4850X2

Well, i'm using my 8800gt g92 until i repurchase in Q2. I'm currently running on my 1080p HDTV as well, and have all settings maxed in-game and in the Nvidia control panel playing left 4 dead, tf2, hl2, and all other source games I get typically a solid 60 fps (refresh rate limited) but i never dip below 40 so you need not worry about any Nvidia offering out really having any issue with source games. Your choice though, DX11 is definately something i wouldn't want to pass up if i was you though.
 
Sherloc said:
DX11 is definately something i wouldn't want to pass up if i was you though.
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There are barely any DX10 games, let alone 10.1. I don't expect DX11 to be a big deal for a couple of years.
 
Ye, but if you're keeping the card 2-3 years as stated then you'd want to take advantage of DX11 games which will be out in under 2 years. Also the fact that DX10.1 wasn't used is a moot point because nvidia didn't support it, along with the difficulty it presented game developers. DX11 is backwards compatible with DX9, DX10, and DX10.1 cards, but won't have all the benefits unless using a DX11 card. My point is that the game developers are gonna jump on DX11 bandwagon seeing as Nvidia is going to support it, and the ease of which they can convert from the current staple DX9 to DX11 graphics in games.
 
Sherloc said:
Ye, but if you're keeping the card 2-3 years as stated then you'd want to take advantage of DX11 games which will be out in under 2 years.
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We'll see DX10 games en masse before DX11 games en masse. When a DX11 game that I want to play comes out, I'll get it. In the meantime, future games that I'd want--chief among them HL2 Episode 3--will use DX9 or 10.

DX11 is not a compelling reason to wait three months.
 
I had this issue when I was running VistaUltimate before SP1. Have you installed SP1 yet?

Duo Joe said:
I just loaded Far Cry2 and when I went to play it I started getting these weird horizontal artifacts streaming across the screen. Im pretty disapionted.
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there are new drivers up at the sapphire site as of today. i cant understand why you guys are having so many problems. it runs tf2, l4d, bioshock, dead space, cod4, farcry2 crysis warhead all without a single problem with vista 64 sp1 (i7 920/evga x58sli). i put it in my other machine, q6700/dfi p45 vista 64 sp1 and it also runs great on it. and lastly i put it in my son's nforce 750i board and e6850 c2d machine with vista 32 sp1 and it ran all his games fine.
 
I'm starting to think that some people might be unnecessarily sloppy with their driver installs, or tried to mix-and-match the official Catalyst drivers with Sapphire's drivers.
 
Did I read the spec right, the core clock is at 650MHz on the 2GB HD 4850 X2 instead of 625MHz on the single card?
 
vanilla_guerilla said:
there are new drivers up at the sapphire site as of today. i cant understand why you guys are having so many problems. it runs tf2, l4d, bioshock, dead space, cod4, farcry2 crysis warhead all without a single problem with vista 64 sp1 (i7 920/evga x58sli). i put it in my other machine, q6700/dfi p45 vista 64 sp1 and it also runs great on it. and lastly i put it in my son's nforce 750i board and e6850 c2d machine with vista 32 sp1 and it ran all his games fine.
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Ive read nothing but mostly probs with this card on several forum's.
 
jediknight73 said:
Ive read nothing but mostly probs with this card on several forum's.
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What were the specifics of their problems? My impression here is that people had problems when they tried to mix and match driver versions between the Sapphire releases and the official Catalyst drivers.
 
what would be the big issue? they figured out how to put 2 gpus on one card years ago. the 4850x2 isnt anything special. so supposedly this card cant run some particular games for 10 or 12 people?

btw the new drivers are ok. my blu ray performance got much better, and i picked up some framerate in farcry2. thats all i have checked so far. the regular monthly ccc should be out today or in a couple days and ati promises all kinds of perfromance bumps for the 4xxx cards.
 
I have never kept any video card for over 6 months, I have a 4870 now and I am forced to upgrade again. 4850x2 is really amazing I will probably get that over the weekend! great review.
 
vanilla_guerilla said:
btw the new drivers are ok. my blu ray performance got much better, and i picked up some framerate in farcry2. thats all i have checked so far. the regular monthly ccc should be out today or in a couple days and ati promises all kinds of perfromance bumps for the 4xxx cards.
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The official Catalyst drivers don't support the 4850 X2, however. So we'll have to wait for Sapphire's release of the Catalyst 9.1s. Unless I'm missing something?
 
Terpfen said:
What were the specifics of their problems? My impression here is that people had problems when they tried to mix and match driver versions between the Sapphire releases and the official Catalyst drivers.
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just the card wont work allot. driver's or the card itself?
 
Terpfen said:
The official Catalyst drivers don't support the 4850 X2, however. So we'll have to wait for Sapphire's release of the Catalyst 9.1s. Unless I'm missing something?
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last month's official drivers didnt support the card because it wasnt out yet. this month's will. unless i am mising something.
 
vanilla_guerilla said:
last month's official drivers didnt support the card because it wasnt out yet. this month's will. unless i am mising something.
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This is confirmed? Great! Makes me even more glad to have purchased a 4850 X2. Can't wait to build this new system.
 
pretty much. same thing happens with nvidia cards. i got a g92 gt on day 1, had to modify drivers, also gts g92 and 9800gx2. the card has only been out since the middle of december.
 
just a heads up, the cd drivers and updated drivers from the sapphire site both work in windows 7, install in compatibility mode. the ati win7 drivers will not allow you to enable crossfire, as they are based on the 8.11 drivers which were out before the release off 4850x2 and hence do not support it. dvd, blu ray and hd-dvd performance great. tf2, fc2, dead space and crysis warhead all work as good or better than in v64.
 
vanilla u play any real old games? like jediknight 2 or planetside on that 4850x2? Im dieing to buy this card.. BUT with just saph doing the driver's and the post's I've read online it just scare's me..
 
not really. just hl2 and gta3 san andreas. i have posted this before - i dont understand why guys are having problems. mine has run great since day 1. and it will be supported in cat 9.1 if ati ever gets around to releasing it.
 
I'd say do it, but then again the card didn't work for me had to many driver compatiblity issues : (. Best of luck.
 
great price. they have list price as $500. i am pretty sure the list was only $400, as i got mine the day it was released for $300. great bang for buck card @ $280.
 
Got 4850x2 and it's great... after my pc boots anyway.
Whenever I try to start my pc from a cold boot, I would see a black screen after POST, when it tries to load windows. I have XP and Vista dual boot, in the case of XP, it'd just reboot instantly instead of hanging at the black screen. Sometimes I'd get the black screen too if I try to invoke vista's boot to safe mode options. After a few consecutive restarts sometimes the pc would just boot up normally and then it'd be just fine with with crossfire and even overdrive turned on.

At first I thought it's my 600w OCZ stealthstream psu but then after I got the PC Power and Cooling 750w psu it was the same thing so I can rule out the psu being a problem. I definitely have enough power for this card.

I'm running with 8.12 from sapphire and just applied the latest 8.12 hotfix from ati this morning. but it's still the same.

I'm on a thread with the sapphire support and so far he's suspecting that I have a faulty card. However I already have it RMA'ed once already from newegg and same issues.

Been reading all over trying to find a solution and I think I'm gonna try to clear my cmos next and perhaps take out a couple RAM or try again with the 8.11 sapphire drivers...

Anybody has any suggestions? Thanks.

Spec:
Dell inspiron 530 with 1.0.16 BIOS.
Windows Vista 32bit home basic with SP1
q6600 cpu overclocked to 3.0ghz.
3GB ram at 800mhz.
500GB HDD.
soundblaster audigy2 pci.
PC Power and Cooling 750w psu.
 
jotaro5 said:
Got 4850x2 and it's great... after my pc boots anyway.
Whenever I try to start my pc from a cold boot, I would see a black screen after POST, when it tries to load windows. I have XP and Vista dual boot, in the case of XP, it'd just reboot instantly instead of hanging at the black screen. Sometimes I'd get the black screen too if I try to invoke vista's boot to safe mode options. After a few consecutive restarts sometimes the pc would just boot up normally and then it'd be just fine with with crossfire and even overdrive turned on.

At first I thought it's my 600w OCZ stealthstream psu but then after I got the PC Power and Cooling 750w psu it was the same thing so I can rule out the psu being a problem. I definitely have enough power for this card.

I'm running with 8.12 from sapphire and just applied the latest 8.12 hotfix from ati this morning. but it's still the same.

I'm on a thread with the sapphire support and so far he's suspecting that I have a faulty card. However I already have it RMA'ed once already from newegg and same issues.

Been reading all over trying to find a solution and I think I'm gonna try to clear my cmos next and perhaps take out a couple RAM or try again with the 8.11 sapphire drivers...

Anybody has any suggestions? Thanks.

Spec:
Dell inspiron 530 with 1.0.16 BIOS.
Windows Vista 32bit home basic with SP1
q6600 cpu overclocked to 3.0ghz.
3GB ram at 800mhz.
500GB HDD.
soundblaster audigy2 pci.
PC Power and Cooling 750w psu.
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I had a some-what similar problem with my HD3850. I would just get a black screen before post, and restarting wouldn't help until I restarted a few times. My motherboard would say "VGA Error". But I knew the vga was perfectly fine... I found out that it was actually my RAM.
 
Sorry if this is a noobie question, but does having 2 4850s in xfire perform just as well as having a single 4850x2? I have a crossfire capable mobo and don't exactly have the cash to splurge on a 4850x2 straight out. Was more in the line of buying one 4850 and then getting another 4850 when newer games require the extra speed. Is the performance between the two setups the same or does the 4850x2 have some advantageous?
 
Advantages:

-Excellent price-performance...generally cheaper than two HD 4850 1 GBs crossfired.

-One card on only one 16X PCI express slot. (Good for P45 owners, etc. who could only use 2 8X slots for crossfire). Also, you can use the other for Phys-X or whatever.

-Can support more than two monitors (?)

Disadvantages:

-Some might consider the card loud without fan control.

-You have to depend on Sapphire for the drivers. I'd like to try the new 8.12 hotfix driver, but Sapphire hasn't released an update. I guess they are waiting for the official 9.1 Cats.

-Crysis and Warhead DX9 have horrendous microstuttering. This is vexing because DX10 Crysis runs perfectly. One would think it would be the other way around...:confused:
 
Spent the evening assembling my new rig, complete with 4850 X2.

* Yes, the card is huge. Make sure you have the case room for it. My Coolermaster CM-690 barely accommodates it.

* Contrary to some of the posts in this thread, I'm not experiencing any driver issues. Loaded up the included driver CD on Vista Home Premium X64. Everything works fine. Haven't downloaded the updated drivers from Sapphire's site yet, as the disc drivers are fine and the Catalyst 9.1s will be out eventually. (vanilla_guerilla, where did you hear that the 9.1s will officially support the 4850 X2? Not that I don't believe you, I just want to see it for myself.)

* The fans are indeed audible. I haven't tried any fan control yet, as I have no idea what third party software to use in this regard. (Any suggestions?)

* Team Fortress 2 runs silky-smooth. 1920x1080, 8xAA, everything cranked up on max. Granted, it's TF2, but come on, I haven't had enough time to install other games yet!

I think people are a little more wary about this card than they really should be. I'm pleased with my purchase.
 
I had a few problems but haven't played around much. New build, new to Vista, new to 64-bit and new to OC'ing. Life is good. :)

Using the stock drivers (that came with the card - the 2x1Gb model btw):

Crysis - major corruption until the game was patched, at which point everything was silky smooth on DX10 (1920x1200, Very High - I don't remember the AA/AF settings.)

The Witcher - major corruption with both stock and EE version.

Other thoughts...

The card is begging for aftermarket cooling. The fans are really loud even at the minimum CCC setting (20%). At 100% I might as well slap in my old T-bird A7V fan that sounded like a hair dryer. Dayum.

It also sags enough that I ordered a cardkeeper for it (thanks to enginurd for the link.)

CCC takes a little getting used to since I've been using nVidia's controls for so long. No biggie.

I'm also thinking about trying the ATI 9.1's on this card. Any particular reason why I wouldn't want to do that? Has anyone else tried them out?
 
Well, I've encountered my first problem. Attempting to run the Armed Assault 1.15 beta--actually, any version--results in a Mode Not Supported display error on my Samsung LN32A550. (The TV displays the message, not Windows.) Do I need to force an HDTV mode in CCC? Game runs fine when launched in a window using a third party launcher program.
 
Terpfen said:
Well, I've encountered my first problem. Attempting to run the Armed Assault 1.15 beta--actually, any version--results in a Mode Not Supported display error on my Samsung LN32A550. (The TV displays the message, not Windows.) Do I need to force an HDTV mode in CCC? Game runs fine when launched in a window using a third party launcher program.
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Try to disable Catalyst AI.
 
eggrock said:
Oh, I thought ATI had released the 9.1s but Sapphire hadn't. ATI.com says I'm wrong, too. :eek:

2-pin fans on this card. Hmmmm.

http://www.overclock3d.net/gfx/articles/2008/12/21202750235l.jpg

[edit] Well lookee here, someone already did what I'm planning to do. Same cooler I chose, too. :) His temps. seem way out of whack.
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http://www.performance-pcs.com/cata...th=289&zenid=bc2b3509759961a921b90ffddfa125f9

several styles 2 to 3 pin converters on that page.

sapphire tech support assured me cat 9.1 will support card. why wouldnt they? this card is manufactured by ati/amd. why would they refuse to support it? does anyone know of any case where ati or nvidia built a card and then never supported it with drivers? this card was released 10 days after the most recent set of cats. hence, not supported by 8.12.

my case is not on the desk anymore and has 4 120mm fans, plus a 120mm on the hs/f. so i never hear my 4850x2. also, my card is 30c at idle with fans at 20%. my card has never been above 60c, my fans have never been above 30%. so that guy with the zalman that gets over 80c is definitely doing something wrong.

4850x2 might perfrom a little better than 2x 4850 1gb cards. but not much. the benefits were outlined above by ogilvy very concisely. and yes, it will support 4 monitors.

that armed assault glitch definitely sounds like a driver error. anybody else run into this?

yep, my card sags a little also. but i dont think i want to install a cardkeeper. and while i have no plans to upgrade right now, i dont think i have had a vid card in my primary machine for over 3 or 4 months, ever. but maybe 2x 4850x2?


use the fan control in the cats.

that non cold booting issue does not sound like a vid card problem. most likely ram or motherboard. make sure virtualization is disabled in bios. try booting with only one stick ram, then try the other. clear cmos and boot with your boards "optimal" settings.
 
Actually, the ArmA problem is caused by a horrible .cfg file. I edited arma.cfg to change the resolution from 800x600 to 1920x1080 and it works fine.

Not a driver problem, just crappy coding.
 
Terpfen said:
Actually, the ArmA problem is caused by a horrible .cfg file. I edited arma.cfg to change the resolution from 800x600 to 1920x1080 and it works fine.

Not a driver problem, just crappy coding.
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Nothing is at fault here, the game just loads at a very low resolution which is not supported by the TV. This is normal for older games and I'm sure that you will come across this problem again with some other older games.

There is nothing you can do... or maybe there is, try using GPU scaling option. I guess that the option could scale the game to fit the higher resolution. I think that this way your TV will always see the resolution from your card as 1920x1080.
 
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