Our Setup

The system I'm using comes from parts from Corsair, Sapphire and ASRock. Just hours before I began writing this article, a new Radeon HD 7950 arrived on my door step from GIGABYTE, so we'd like to thank them too.

This late arrival is actually perfect, as we'll be able to do a quick run on single-GPU tests, and then slot in the second HD 7950 for some dual-GPU action. Oh boy. I love me some multi-GPU tests. The specs we have cranking along inside of our system thanks to our partners are:

- Intel Core i7 3770K @ 4.8GHz

- Corsair H100 Hydro Cooler

- Corsair Force Series GT 240GB SSD

- ASRock Z77 Extreme 9 motherboard

- Sapphire Radeon HD 7950 OC Edition

- GIGABYTE Radeon HD 7950 WindForce Edition

- Corsair Obsidian 800D Case

- Corsair 8GB kit of DDR3 - CMZ8GX3M2A1866C9

- Windows 7 Ultimate Edition x64

- AMD Catalyst 13.1 drivers

We'll do is a single test of 1080p at absolute maximum settings in the new 3DMark at stock GPU settings, then we'll repeat it with some overclocks on the GPU. We'll then run the standard Fire Strike test at stock, and then again at an overclocked GPU speed.

We'll then slot in the second HD 7950 and do it all again to provide us with some single-GPU and multi-GPU tests, at stock and overclocked numbers. This should give us some great results to look over.