Which graphics card to add to my Llano A8-3850?

[flyingguy]

Hi all,

I've recently built a new system consisting of the following;

AMD Llano A8-3850 2.9GHz

4 GB Kingston HyperX Blu 1600MHz DDR3

Gigabyte A75M-D2H Socket FM1 Motherboard

Been very happy with it, especially as it cost just under £300 for a whole new rig. Anyway, I've been able to play all of the games I've installed, (CODs, BFs etc) at near full graphics, with only a tiny amount of stuttering etc. I didn't buy a dedicated GPU at the time as I was keeping costs down and wanted to see how well it would perform, though now I'd like to buy one. I've done a bit of digging around and it would appear that the best card you can crossfire (think that's the correct term) the APU with is the 6670 (though please correct me if I'm wrong) and that combining one with the integrated graphics can actually give a pretty good performance.
My question is;
Does anyone have any thoughts or experience in this setup and can give me any pointers? If I'm going to spend £60 e.g on a 6670, is there something that might only cost a bit more, but will give better peformance on it's own, instead of crossfiring? I've read a bit about bottlenecking as well, is this something that I might encounter?
Anyway I hope this all makes sense and apologies if my terminology is incorrect!

 

[CinderzFTW]

It would have to be an ATI card, as they can pair up with the onboard graphics from the CPU which will boost your performance.

I would get something with a bit more umph than the 6670. I would opt for a 6770 for a good performance pc, or I would recommend pairing the APU up with a 6850. This would let you play games at 1920*1080 really well.

 

[Quixote]

Its not just generic crossfire, its called 'dual graphics' and you have to use either 6450, 6570 or 6670.
See here:
http://www.amd.com/us/products/technologies/dual-graphics/pages/dual-graphics.aspx#/3

Unfortunately it looks like it doesn't scale nearly as well as traditional crossfire, performance typically seems to be closer to whichever is faster out of the onboard or the discreet card than to the combined power of both :

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-a8-3850-llano,2975-2.html

So it might be a better bet to just get a half decent discreet ATI card, although dual graphics does let you run more than 2 monitors if thats something you need to do.

Anyway, I don't have personal experience of a dual graphics setup, maybe driver performance has improved by now ?

Was very impressed with the a8-3850 for gameing when I had a go at my parent's house though.

 

[CinderzFTW]

Its not just generic crossfire, its called 'dual graphics' and you have to use either 6450, 6570 or 6670.
See here:
http://www.amd.com/us/products/technologies/dual-graphics/pages/dual-graphics.aspx#/3

Unfortunately it looks like it doesn't scale nearly as well as traditional crossfire, performance typically seems to be closer to whichever is faster out of the onboard or the discreet card than to the combined power of both :

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-a8-3850-llano,2975-2.html

So it might be a better bet to just get a half decent discreet ATI card, although dual graphics does let you run more than 2 monitors if thats something you need to do.

Anyway, I don't have personal experience of a dual graphics setup, maybe driver performance has improved by now ?

Was very impressed with the a8-3850 for gameing when I had a go at my parent's house though.

Really?

I thought you could sling any decent halved ati gpu in it and get dual graphics.

 

[Quixote]

Really?

I thought you could sling any decent halved ati gpu in it and get dual graphics.

No, if you go to the 'desktop' tab on my first link, it shows you the cards and the names they give to them when x-fired with the different APUs.

Another big caveat is the performance boost only works on DX10/ DX11 games, not DX9 which includes for example games as new and AAA as Witcher 2.

I'm not saying it's a bad idea but it seems to yeild poor performance increase in games.
If thats your aim, probably best to go for a 6770/ 6790 anyway (I know, thats what you suggested anyway, it just won't get a boost from the on board).

 

[CinderzFTW]

Ah, the HD6770 is just a HD5770 is new clothing. Same gpu all round!