Worth the cash?

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dreadloxx

dreadloxx

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Feb 1, 2009
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Currently i am debating on getting another Diamond HD 4870 1 gig to run crossfire, but i will have to get a new PSU to be able to power both cards. Is it worth spending the money on a new psu and another 4870 or is the performance not going to be worth the cash ill have to spend. The psu i was leaning towards isItem#:N82E16817371024
specs are:

Antec 1200
Phenom II 955
Antec EA650w
OCZ platinum 800mhz x 8gigs
Asus M3A78-T mobo
HD 4870 1gig
 
You may not need to buy a new HD4870 the new series HD5870 will be out (most likely) by year's end some even say it may be out July 9 2009.
 


And that's bad because...? Anyone worth his salt about multi-GPU solution would know that x8 is plenty adequate for running cards up to a single 4870...

But yeah, dreadloxx, bear with one 4870 for a bit longer. There's a plethora of stuff coming within a year, and it'd be a pity to toss ~$300 and then be outdone by a new API.
 
There is another thing to consider. You already have a good PSU. The question is, is it worth it to spend $140 on a new PSU, and another $200 on another GPU? Its a bit more like is it worth it to spend ~$350 for a second GPU running in CF? Without knowing your budget, we can't say.

Personally, I get the feeling the answer is no, or at least not yet. Unless you have a bunch of spare $$$, your probably better off waiting for new cards. If not to buy them, then to at least drive down the cost of current ones.
 
Agree with the PSU: It's listed on the ATI site as running a HD4870X2 so apart from needing converters for the second card will Crossfire 2X4870 without problems.
The motherboard supports Crossfire at a maximum of X8 on slots 1 and 3, but the 'board is PCI-E 2.0, so there will be no impact on performance in Crossfire unless Dreadloxx wants to drop in a pair of GTX295s' instsead😉, and it will be minimal, even then!

But, as Outlander has said: We need to know your monitor resoloution, Dreadloxx!
 
Thanks for all the input. My current resolution is 1680x1050 on a 22" monitor. The problem with my current PSU isnt the power but it only has 2 pci-e connectors and it would require 4 for 2 cards crossfired, and i wasnt aware that my mobo wouldnt support CF in slots 1 and 2 being that they are both x16, whats the reason for that?
 
@ Dreadloxx: You could use molex/PCI-E converters and keep the PSU, although it's your money and if you are going to be happier with another I am not going try to persuade you against it, being worried about killing the PSU every time you boot the system is quickly going to take the shine off it!
The PCI-E layout is just how Asus designed the MB, but it makes a certain amount of sense to place the two graphics card slots as far apart as possible, allowing two large cards to operate with the middle slot open for less demanding hardware such as a soundcard. If you have lost the MB manual, it can be downloaded from the Asus website and shows how the three slots can be used.
I'm not sure you really need to CF two fast cards at that resoloution.
 
My GPU is only scoring in the mid 8000's with 3dmarkvantage, i notice some FPS drops during games like COD WaW when there is heavy smoke or in WoW during 25 man raids. I spent alot of money on my system so i figured i might as well spend alittle more to get exactly what i want lol. kind of scured reasoning i know but hey, I would like to be able to set my AF up to 8 or 16 and have my AA up abit as well but it doesnt seem like this card can do it alone. Although i dont want to spend the cash and not see any improvements...thats why i ask the experts (all of you)
 
Well, since you did buy a Crossfire board, might as well use it.
Get the new PSU, and throw in another GPU. You will see an average of 30% to maybe 50% increase in speed, depending on the game, and how high up you turn the eye candy, but yeah a couple of 1 gig 4870's in Crossfire is pretty solid and you will see a nice improvement, especially when you turn up the details.
Don't worry about your board being X16 and X8 with 2 cards, won't matter at all.
 
witcherx i doubt i can get my money back out of this card especially since they dropped down to $199 now on newegg...i payed $350 for mine when it came out and the 4870x2 still runs about $425 so i would be better off still just getting anothet 4870 to CF...how much of a diffrence is there between a 4870x2 and 2 4870 CF. wouldn't imagin it being much.
 



the HD4870x2 is faster than crossfire HD4870 depensing which onces you get. so oyu might have to overclock them to get up up on par with the X2

rember the X2 techicvaly has a 512bit memoery bus (2*256bit) and basicly everything is doubled


to be honest, the HD4870X2 should be brought if only your mobo can't support xfire or its not too fast at doing say aka 8x/8x but your is 16x/8x so not much of a differcens maybe worth 1-2 fps😛


the X2 takes that out

 


Tom's did an excellent review of the CF vs X2 on ATI cards. Here is a link to the article.

It compares the 4870 and shows only slight advantages in either direction depending on the resolution and AA/AF.

Ultimately the difference comes in the capabilities of your board and the power consumption. Both of those have been addressed in this thread.
 
thanks.... but rember with crossfire as in its true form it has to go through the the PCIe slot, the X2 don't have that part as such.

but still, makes very little diffrences, so for those who are asking to upgrade to a X2 from CF HD4870 don't 😛
 


Do u know if they are using the 1gig version of the 4870's they crossfired or the 512mb
 
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