler becomes much hotter when running stress test style benchmarks. What's even more remarkable is that in my crossfire setup, this Sapphire card is located just above my XFX card on my motherboard, and is thus the card that can be considered starved for air.

-Even by today's standards, the 6970 presents itself as a powerful video card. Keep in mind the 6970 was released as an enthusiast level GPU back in its day (late 2010), compared to say, the 6800 series cards which were considered more mid-level. The card has no problems running Skyrim on ultra (I would not suggest enabling ENBs, however) or many other titles released before 2012 on highest settings. The card begins to show its age with more recent titles, and if someone were to have no issues changing several graphics setting from Ultra to High (or worst case: High to Med) then this card would be fine to purchase and use with the many games of today.

Cons: -The memory used with this card is ‘Elpida’ GDDR5, as opposed to ‘Hynix’ memory. Cards which use Hynix memory (such as my XFX 6970) are better overclockers, and don't suffer from periodic black screen issues present with even casual levels of overclock. I'd love to overclock my crossfire setup further than what I currently have (920/1410) but any higher adjustments leads to the black screen issues.

-If you are interested in setting up a Tri-fire setup with three of these specific Sapphire 6970 cards, I can tell you now that you are out of luck. This Sapphire card differs from my XFX 6970 in that there is only one location on the card where a crossfire cable can be connected. My XFX card has 2 such locations. In a Tri-fire setup, 2 crossfire connect cables are required to connect three cards together, essentially meaning that one card requires 2 separate points of connection. That setup is simply not possible with these Sapphire cards.

Overall Review: As I’ve made it clear that this Sapphire card was added to my system which already contained a XFX 6970, this review contains extra information for those interested in doing the same (ie upgrading to a crossfire setup). Refer to my points below.

-For the budget minded, I would recommend the purchase of this video card as a standalone GPU for the reasons I've stated above.

-For those interested in adding this Sapphire 6970 to an already owned 6970 (or bios updated 6950) I would also recommend this card.

-For those thinking about purchasing two of these video cards for the sole purpose of setting up a crossfire 6970 configuration - I would advise against such action. Crossfire setups present a slew of added problems and issues, and while I've spent the time tinkering and figuring out solutions to many of the problems, I've willingly done so because with everything working as it should, I've essentially doubled my FPS in games with the purchase and addition of a single ($150) card. Rather than spending $300+ on two Sapphire 6970s, I would recommend purchasing a different card, and avoid SLI or crossfire configurations altogether.

The upcoming Radeon 300 series cards look very promising, and I now have a setup that I can feel confident about using until the price of these new Radeons (and even other recently released Nvidia cards) become more appealing to me.

Happy gaming.

Pros: The card worked well for what it was worth. It was very cheap and was able to play games very well.

Cons: The card is very bulky, and runs very hot. I had the card for about 9 months and the card overheated while playing ark survival evolved. One of the components got burnt to a crisp.

Overall Review: Although the card didn't last very long, it still was great while it lasted. However I have a friend who had the same card that recommended it to me, and his eventually broke a year or two later also