Crossfire, SLi, Bigger single card......

Sparky · 19 Dec 2011 at 20:08

Evening gents and Seasons Greetings, need a bit more oomph in the Gfx dept. My board is capable of Crossfire,sli or a mixture of both using Hydra so i need some advice and you lot are the resident GPU experts.

Current specs are

SB 2600k at 4.7ghz
MSI Big Bang Marshal
8gig Corsair XMS3
ASUS 5770 1GB

So what to do? PC is used mainly for Bluray and BF3 via a 1080p projector

Your thoughts please.

ALXAndy · 19 Dec 2011 at 20:33

I had Xfire 5770. This time though I am going to prove it.

There you go, there's even a 8800 Ultra running Physx with GenL's Physx hack.

What was it like? I'll tell you.

5H1T. With a capital 5.

Hydra? oh dear... Oh dear... Didn't they dissapear?

So, in summation - Get a 6970 Lightning card from the uber deal going on and all will be happy in the world.

Ed. This is how good Crossfire was.

I sold it and bought a GTX 470.

Sparky · 19 Dec 2011 at 21:21

I suppose it depends on what res you run for me a single 5770 struggles in BF3 even just on high settings.

ALXAndy · 19 Dec 2011 at 21:27

It will do. It's too slow and it doesn't have enough vram mate.

As I say, Crossfire is to be avoided at all costs. The only people who defend it and say it's good are those that use it. Watch them change their minds when they are free of the aggro.

If you can afford it (and it will fit) the 6970 Lightning is the card to have. £269, plug and go, play games.

Crossfire? Plug and pray. Then install the drivers and enable CrossfireX. Then look for the profile patches, and hope they work. Then, for the most part, disable CrossfireX and fall back to one card just to be able to play the game.

Sparky · 19 Dec 2011 at 22:42

So a single GPU would be better in your opinion? Any suggestions, have had ATI for a few years maybe time for a change.

Cleeecooo · 19 Dec 2011 at 22:45

Sparky-F1 said:
So a single GPU would be better in your opinion? Any suggestions, have had ATI for a few years maybe time for a change.

Single cards are generally better

570 or 6970 lightning

ALXAndy · 19 Dec 2011 at 22:49

If you're looking for it to last get the 6970 Lightning deal.

I'd love to say 570 in that too, but the way modern games eat vram it's not the best choice. Which is a shame, because the 570 will beat the 6970 when overclocked.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-123-MS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1752

Remembering of course that you're getting a top card that is 100% custom. It also has 2gb vram and some free games

But yeah, safe bet atm is a single card with lots of vram.

Cleeecooo · 19 Dec 2011 at 22:50

You don't need that much VRM.

1.3GB is enough at 1080p

opethdisciple · 19 Dec 2011 at 22:53

Defo get a single powerful card. Way less hassle.

Sparky · 19 Dec 2011 at 22:54

So a pair of 570 would be a pain as much as a pair of 6950/70. Looks like a single card will have to do then.

d_brennen · 19 Dec 2011 at 22:57

For BF3 I'm running 1GB CF 5850s @ 1080

120+ FPS dropping as low as 75 on a 64 player Karkand battle. Textures on high, AA off (with the post thingy right up) and everything else on Ultra. I can run Ultra textures, but for the tiny gain I prefer the much smoother frame rate. Not looking to get into a VRAM debate here, just my personal findings

ALXAndy · 19 Dec 2011 at 22:58

Yo. Yes and no.

No, SLI drivers are much better, and EVGA do a patch thing of their own so it usually works.

Thing is mate, you ain't going to circumvent the caveat, and that is that the 570 doesn't have enough vram. Adding another doesn't add any more ram. It just makes the cores rip games to shreds. However, if you ain't got the vram you need you're in trouble..

I run quad SLI GTX 295s. Acceptable vram limits? these things go bezerk. Give them Battlefield 3? they crap out. Absolutely useless.

So that leaves you (if you want to be safe) with the 2.5gb 570, 6970 2gb (may as well get the Porsche like Lightning as it's cheap and comes with games) or a 3gb 580 which is overkill.

And out of the 3 the 6970L is the cheapest..

Ed. I refuse to turn AA off. You end up with a game console and the flickering of the jagged edges gives me a headache. I recently bought a 360. I played Fallout : New Vegas for 35 mins before feeling rather ill.

Final8y · 19 Dec 2011 at 23:00

ALXAndy said:
As I say, Crossfire is to be avoided at all costs. The only people who defend it and say it's good are those that use it. Watch them change their minds
when they are free of the aggro.

Crossfire? Plug and pray. Then install the drivers and enable CrossfireX. Then look for the profile patches, and hope they work. Then, for the most part, disable CrossfireX and fall back to one card just to be able to play the game.

While multi GPU is more problematic, and it may of been very in your experience, but for the most part in my experience i don't disable CrossfireX and fall back to one card.
And of course the majority of people who say its good are the ones that are using it or they would not be using it if they thought otherwise.
Its called own personal experience and opinion and the 5770 is problematic with CF.
If a single GPU has the power to do what's needed then by all means.

1900xt CF
4x3870 Quadfire
2X 5970 sapphire Toxic 4GB Quadfire.

And i'm in no hurry to go single GPU.

Cleeecooo · 19 Dec 2011 at 23:04

The 570 has enough VRAM!!!

ALXAndy · 19 Dec 2011 at 23:07

Final8y said:
While multi GPU is more problematic, and it may of been very in your experience, but for the most part in my experience i don't disable CrossfireX and fall back to one card.
And of course the majority of people who say its good are the ones that are using it or they would not be using it if they thought otherwise.
Its called own personal experience and opinion.
If a single GPU has the power to do what's needed then by all means.

1900xt CF
4x3870 Quadfire
2X 5970 sapphire Toxic 4GB Quadfire.

And i'm in no hurry to go single GPU.

From the sound of it you like to throw money at problems. That's great, but none of your setups (providing you had them new) would have been weak enough even when Crossfire wasn't working well to leave you with any major headaches.

I read reviews on CF 5770 and it seemed too good to be true. Wait, these £250 GPUs can actually beat a 5870 that costs £50 more? and by quite a margin too? SIGN ME UP !!!!oneone.

And then the reality of it dawned on me. When it didn't work (hint - often) I did not have enough muscle to do what I wanted my games to do. Which was annoying at the best of times, and swear worthy the rest.

I stuck it out for the best part of 11 months. You? it seems to me that your setups cost many many hundreds of pounds. Your 5970s alone are man enough to take care of any game in the world when running alone, so chances are you are simply eradicating the issue by throwing money at it.

His scenario (and mine when I used it) is the same.

Unless you go by the name of Merlin then I don't know how you can put up with Quadfire. Been there last year for a laugh (£80 for a pair of 3870x2) and it was absolutely bloody horrible.

Sparky · 19 Dec 2011 at 23:21

What are your opinions on these 6950's unlocking to 6970's ?I guess that is another option.

Surveyor · 19 Dec 2011 at 23:25

You don't buy a HD 6950 on the basis you can unlock it.

You buy a HD 6950 because you want a HD 6950.

If it unlocks, and works properly, it's a bonus.

ALXAndy · 19 Dec 2011 at 23:28

Surveyor said:
You don't buy a HD 6950 on the basis you can unlock it.

You buy a HD 6950 because you want a HD 6950.

If it unlocks, and works properly, it's a bonus.

+1 XP.

It's nice to see common sense still exists.

I concur. Buy what you need. If a 6950 will cut it as stock? fair play. If you want a 6970? get a 6970.

If you are the sort of person who sticks with your hardware and doesn't change it every ten seconds then just get what you need and don't waste your time.

I admit I am bias because I do own a 6970 L. However, you are getting a £350 card for £269 and two free games. No matter what way you look at it, it's a bargain.

And it won't cause you headaches, doesn't need unlocking or faffing or overclocking etc.

I guess it just depends on whether you like to gamble

Sparky · 19 Dec 2011 at 23:30

OK just to clarify, we are talking about this one?

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-123-MS&tool=3

ALXAndy · 19 Dec 2011 at 23:35

We are yes.

It's basically this card.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-141-MS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1752

Without the pretty box. However, it probably doesn't overclock as well so they reboxed it. Mine does though, however it wouldn't do 940@ 1175mv. I got it doing 960@ 1250mv instead

It's a 100% ground up custom mate. I wrote a brief write up on it, but the whole card is military grade with very high powered caps and VRMs etc.

This is it sitting next to a standard 6970.

And the PCB it has.

Compared to a standard 6970.

Just make sure you have room

You can read more about it here.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/msi-radeon-6970-lighting-review/

As I say it clocks at the standard 880mhz of a 6970, but it's been designed from the ground up to be safely overclocked. Mine does 960 without the temps changing at all. Love it