Radeon HD 7990 In CrossFire: The Red Wedding Of Graphics

[InvalidError]

Big question, though, how much is console development stealing resources from the desktop graphics development team?

If they are reusing "off-the-shelf" IP cores from their GPU/CPU/off-core libraries, the only major product-specific effort they need is system-level validation to verify that all selected components work as expected once put together in a customer-specific configuration and most of that testing should be automated.

The bulk of design effort goes into individual building blocks' design and unit-testing. Once you are as close to 100% certain each building block behaves exactly like it is supposed to as you are going to be, putting them together to accommodate custom orders *SHOULD* be relatively painless.

 

[slippyrocks]

okay did some research and figured out the problem other than psu intake needed to be facing down. needed to install all optional fans. specifically on coolmaster's site says "GPU air duct with fan for SLI cooling (a 150cfm fan is recommended to be installed by nVidia for cooling GTX 480 SLI )." more so in this case ..did you install such a fan? here is a delta fan on newegg that would work $30 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835213006
used DFS123812H-3000 "ULTRA KAZE" 120 x 38 mm Case Fan in my setup
http://www.gearxs.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=3421

 

[06yfz450ridr]

okay did some research and figured out the problem other than psu intake needed to be facing down. needed to install all optional fans. specifically on coolmaster's site says "GPU air duct with fan for SLI cooling (a 150cfm fan is recommended to be installed by nVidia for cooling GTX 480 SLI )." more so in this case ..did you install such a fan? here is a delta fan on newegg that would work $30 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835213006
used DFS123812H-3000 "ULTRA KAZE" 120 x 38 mm Case Fan in my setup
http://www.gearxs.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=3421

on my 550ti sli setup my side air duct actually is right exactly in between the two card and i never used to run a fan there for some reason. even overclocked they wouldnt go above 70c now at almost full load both are around 55c

 

[bucknutty]

I have been rolling 2 gtx 470s in SLI now for 3 years. They work so well that when I got a new i7 3770k I decided to sit on them and wait for the Nvidia gtx800s or the AMD 8000s.

They have both always bounced off 90 deg whiles gaming with the default fan profile. I added an extra intake fan and a side fan blowing right on them, but rather than the cards running cooler, their fans just went down from around 60% to around 50%. I used to use a custom fan profile to keep them cooler, but I got bored of it and just let them take care of them selves. They like being at 85-90 so I just run the crap out of them. I never had any issues with stability or gaming performance. Just hit Battle rank 50 in planet side 2. PhysX in that game is awesome!.

 

[vsighi]

7970 CF sux... look like I'm not the only one complaining about AMD 7970 CF :-/ I just got my second 7970 and it makes a long beeeeep under heavy game play only !! my PSU is 850W so that will not be a problem. I think they run to HOT, I uninstall both card and nothing !! I swap the card PciE and still the same...I may have to try one more thing and I'm DONE. BIOS update :-/
Look like I will return the second one and wait for 8xxx series in September this year. I think I'm done with CROSSFIRE :-((

 

[Jayzied]

I'm really surprised about this report. It's supposed that an important company as AMD has to develop quality products without these issues. More than 100º is not only dangerous for your GPU (both of them, in this case); it's also dangerous for all your rig. Furthermore, noise is another annoying thing in this Xfire... Something really bad having in mind that you have spent 2000$ for these two cards!

 

[17seconds]

At least they know when to throw in the towel.

7990 discontinued after 2 months:
http://www.guru3d.com/news_story/amd_eols_radeon_hd_7990_dual_gpu_card.html

 

[Millionaire_Bruce_Wayne]

Whilst bitcoin mining with the cores of my stock centrifugal fan cooler 7970s clocked to 1150Mhz the temperatures were hitting 85c at 65% fan speed, so I wedged a fan in the case in front of them, literally just wedged between the drive cage and 24 Pin MoBo Power lead popped the drive guards and PCI slot guards out, it dropped the temps down to 77 degrees.

I had GTX 480s back in the day, so I stuck silicon thermal pads on the back PCBs with the trimmed fins from an old CPU heatsink stuck to it, and a couple of old laptop blower fans venting out the back, you don't need fancy cooling, you just need a little creativity.

 

[InvalidError]

you don't need fancy cooling, you just need a little creativity.

You do not even need creativity; just need some common sense.

If you slap a bunch of fans blowing onto a PCB with airflow constrained between four walls (PCB on top, rear IO plate, motherboard and card in the expansion slot below) exhausting within the case without anything assisting with shifting hot air out of the boxed area, the fans will simply re-ingest the same air they just vented through the heatsink.

The most effective way of breaking re-ingestion loops is to have an extra fan blowing fresh air into the GPU stack to kick hot air out of there.

 

[Raoul St-onge]

How about you just get the 7970 ghz edition in crossfire with the 7990. I read that u get 50% increase in pretty much all aspects.

 

[nocturnal2048]

Since I am not in your lab seeing fist hand the results that you (claim) to be true I wont be foolish and tell you what I really think about them...that said I have three friends who are running Quadfire rigs. Here are MY findings, and these are legitimate!

1.) Trying to overclock these cards is a bad idea, their cooling solutions are passable however they run (REALLY HOT). Unless you are going to be installing some form of water cooling device I would strongly suggest you not overclock (at all).

2.) You must have a chasis that will support these monsters as they will discharge some serious (toxic) heat. My friends are using the Corsair Carbide Series 540's for this purpose and that's what I will be getting in November for my Quadfire build.

3.) Not all 7990's are made the same, some manufacturers have more reliable kit than others...and Obviously you need a serious PSU to power it all...

I don't know what you idiots are trying to say or prove about the 7990 GPU's but I have (as I said previously) not one but three friends that are running these cards as we speak and they all have been doing so for at least 3 months or more. They have no problems with their Quadfire setups and I will definitely be purchasing two of these bad ass GPU's for my build. Tom's Hardware is bias towards AMD and that is obvious! January I will be launching my own site and there you will be able to get un-bias reviews of all hardware as I am not getting kickback money from hardware dev's to bash their competitors products not to mention I am not a fan-boy of any hardware manufacturer...I simply buy the best hardware that my wallet will allow and I suggest you do the same!

 

[Isaiah4110]

Since I am not in your lab seeing fist hand the results that you (claim) to be true I wont be foolish and tell you what I really think about them...that said I have three friends who are running Quadfire rigs. Here are MY findings, and these are legitimate!

1.) Trying to overclock these cards is a bad idea, their cooling solutions are passable however they run (REALLY HOT). Unless you are going to be installing some form of water cooling device I would strongly suggest you not overclock (at all).

2.) You must have a chasis that will support these monsters as they will discharge some serious (toxic) heat. My friends are using the Corsair Carbide Series 540's for this purpose and that's what I will be getting in November for my Quadfire build.

3.) Not all 7990's are made the same, some manufacturers have more reliable kit than others...and Obviously you need a serious PSU to power it all...

I don't know what you idiots are trying to say or prove about the 7990 GPU's but I have (as I said previously) not one but three friends that are running these cards as we speak and they all have been doing so for at least 3 months or more. They have no problems with their Quadfire setups and I will definitely be purchasing two of these bad ass GPU's for my build. Tom's Hardware is bias towards AMD and that is obvious! January I will be launching my own site and there you will be able to get un-bias reviews of all hardware as I am not getting kickback money from hardware dev's to bash their competitors products not to mention I am not a fan-boy of any hardware manufacturer...I simply buy the best hardware that my wallet will allow and I suggest you do the same!

Wow, first off I have been around TH for a long time and never picked up on any bias for or against any particular brand.

Secondly, I'm going to nitpick here since your post is so outlandish and point out that typically someone being "biased toward" a particular company means they have a preference for that company and give overly positive reviews. Thus, if TH was "biased toward AMD" they would not be writing so much about the negatives surrounding a 7990 Crossfire setup.

Lastly, you have three friends running dual 7990 systems and are about to do so yourself? Wow, what circles do you run in such that you have three friends who all have the money to blow on $4k+ systems and ALL choose to run dual 7990 setups in those systems? Yeah that sounds a bit hard to believe, especially from someone who joined the site simply to bash TH and tout their own site.

 

[Lildirt]

Build your computer with a liquid nitrogen cooling system, lol.Spend so much money but you could dual-crossfire (hell, probably quad-crossfire) anything in the world with stupid overclocks.