HD 4870 CrossFire Review!

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Read this http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/14967/7 It shows a lowly 4850 at 25x16 with 4xAA coming within 10% of the G280.

 

[ro3dog]

Can we not start the ATI vs. Nvidia fanboy nonsense? Both sides have positives and negatives with their latest cards, but ultimately both have been extremely disappointing. Nvidia for the outrageous price, and ATI for... well, everything else. I personally don't give a rat's ass which company I buy cards from, but I'm going to be damn scrutinizing for both sides. Right now, honestly, ATI has had a good release for low-mid range cards and budget builds, but nothing else. Their Crysis performance in the benches so far has been embarrassing. You obviously seem to like ATI, that's fine, but don't turn this into an ATI/Nvidia ****. There's a reason bipartisan politics sucks so much ass, it's because they both have the other side labeled as X or Y, so they don't listen to each other anymore.

ATI Fan huh? HE MUST NOT KNOW WHAT HES TALKING ABOUT! Likes Nvidia? STFU!

Anyway...

4870: $300
2x 4870 in Crossfire: $600
GTX280: $660

$60 to not waste the extra PCIe slot, and be able to upgrade to SLI when the GTX280 comes down in price? Seems worth it to me, others might not agree.

Remember that this is the 4870 512MB, which to me seems kinda lame. I want to see how the 1GB compares, and then the 4870x2. The ultimate test will be 2x 4870x2's vs. 3way GTX280. Right now the 3 way GTX280 seems to pretty much own crysis at 51fps avg 1920x1200 very high everything, and 38fps avg at 2560x1600 very high everything. This is with new drivers. I've seen a significant boost just over the past 6 months with driver releases for the 8 series, so it'll be damn exciting to see how more of a boost we'll see for Crysis. If the 4870x2 can step up, ATI will win over the performance gamers, but otherwise they'll still be left in the dust and just beating Nvidia's low end cards in price with their high end ones.

Also, let me say that 83c is unacceptable. Even in Tri SLI with 3 8800GTX's sitting right on **** top of each other, I've yet to see any of my cards pass 74c at full with the initial thermal paste, and 68 after using AS5. 68 is already wayyyy hotter than I'd like it, but they're warm cards, and they put off so much damn heat into the room. I don't care who you are, if your vid card is hitting 80c, you've got a hybrid computer/ezbake oven and you may as well cook some brownies or cookies on that sucker while it still works. You won't be seeing the usual "ATI has the advantage with overclocking" arguments if that kind of temperature is an accurate measurement of the 4 series 2 months from now.

LMFAO.You came in writing no fanboy-ism,yet quickly jump on the Nv band wagon.The 4850 came to challenge the 8800gt and the 4870 came to challenge the 9800gtx.These cards are so good that they are up against cards thats more pricey .You guys must work for Nvidia .when the 4870x2 comes out,you will be chanting how it takes 2 gpu's to beat Nv.Oh,if you guys/gals dont know how to get rid of the heat ,we at the forum do help noobs

 

[Oh Snap]

In single card? And if not, whats that telling you?

Nope, in CF, and that's telling me that thus far ATI really hasn't gotten their **** together with their drivers. When it comes to the time to buy, ultimately everyone has to go with what works. If they have major CF issues with the 4870x2 release, that's going to cost them big and make them look like they don't really know what they're doing. ATI has always had notoriously problematic drivers, and if they can't break out of that image, a lot of people will end up going with Nvidia. The hardware might have awesome potential, but if they can't be bothered to really push it as far as they can, why should anyone be bothered to buy from them?

Just sayin'.

 

[romulus47plus1]

Fanboyism fanboyism fanboyism...
JayDeeJohn let's leave.

 

[Oh Snap]

LMFAO.You came in writing no fanboy-ism,yet quickly jump on the Nv band wagon.The 4850 came to challenge the 8800gt and the 4870 came to challenge the 9800gtx.These cards are so good that they are up against cards thats more pricey .You guys must work for Nvidia .when the 4870x2 comes out,you will be chanting how it takes 2 gpu's to beat Nv.Oh,if you guys/gals dont know how to get rid of the heat ,we at the forum do help noobs

Did you actually read what I posted or just see that the word "nvidia" wasn't followed with "sucks" or "blows donkey balls" and assume I'm an nvidia fanboy? If ATI wants to compete with old Nvidia cards, that's fine, but don't go telling me that they "win" some kind of special competition for doing so. They're competing with soon to be outdated cards, and they need to step it up. Seriously, get real here people.

 

[uguv]

My last few cards have been nvidia but I was thinking of going with a pair of 4000 series cards in crossfire in my next build. I was hoping for a bit more from the 4870s in crossfire but I honestly wasn't too impressed. In most cases it barely beats crossfired 4850s.

If you can fit 5+ 4870's into a case, let me know, because this argument runs thin when you've only realistically got 2 or 3 slots to work with.
Consider upgrading in the future. With a GTX280, as outrageously priced as it may be, you've got the option go to 2 or 3x SLI in the future when prices come down, which would last for a very, very long time. You pop a couple 4870's in there, sure you could crossfire them with a 4870x2, but then you've really got 1 and a half cards. Just seems kinda mickey mouse to me. Just IMO.

My problem with future upgrades and going 2 or 3 SLI is that I'd have to use a craptastic nvidia chipset, something that I've been avoiding at all costs.

 

[eded333]

Oh man, again.... if you reaply heatsink with as5 temps goes down by 20ºC... so shame to ati on that, but it has an easy solution

 

[Oh Snap]

Read this http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/14967/7 It shows a lowly 4850 at 25x16 with 4xAA coming within 10% of the G280.

Which is actually pretty impressive as far as how they're handling AA. Like I said, that's why I want to see ATI's top cards (2x 4870x2) vs. Nvidia's (3way GTX280, or possibly a 2x 200 series x2? Haven't read much on that or if it's even been announced). AA is nice, but being able to hang with Crysis' ridiculous shaders is also very important.

Oh man, again.... if you reaply heatsink with as5 temps goes down by 20ºC... so shame to ati on that, but it has an easy solution

That's a bit of an exaggeration.

 

[romulus47plus1]

Monsta and Oh snap sing.....
"I am beautiful no matter what they say , words cant bring me down....
So dont you bring me down today.......

LOL respect for these words.

 

[eded333]

and no monsta, two 4870 come on top of a single 280 on 7 of 9 test, by little overall sometimes much others not so, yes, and yes depends on resolution but they do come on top of the 280 on many of the tests. Its not a big deal, nvidia has a grate product, overpriced, and 2 atis best gpu that costs a bit less gets marginally on top of the 280

 

[eded333]

Oh Snap, its not an exageration, read it on a review which also tested the S1 im not talking on air

 

[ovaltineplease]

My last few cards have been nvidia but I was thinking of going with a pair of 4000 series cards in crossfire in my next build. I was hoping for a bit more from the 4870s in crossfire but I honestly wasn't too impressed. In most cases it barely beats crossfired 4850s.

This is the fundimental problem I have with the 4870 CF solution right now; AMD touted a lot about Crossfire scaling and they so far have only really pushed the envelope on that in 1 game that .. well really any video card made in the last year can play Call of Duty 4 without breaking a sweat.. you don't need 600$ graphics hardware for that :S

Anyways, I think that Oh Snap is right, AMD does need to fix these software issues rapidly because this fanboy stuff is going to wear off as time passes. Its great that AMD launched well with this card but if they drop the ball now they will be back to square one again.

 

[copasetic]

Do you honestly believe in what you are saying that the drivers are gonna cool it down? Unless they come with free aftermarket cooling then your comment would have some credibility

I dunno, I thought it was pretty straight forward how it works.

Lets say I go into ATI Tray Tools now and set the fan to run at only 40% when the temperature reaches 70C or higher. The temperature will probably climb over 90C no? Then I tell the fan to run at 100% in the same situation, temperature will stabilize a lot lower.

I'm doing this through the drivers, which control the fan speed. If the drivers aren't controlling the fan right, then temperatures will go up. Once the drivers are fixed, the fan will run properly, and temperatures will go down.

Same idea with the PowerPlay feature.

 

[Oh Snap]

Oh Snap, its not an exageration, read it on a review which also tested the S1 im not talking on air

Oh so you just have to get water cooling first, and THEN apply the AS5 to make up for unacceptable temperatures. Gotcha

 

[jevon]

But Anand's review clearly shows that two Crossfired 4870's CAN play very well at the highest settings/resultions? What games are going to be out in the next 6-12 months that are going to be worse than Crysis on requirements? The Anand review "only" did Crysis @ 1920x but I wouldn't call that midrange And Crysis isn't the greatest for benching IMO either, the CF 4870's do mostly 60+ fps at 2560 on the other games.. I'd call that high performance.

For me another one of the downsides to going SLi is that you would also have to subjugate yourself to an nVidia chipset! Right now, in my opinion of course, an Intel processor on and Intel chipset with ATi cards is best choice for 95% of builders and buyers when you consider overall cost, stability, and performance.

 

[eded333]

LOL, no really people are reporting as much as 14ºC drops just by reaplying thermal paste, ill give you some link if u are curious

 

[uguv]

Even the 280 as a single card is beating it in most of the benchmarks compared to 2 x 4870's.LOL

In which benchmarks?

I only looked at the 1920x1200 results because that's the resolution I used, but CF4870s beat out a single GTX280 in most gaming benchmarks I saw at that resolution. I think the only 2 that showed the GTX280 ahead were Tomb Raider and Bioshock, neither of which really scale at all with crossfire.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

It comes down to this. nVidia has expensive to produce G280 as the fastest card. Thats it. The G260 is currently struggling to keep up with the 4870 at 150 dollars more. ATI has to work on their drivers. And anyone whos really looked at the 4xxx series, I mean really looked and knew anything about pcs and gpus know that a fan running at 18% isnt going to get the cooling job done, and getting a driver with better power and fan control will solve this problem. nVidia is hurting. Theyve implemented their UMAP strategy thats put a stranglehold on their AIB partners, which is why youre seeing one of them jumping ship. Thier low yields are the cause of this. Thier CUDA and physics are easily implemented by ATI and their the way its meant to be played program has lost a huge market effect in what future games will be favored, as well as the implementation of DX10.1 which gives a ATI card a 20% advantage using AA, making the ATI cards just that much closer to nVidias in fps. The G280 is king, no doubt. But for a 10-15% gain over a card thats less than half the price, and even gets beat in a few games, thats not exceptable

 

[ovaltineplease]

and no monsta, two 4870 come on top of a single 280 on 7 of 9 test, by little overall sometimes much others not so, yes, and yes depends on resolution but they do come on top of the 280 on many of the tests. Its not a big deal, nvidia has a grate product, overpriced, and 2 atis best gpu that costs a bit less gets marginally on top of the 280

yea okay, but guess what; 2 9800 GTXs come out on top of a gtx280 as well, and they are 200$ cheaper than 2 4870s, also 2 8800 GTS 512 g92s come out on top of the gtx280 and they are 250$ cheaper than 2 4870s


Do you not see a problem with the configuration you are praising so much? Hello, the Crossfire software is fail; if you want to praise the 4870, praise it on the merit of being a good single gpu solution, but the crossfire scaling is just not where it should be given the calibur of the single gpu!!

 

[gridener]

lol to everyone.

 

[eded333]

FLAME FLAME FLAME love it when NVIDIOTS and ati fanboys get together .
All here, main point. "90% performance of a GTX 280 at 49% less" At higher resolutions the 4870 is almost on par to greater than the GTX 280. Of course 280 is on top, but not in crossfire, u also look at what interests u they are on pair in crossfire, allthough results should be better yeah

 

[eded333]

we compare prices u compare cards, lets continue the flame XD

 

[ovaltineplease]

so it took 2 ATI latest card to come close to a single NV card lol.. what would happen if you put two 280 in SLI with good driver lol

If you have a 4ghz processor and you overclock the gtx280 up a bit you get min 45 fps in crysis with 4xaa at 1920*1200*very high


Of course, that cost of that system is absolutely absurd and you need a 1200watt high amperage PSU to run it- but thats the kind of performance you can expect.

I still think the gtx280 is a bit rediculous, but it is nonetheless "fastest" I suppose

 

[eded333]

of cours, nobady says no.... just that the price is something like.... prohibitive yeah

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

so it took 2 ATI latest card to come close to a single NV card lol.. what would happen if you put two 280 in SLI with good driver lol

Tell us please, after forking over that 1300 dollars. Please, go ahead, tell us