AMD Dual Graphics Analysis: Better Benchmarks; Same Experience?

[17seconds]

Rather than outrage, which is the appropriate emotion when a company steals your money and sells you a broken product, all we get from consumers and fans are the usual excuses, rationales, misdirected anger, and criticism of the messenger. I wonder what it would take to get some people to realize that its the product that's flawed, not the people testing it.

 

[Sam Bittermann]

As an A10-6800K/6670 GDDR5/1866MHz DDR3 owner I'd like to thank Tom's for this article. I've experienced exactly what their results show and am severely disappointed with AMD at this time. Further more they won't give me a straight answer on whether a 7750 would work in dual graphics but it show it does AND gives the smoothest frame rates after a single card configuration. Seems I wasted my money on a 6670 and this whole system.

 

[clonazepam]

I got the A8-5800K a long time ago, for the kid. I never put a discrete card in with it, but always thought to myself, well I might some day, maybe just to satisfy the nerd in me and have something a little different to tinker with.

I'm glad I never got around to it. Yes, when playing full fledged triple A titles, I'd always gone with 720p and higher visual settings to meet or exceed 30fps.

The system's not for me, so most games played are casual web-based stuff anyway. Edit: Forgot, lots of Steam Independents too!! =)

 

[JPForums]

You went into this story knowing that AMD has acknowledged their crossfire issue and has commenced working on a frame pacing solution. You said yourself that Hybrid CrossFire was the more on point description of Dual Graphics. You also went into the story knowing that frame pacing wasn't yet available to this setup. In other words, you went into this story knowing full well that nothing had changed for this setup. It was obviously still going to have the same problems that AMD has been trying to fix. There is no new information presented here.

You say you weren't picking on AMD, but you ran a story that you knew the results of before you started and that served only to readdress issues that AMD has already acknowledged and made measurable progress on.

I've been advising people against buying into CrossFire for a while now. I'm definitely a proponent of SLI for multicard configurations. I'm rocking two GTX670 FTWs at the moment. However, given the progress AMD has been making, I've also advised those who already have CrossFire setups to have a little patience rather than drop the cash for a new Nvidia setup. Every time a new article like this comes up, I get hit with a load of comments like: "I thought you told me they were improving their crossfire. This article says that it's worse than ever." Then I have to explain to them how the current driver only helps DX10+ games on discrete cards and the article is talking about DX9 games or integrated setups, etc. Then I have to show them all over again how DX9 titles are generally light enough that a single card can handle the workload with room to spare.

 

[sarinaide]

Its a bit of a gambit right now, Dual Graphics has potential but lets give AMD the time to roll out the sequence of frame pacing drivers they said they would then better ascertain at the end where Dual Graphics stands. My experiences with 7750's and 6670's was that demanding games like BF3 and Farcry3 are not very playable despite the encouragingly high FPS notably at 1680x1050.

As of such we tried BF3 with CFX's 7870GE Hawks with Catalyst 13.8 drivers and at 1920x1200 fully maxed the game played on a 120hz seemlessly no microstutter so if Crossfire is fixed its a start, considering most are likely on CFX solutions its a possitive step.

 

[clonazepam]

Given the age of this hybrid technology, you'd expect better results from it by now (quality). The article shows what's available today, and how well it works. Most people want to buy what works, not what is promised to work sometime down the road.

 

[Sangeet Khatri]

Get the Phenom II X4 965 BE or the AMD Athlon II X4 750K and pair that with the 7770 Ghz Edition for about the same price. That would offer way better performance than this dual GPU bulls#!t

 

[InvalidError]

Second Dual graphics is not perfect at the moment, yes AMD are the pioneers of this technology so there are lots of challenges but if I were to look on the bright side, I'd say at least it's only software so with an update hopefully this can be resolved.

AMD is the "pioneer" simply because nobody else makes BOTH APUs and discrete GPUs so AMD is the only one who can even try making both work together.

As for it being "all software," I would have to disagree. While MUCH of it may be software, you still need to make the hardware play nice with each other and the hardware itself may lack the necessary tweaks to make it happen smoothly. Trying to smooth out uncooperative hardware with software can get real ugly real quick or just never work quite as intended.

 

[jpishgar]

Anyone notice that they declined to use the latest 13.8 driver? This is very typical of TomsHardware. If they would quit getting their pockets filled by Nvidia and Intel maybe then we would see some fair comparisons.

Firstly, the driver was in beta.

Secondly, our editorial staff spoke with AMD directly about 13.8, and AMD said specifically that the new, beta driver 13.8 would not affect Dual Graphics.

Thirdly, our pockets are not "lined by Nvidia and Intel", as much as errant AMD fanbois (of which I am one, much to the chiding of the moderators) may believe they are. We get the occasional accusation like this when we arrive at conclusions and analysis based on in-depth testing from across a broad spectrum of people with agendas to push. We are as immune to offers soliciting editorial preference as we are to the accusations that such is taking place. Tom's Hardware was built on a strong principle of journalistic integrity at a time when every other hardware and tech site out there was kowtowing to manufacturers who wanted stories spun "just right".

We do not play that game, here. We are not interested in playing that game.

If, in the future, you have a sincere, valid gripe or concern about a review or coverage, please make it. You can contact me directly via PM, or Chris Angelini, or any of the editorial team and have your issue addressed. Otherwise, please do keep allegations of unfairness and preference to a minimum, as we take them very seriously.

Thanks for your cooperation.

-JP

 

[COLGeek]

All the more reason to get the strongest single GPU solution one can afford vice a multi-GPU solution.

 

[rpgplayer]

The graphics division of AMD has always put out great hardware components, it's their driver packages that completely suck. The single greatest investment that AMD could possibly make right now is to do a groud-up redesign of their software department. They need some new talent there that can write code to fully optimize the hardware they currently have.

 

[sarinaide]

Chillax, AMD will fix this when they get to it in the interim maybe Toms can re-run the HD7990 review with Catalyst 13.8 to get a better assessment over the last review.

 

[cleeve]

It's interesting that many of the benchmarks were done using unplayable settings to begin with.

That was the point!
If the game was playable on the APU alone, there would be no reason to add dual graphics! We therefore chose settings that were hard on the APU, and that Dual Graphics improved into what should have been a smooth amount of FPS, according to FRAPS.

I would like to see the benchmarks rerun with settings where even the lower end configurations run at playable frame rates. I'm also curious to see how RAM speed affects the overall result. We know APU's are sensitive to frame rates, I'm curious on this this affects dual graphics configurations.

Absolutely, APUs can deliver smooth frame rates, but you need to use lower settings and resolutions.
The point of this article isn't to say that APUs are bad. APUs can be great! But our purpose here was to examine Dual Graphics specifically, so we chose tougher settings to illuminate that.

If you're interested to see what an APU can do on it's own, and with high speed RAM installed, check our Richland review:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/a10-6700-a10-6800k-richland-review,3528.html

 

[cleeve]

Chillax, AMD will fix this when they get to it in the interim maybe Toms can re-run the HD7990 review with Catalyst 13.8 to get a better assessment over the last review.

+1 for TRVTH!

Our hope is that AMD fixes this issue with a software update so we can revisit the problem in a future article.

Ideally, everyone with dual graphics setups will be able to enjoy smooth and improved performance that they can see! If this article helps us get there, we've done our jobs.

 

[-Fran-]

Sad state of affairs on their biggest product line for consumers right now... They should really address this type of issues if they sell the idea of "improving one's experience with another discrete card".

Nice findings.

Cheers!

 

[cleeve]

lol @ NV propaganda. It's all they've got left.
It's clear that drivers are being rolled out to remove any glitches that might affect somebody's experience.

While I'm sure you'd rather us bury the truth, it's articles like these that challenge the status quo in the first place.

If everyone had your attitude and just assumed everything will be fixed without challenging it, we would have never gotten an improved CrossFire driver from AMD.

Improvement requires challenge. If I have challenged AMD so that they pay attention to their Dual graphics driver, do you feel that is a bad thing? If so, then should you not also feel its a bad thing that anyone noticed frame latency in the first place to prompt them to act and create a driver fix?

Your response does not hold under scrutiny. Perhaps your post speaks more about your company preference than propaganda from our side of the equation. You may want to consider an objective look in the mirror.

The timing of this article isn't shocking. How much does it cost to have a website do a headline article on intel, nv, intel/nv graphics solutions with the same objectivity?

It costs nothing, actually... we're running CrossFire vs SLI driver tests with AMDs new driver as we speak for an upcoming review.

 

[yannigr]

To all the morons who can not understand that 1+1=2 and call the others trolls. When you add a 7750 in the setup you don't need faster memory because from the article is obvious that you are NOT going to enable dual graphics. Do you understand now or do I have to paint it for you? Maybe you need to see it in pictures?

 

[wh3resmycar]

apus are stupid. they are useless.. AMD still keeps on dreaming that "casual" gamers play games on low to medium graphic settings... they don't... they play games on their smartphone/tablets.

on the other hand, people who actually buy an APU and hoping to get a "good" gaming experience are fooling themselves.... good luck being scammed by AMD..

motherboards have PCIE slots for a reason. why not use it?

 

[rmpumper]

you don't need faster memory because from the article is obvious that you are NOT going to enable dual graphics

That would be retarded thing to do. Why would anyone get a more expensive APU to not use it's GPU? Are you even thinking before posting this nonsense?

 

[COLGeek]

Hey guys, I want to know if I can do the same with my ati 4850????

Yes, you can Crossfire a HD4850 with another HD4850/4870, but not with an APU.

 

[abitoms]

congrats on your child, Chris !

And thanks for the article. I think I was among many who were wondering how 7750 worked with dual graphics mode

 

[JohnnyLucky]

Thanks for an informative article that sheds light on dual graphics.

 

[ElMoIsEviL]

The entire end of your article is out of date. You can mention that 13.8 wasn't available at the time of writing and that's fine and dandy but it has been available prior to the publication of this article making the information contained in this article.. out of date from the onset. This entire article shouldn't have been posted as it is ALREADY yesterday's news imo.

 

[brucek2]

Good on folks like Tom's and Tech Report for digging deep on investigations like this. Its a lot more work than just blindly reporting a FRAPS average. As a paying consumer of graphics hardware, I'm grateful they're doing the extra work to try to best understand the experience I'd be getting.

That said -- really, really bad on AMD on trying to get away with this. I can not believe the engineers and testers working on these technologies as a full time job did not know about these no-better-experience issues long ago. And yet, AMD chose to release the products, market the products, and do nothing to fix it until the press finally caught on only months (years?) after the fact. Its at least borderline fraud if not actual fraud no? Or perhaps negligence but I don't believe it for a second. Their tech staff is not stupid; though perhaps their marketing executives might be that desperate though?

 

[Marcus52]

Outstanding article, tyvm Don!