ATi 4870x2

[s-f-r-j]

Hello,

How much power does this card use ?
http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/ati-radeon-hd-4000/hd-4870X2/Pages/hd-4870X2.aspx

How good is this card comparing to new 5 series? (if can be compared)

I have Antec 650true power PSU.

Should this be enough?

( i am sorry for opening another thread, but did not want to put info about this card into other thread about crossfire - that i asked).

Thank you,
s-f-r-j

[GotNoRice]

I ran my overclocked quad at 4.4Ghz (that sucks a ton of power all by itself) along with several 15k SCSI drives and a single 4870x2 from an Earthwatts 650. I felt like I was getting near it's limits but it always got the job done.

The 4870x2 will give you performance on-par with a 5870.

The downsides being that you will only have DirectX 10.1 instead of 11 and no eyefinity. Thankfully the way DirectX11 works, you will still be able to run DirectX11 using DirectX 10.1 (using only the 10.1 feature set of course) because DirectX 11 contains built-in downlevel paths for 9, 10, and 10.1 hardware. You won't be in a situation where you won't be able to play a DirectX 11 game the way you would have been with a DirectX 9 card and a DirectX 10 game. You will also have higher heat output and higher power consumption with a 4870x2 compared to a 5870.

Here is a good article that compares the two cards, among others:

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3643&p=18

Meanwhile AMD is retiring the 4870X2, which ended up beating the 5870 enough that we would consider it a competitor to the 5870.

[s-f-r-j]

This card i am looking @ is used.

Person that is selling this card is willing to give me 2 days to test it, if i don't like it (doesnt work for me) i can return it, as he said.

What should i look into? How to make sure card is working as it should.

Thank you GotNoRice for detailed information, will be reading that now.

s-f-r-j

[GotNoRice]

Well the cards have a tendency to run hot, so you should probably do a good inspection of the cooling on the card.

Get a program such as MSI Afterburner that will graph the temperatures of each GPU over a period of time. Keep that running in the background then do a run of Vantage. When the benchmark is done open up afterburner again and check the temperature graphs. If you see either GPU doing 90C+ it might mean you have dust built up inside or the heatsink isn't properly mounted anymore (crusty paste, tweakage over time due to heat, etc). You can also set custom fan profiles using that program that will both make the card quieter at idle and run cooler in games. The program will also show individual GPU utilization so you can verify crossfire is working.

[madhatter256]

Yeah, at least a 650watt because it is like running two 4870 cards and I've seen newegg's spec page say that crossfire requires at least 650watts.

[sandyduff]

Yeh if you do go for one invest in an Accelero cooler for it... i have one installed and its great!! Under load it never goes above 60 degrees...

If you can get a good deal on it... go for it... if not, save up for a 5870... like GotNoRice said... its on par with a 5870 performance wise but doesn't support DX11...

[s-f-r-j]

Well, i think i will have to step aside from this, at least for now.

Guy that was selling this is actually giving me some stories now and asking for more money.

I think i will stick to my other thread i made for 4870 cross fire.

Thank you all so much for time and all ideas.
s-f-r-j