6770 with future crossfire upgrade if needed vs 6950 now?

[frommaine]

Am i better of buying a 6770 for now with the option of buying a other one for crossfire if i need the power down the road or am i better of just spendthe the extra $100 for a 6950 now? I was to be able to play Diable 3 and Skyrim in high settings.

 

[jyjjy]

If you can afford the HD6950 it would be the way to go.
What is the rest of your system including PSU and resolution?

 

[Novuake]

Defintiely the HD 6950 if you have a 600w PSU and the cash.

Just be sure to get a 1 GB version, there is no actual benifit to the 2GB.

 

[jyjjy]

There is benefit to 2gb if you use an ultrahigh resolution monitor or Eyefinity.

 

[Novuake]

There is benefit to 2gb if you use an ultrahigh resolution monitor or Eyefinity.

Semi-true, but he won't be doing that. So irrelevant.

 

[ilysaml]

@ OP, What's your gaming resolution ? anyway the idea of Crossfiring low end GPUs is kinda a waste of time, a single high end GPU will beat them.

 

[frommaine]

The PSU i picked is 850w and I am going to be getting a single 27" 1920 x 1080 monitor.

 

[jyjjy]

Semi-true, but he won't be doing that. So irrelevant.

It's not semi-true, it is true and I can't see how you would know what options he would like available in the future.

 

[jyjjy]

The PSU i picked is 850w and I am going to be getting a single 27" 1920 x 1080 monitor.

850w is much more than you need unless you want to crossfire HD6950s in the future and even then it is a bit much.

 

[ilysaml]

The PSU i picked is 850w and I am going to be getting a single 27" 1920 x 1080 monitor.

So, single HD 6950 all they way, you'll be able to max out some games and play all the current games at high settings.

 

[Novuake]

It's not semi-true, it is true and I can't see how you would know what options he would like available in the future.

I repeat, it is semi-true.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-6950-1gb-benchmark,3041.html

Feutured article. Read it. "The reference card (HD6950) runs out of steam before using the 2GB available."

There are exceptions, for example compiling very large batches of 3D flouting point data (arcGIS would use it for example), but very few people would use it.

 

[jyjjy]

A single HD6950 may "run out of steam" as you put it. For the situations I was describing Crossfire would be appropriate(something the OP specifically mentioned) and 2 HD6950s will be limited by 1gb of video memory.

 

[Novuake]

A single HD6950 may "run out of steam" as you put it. For the situations I was describing Crossfire would be appropriate(something the OP specifically mentioned) and 2 HD6950s will be limited by 1gb of video memory.

He mentioned a Xfire setup with 2 x HD6770, not HD6950s. And 2 x HD6950s would not just have 1GB but 2x 1GB, which is sufficient.