Sapphire HD 6990 is currently the fastest graphics card around, although Nvidia will attempt to snatch the throne with its GTX 590. HD 6990 beats GTX 580 by about 30%.
Radeon HD 6990 launched on March 7 and AMD improved its performance witt the new driver – Catalyst 11.4 early preview. On launch day, Sapphire's HD 6990 cost about €600 but you can find it today priced at around €550. As one would expect, performance is great, but what else to expect from two Caymans.
However, consumption and loundness aren't quite the HD 6990's thing. On the other hand, not every card will allow for using 5 or 6 displays and still chewing up pretty much anything you throw at it.
There's no doubt about it - Sapphire's HD 6990 is a killer card. However, if you've developed a taste for Sapphire's HD 6990 it might we wiser to wait a bit more as Nvidia announced the GTX 590 at lower price than initial, which may prompt AMD to do some price adjustments of its own. In any case, HD 6990 is a card that will provide some serious performance, be it a 30'' inch display or full blown Eyefinity setup.