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is crossfire worth it?

post #1 of 25
2/9/10 at 3:13am
Thread Starter 
or should i just stick to single video card boards. im ordering a new mobo today and im not sure to get something that supports crossfire or single cards.

the board i want is the GIGABYTE GA-MA770T-UD3P AM3 AMD 770 ATX
stupid board went up 10 friggen dollars since last night

the reason i ask is because i see everyone having issues with current drivers and crossfire.
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post #2 of 25
2/9/10 at 3:29am
I have seen posts with people having crossfire issues.

However, I have used crossfire on a couple of my systems for almost a year and half now, and never had problems with it. I think typically people have trouble installing drivers overtop of other drivers (or non approved drivers because they think they will get 3 more fps on some test).

I think the best move is to get the best single video card you can afford at
the time, and if they day comes that it doesnt produce enough FPS for you, slap another one in there and crossfire em.

Note: my 4870x2 still performs amazingly well.
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post #3 of 25
2/9/10 at 3:33am
crossfire is pretty!
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post #4 of 25
2/9/10 at 4:37am
only problems I can think of with crossfire

if you wanna get an aftermarket cooler you need to get 2

flickering in bad company 2 but it will probably get fixed
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post #5 of 25
2/9/10 at 6:09am
Thread Starter 
well ive been debating this only because i really dont like crysis at all so those 2 games are no big deal to me. i play alot of war games and i love games that have to do with the " End of the world" such as fallout 3 style.

I dont see myself ever getting into crysis so i wasnt sure if i really needed crossfire support.
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post #6 of 25
2/9/10 at 6:12am
CF is great - ive run it on a pair of 3870s and a pair of 4870s and never had an issue with it at all.

with a 5850 and a 24" panel its probably not needed for any game you through at your system - but for the future its an option.

that mobo is a 770 chipset - it supports CF but at 8/8x i believe.
this is generally fine and ~5% at most slower than the 790FX chipset (what i have) which is a 16/16x crossfire.
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post #7 of 25
2/9/10 at 6:14am
its less than 5%

more like 1%
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post #8 of 25
2/9/10 at 6:15am
from what ives seen its an average of ~3% at most 5%
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post #9 of 25
2/9/10 at 6:15am
Thread Starter 
the motherboard i chose is a single slot motherboard 16x slot only. supports no crossfire. what i had planned was to sell my 5850 and grab a 5870 or even a 5970 so i didnt see the need for xfire.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128392
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post #10 of 25
2/9/10 at 6:18am
ah - you are right - im conserving bandwidth and have turned off all images on my browser for now.....

5970 = internat CF of 2 5870s - its a very good board too.
any CF board though you could get another 5850 and put it straight in and get the performance of a 5970 (almost) and it would possibly work out cheaper.
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