Crossfire Qs ( but on the cheap )

[FatRakoon]

I have done a number of SLI setups over the years. starting at the 6600 and through the 8800 and 250,260 and most recently the 470GTX
I have also had some fun with also plonking another card just for PhysX and hey, sure its been fun, and sometimes a total waste of time and of course money, but hey, its all a laugh isnt it?

Well, recently I had been toying about with Crossfire. To be more truthful, I have toyed with hybrid crossfire with some Mobos providing onboard and card mixing.

My latest effort is using an AMD APU 2.5Ghz with a 6410D Radeon built in, plus a HD6450 PCIE Card and its been a laugh... I have a couple of other older Mobos that do similar with ATI 36xx or whatever the hell they had and sure its been cool.

Irritatingly, I also got an X1900XT Crossfire edition and a number of compatible cards but I dont have the crossfire cable for those - Unless I have messed up my thoughs, they have to use the external cable dont they? Well I dont have one. If they dont, I will kick myself.

But anyway, I have been thinking of having another play about with crossfire, but taking it up a step or two... Make it worth bothering with, but without spending the greenies.

I have a Saphire 7770 card and its a great little performer, but what cards would I need to buy, to get about this level of performance?

Again, I dont need massive massive performance, somethign about the speed of the nVidia 8800GT is probably plenty.

Im not wanting to build a high end Gaming machine, but like I said I just want to fiddle about really, and if its ok, I might use it.

Anyway... Suggestions anyone?

 

[ViRuS2k]

2x MSI HD 6450 SILENT 1024MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card
would probably be equal or just under your 7770
for £30 a pop

but i dont understand your just wasting £60 for the same speed as you already have and with crossfire it will never be as smooth as 1 card... though amd with its framepacing stuff is getting there now where most games do not stutter at all.
these days for that £60 you could probably get a far better single card than your 7770 in performance even if its 2nd hand lol

 

[Minstadave]

I can understand wanting to mess around but as Virus2K says you can nearly always find a single card that will offer a better overall result for the price of 2 cards in crossfire, especially in terms of power usage/noise/smoothness of framerate.

 

[d_brennen]

2x MSI HD 6450 SILENT 1024MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card
would probably be equal or just under your 7770
for £30 a pop

Really? They are really slow

e: Just no

6450s show ~450% CF scaling?

 

[decto]

Really not worth messing about with really low end crossfire.

I recommend you buy another 7770 with similar clocks and memory GDDR5 if yours uses that.

Drivers will be current, recent features supported and you can enable / disable with a click for back to back testing while still maintaining your current base level performance.

AD

 

[FatRakoon]

Absolutely not worth it I know.\

I will NOT be looking at 2x6540 cards and then thinking of swapping those for my current setup, no thats not at all what I meant, although if I did happen to get a boost that one par, I might just for the hell of it.

if they run nice enough, I could consider them on another PC.

I dont play any realy power hungry games anymore, so I have no need for total power.

In truth, an 8800 is plenty for me

I am wierd in that I have loads of PCs and most are Crossfire capable... Not something I have looked for, just something that the boards just happen to be... and Im really only looking for some way to kill some boredom anbd maybe get a GFX boost at the same time.

I already have one 6540 card... Thats doing hybrid cropssfire already and there is no way on earth that 2 of them come even close to the 7770...However... yeah, I will have a shot for kicks with 2 real cards rather than one card and one onboard, just to see the difference.

yeah, another 7770 would be a cool idea, while nowhere near as quick as the GTX470 SLI setup I got, it will certainly be less power hungry plus a lot cooler too!

Anyway, somethings to chew over so thanks for the input.

I think I will simply be cautious and sure, I dont expect to get much with lower end stuff, I just want to have a giggle more than anything.

 

[LtMatt]

7770 crossfire is as low as id go. Infact ive always had a deep dark craving to try a 7770 crossfire setup and ive no idea why.

 

[d_brennen]

7770 crossfire is as low as id go. Infact ive always had a deep dark craving to try a 7770 crossfire setup and ive no idea why.

You know what, one of my daily workstations has a 7770 and truth be told it isn't a bad card for sub 1080 gaming (not that I have Steam on work machines or anything )

Us enthusiasts get a little caught up in what's bleeding edge

 

[arc@css]

7770 crossfire is as low as id go. Infact ive always had a deep dark craving to try a 7770 crossfire setup and ive no idea why.

+1