GIGABYTE Radeon HD 6950 2GB Video Card Overclocked

Final Thoughts

Out of the box the GIGABYTE HD 6950 2GB isn't bringing anything new to the table compared to just about every other HD 6950 currently on the market. That's not a bad thing, though, as it comes with that aggressive price tag and at reference speeds, while we didn't test it, we know how it's going to perform and we know that's very well.

What we got the chance to do today, though, was look at what happens when we start to get down and dirty with the HD 6950. To say we're impressed with the overclocking potential of the model would be a little bit of an understatement. We're seeing some great performance from the GIGABYTE HD 6950 when we overclock which doesn't just put it ahead of the reference clocked HD 6970s, but the pre-overclocked HD 6970s from both Diamond and HIS, too.

We already liked the HD 6950 2GB as out of the box it offers some great performance for under $300. Take the time, though, to do a bit of overclocking and you've got a real beast on your hands for the price.

While you can of course throw the HD 6970 BIOS on the card, it seems that there's some issues coming to light with the memory a few weeks on. Personally, I would recommend that you go down the path of overclocking like this instead of changing the BIOS. It also seems at the moment there's no option to adjust the voltage on the modified BIOS HD 6950s, and considering we can get not only performance better than reference HD 6970s, but also overclocked ones, this is a great path to take.

Strong performance, strong price, great OC potential and a shiny sticker make this another great HD 6950. Another strong brand brings with it a reference card that does exactly what you expect; perform well at a good price. It'll be interesting to see how GIGABYTE attack this model and other models in the series with some of their much loved series like SOC and Windforce.