Crossfire or upgrade?

Replace or add?

  • Total voters
    24
U

unhappy_mage

[H]ard|DCer of the Month - October 2005
Joined
Jun 29, 2004
Messages
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I have one 5870 eyefinity 6 edition, and they're on sale today. Should I get another, or hold out and get a 6000 series card (or a 7000 series card, for that matter)? Primary use is somewhat older games, but I'm considering going 2560x1600 (up from 1024x768 right now, lol) and more fps wouldn't hurt.

Thanks!
 
although 2 5870 would handle that resolution much better, no current card X2, Crossfire/sli handles that high or a resolution very well without sacrificing looks or performance.

I would hold out to see what the 7k series offers, they very well could be killer cards and priced very well, I would wait to see what they bring to the table before you invest in dual 5k dual 6k series cards, the 6k scale very well especially the 6900 series as they do have alof of memory/optimizations to work with, however, scaling only gets so good, and 2500 range reso is hard to fill and have decent play.

Most modern "performance cards" which the 5870 is on the high end of its generation of these, play very well at 1920/1080 or x1200, I am sure the 2500 range is real sweet to look at with the right setup, but it is also an expensive jump to be making, not to mention to get the most out of it. You would be better going eyefinity or something along that line, at least then it would generally be able to run just fine(well more or less, research it well though)

I suppose it is all on the games that you like to play though :)
 
Wow, from 1024x768 to 2560x1600...it's going to blow your mind, lol. Two 6950/6970 or 570/580 handles most games pretty damn well at that resolution right now; a single one, particularly if you're playing older games, should be fine. (I also game at 2560x1600). Most of the console port / older games I played ran pretty damn well even with a GTX280 at that res.
 
TwistedAegis said:
Wow, from 1024x768 to 2560x1600...it's going to blow your mind, lol. Two 6950/6970 or 570/580 handles most games pretty damn well at that resolution right now; a single one, particularly if you're playing older games, should be fine. (I also game at 2560x1600). Most of the console port / older games I played ran pretty damn well even with a GTX280 at that res.
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10x7 is just my setup on that computer, I run 2 24s at 1200p at work, so I should manage to avoid most of the culture shock :p

I'm interested in trying out BF3 single player, but I don't think I can get a chance to try that out before the end of the day, and the deal might go away before I get a chance to try it.

I think I'll probably pass on getting another card and give bf3 a shot before I go blow more money on electronics. It's a tough decision :eek:
 
If BF3 is your concern, no. I would just wait till the next gen cards are out. Reason being is that 2x5870 will still not give you great performance at that high of a resolution. Hell, two 580's probably wouldn't let you max out the game either at that resolution, so I would just wait and get something really kick ass later.
 
I would vote no for crossfire due to studdering issues in most games, since ATi/AMD's multigpu implementation is worse than nvidia's SLI. Don't know what micro studdering is? You're blind.

I have two 5870's in crossfire and even though battlefield 3 scales very well with multigpu's, there is a slight but constant studdering that makes the game feel less than smooth. Its still very playable however, and Battlefield 3 stresses out any GPU.

Crossfire with Bad Company 2? A fucking joke.
 
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MooCow said:
I would vote no for crossfire due to studdering issues in most games, since ATi/AMD's multigpu implementation is worse than nvidia's SLI. Don't know what micro studdering is? You're blind.

I have two 5870's in crossfire and even though battlefield 3 scales very well with multigpu's, there is a slight but constant studdering that makes the game feel less than smooth. Its still very playable however, and Battlefield 3 stresses out any GPU.

Crossfire with Bad Company 2? A fucking joke.
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Strongly disagree in regards to the 6000 series - BC2 and BF3 have been fantastic.
 
I can also say 2560 reso, is almost the same thing as eyefinity or multi-monitor as they are "scaling" to that reso and above, and most cards simply cannot handle that kind of pixel pushing without sacrificing performance or quality, this includes even the mighty ASUS MARS II quad sli(suffers from lack of Vram) or dual 6990(uber powerful, but these card still are not quite powerful enough to be "smooth" at uber high res or spanned res aka eyefinity)

Also to the stuttering, this can be helped with better drivers, better monitors, better performance from PCI-E slots, nothing is perfect, and the 6k series has made this ALOT better then used to be. Nvidia also suffers from this, the X2 cards a little less so, it is the nature of 2 cards trying to work as one unit, there is always going to be some lag, to much "stutters"
 
unhappy_mage said:
I have one 5870 eyefinity 6 edition, and they're on sale today. Should I get another, or hold out and get a 6000 series card (or a 7000 series card, for that matter)? Primary use is somewhat older games, but I'm considering going 2560x1600 (up from 1024x768 right now, lol) and more fps wouldn't hurt.

Thanks!
Click to expand...

If you're not going to upgrade to 2560x1600. Stick with what you got. You do need a Crossfire/SLI system to run at 2560x1600. I did PM some of the guys at widescreengaming forums and they told me some crazy videocard setups like tri-fire or two 6990s. But two high end videocards will be more than adequate for your needs.

If you're going to put of your upgrade to 2560x1600 till 2012. I would seriously try to get two 7970 XTs or two GTX 680s. But I can tell you one thing. Once you game at 2560x1600, you can't really go back. It's painful to game at 1920x1200 now.
 
looks like the deal is dead and the price is not shown, but if it was over $200 no I would not do it, and this is coming from someone with 2 x 5870's pushing 5760x1200 for both BFBC2 and BF3.
 
Also, just need to point out, going dual triple or quad gpu, you really need as much Vram as you can get, most X2 cards can suffer more from lack of ram but do no suffer stuttering as much. I personally would be doing eyefinity rather then trying to get a single or multiple monitors running 2500+ range reso, GPU from all the reviews I have read so far just are not comfortable running those high res situations, 1920 range yes, 2500k+ range, not so much.

Just as an idea, 2 580 MARS II, the best quad gpu you can get, suffer from lack of Vram, 2 6990 do not suffer as much, but frame rates are just not good play quality, playable yes, but not comfortable. I am sure older games that "allow" such high reso would play alright, but modern games, I doubt you would be pushing say 60FPS near constant with settings turned up for it to be "wow this is amazing looking" at the same time, if I am wrong, then so is all the review sites I go to almost every day, GPU are getting really good at scaling, however they are not quite there yet as far as pushing monstrous reso and eye candy comfortably.
 
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