CrossFire HD 2900 XT GDDR4 beats SLI 8800 GTX

[Tom|Nbk]

PCMag has got its hand on a system from Falcon Northwest with dual AMD Radeon HD 2900 XT GDDR4 cards and according to the test results, this is one kick ass system and it easily beats two SLI systems with 8800 GTX cards in them, one of them being another Falcon Northwest system with a faster CPU.

It's worth bearing in mind that this is only in Windows Vista, but the benchmark results speak for themselves. AMD has a lead here by over 3,000 points in the default test in 3DMark 06 and we're looking at over 100 fps in Company of Heroes at 1,280x1,024.

Impressive numbers indeed, although there is some controversy about this review and DailyTech has moaned about it and claims that AMD has supplied Falcon Northwest with some dodgy hardware that's not publicly available.

The other rumour is that AMD has shipped some new tweaked drivers to Falcon Northwest, but if this is the case, then we might have a chance to see these go public some time soon.

It's also entierly possible that AMD happens to have better Vista drivers than Nvidia and this is simply why the CrossFire system is faster. This makes even more sense when you read a users comment at TechPowerUp! that has linked to some older benchmark results where the two 8800 GTX SLI systems goes head to head with Windows XP benchmark results.

Looking at those numbers and comparing it to the CrossFire Vista numbers, the CrossFire system would only win in Company of Heroes, but the lead here is still some 85 fps.

You can find the PCMag review here , the benchmark results here , the TechPowerUp! reader comments here and finally the DailyTech moan here

 

[Tom|Nbk]

Hmm, you like to plug ATI , in 2 threads.

This was on here other day and again not sure if fact or not and at end of the day a 512bit card with 1GiG of GDDR4 not beating a lesser card would be bad.

Just nice to see a few threads showing it in a positive light rather than the constant negative press they have recieved in the past 2 month's

 

[Tom|Nbk]

So what it means, if anyone wants to spend heaps of money on SLi or Corssfire, 2x HD2900XT 1GB is the way to go, but if someone wants single card, then 1 8800GTX stil beats a HD2900XT 1GB?

That's correct, crossfire just happens to scale waaaaaaay better than sli so it's left the dual GTX setup in the dirt.

 

[Tom|Nbk]

Hi there

Tomorrow I shall sort a cracking price out for anyone interested in the 1GB ATI cards making Crossfire a very tempting solution.

Sounds good, now reflect this offer onto the 512's

 

[Tom|Nbk]

I really can't wait until we get some accurate, unbiased benchmarks of the new 1Gig 2900s. (And hopefully a nice new price from Gibbo as well) Really hope they scale as well as they should and give some decent performance.



Past 2 month's what?

That the cards have been out?

 

[Tom|Nbk]

You would be mad not to get the GTX still if you can afford it, its much faster than the 2900.

Yep GTX > 1GB 2900, things may change if Gibbo knocks the price down near the 512's but I doubt that