Real Crossfire Benchmarks

deception`` · Sep 26, 2005

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2541

For the most part, X-Fire is a mixed bag; good performance at low resolutions, but it's own limitations (60HZ max past 1600x1200) make for a VERY hard sell to the die-hard benchmarking/gaming market that will benefit most from X-Fire/SLI. Finally, after months of speculation, we have an opinion from a credible reviewer. Allow me to pull this from their final words:

Anandtech said:
The final verdict on CrossFire is very mixed. It is clear from our Game tests that SLI has a worthy competitor with parts in its price range at 1600x1200@60Hz and below. But we have a hard time buying the idea that many gamers are going to shell out the money necessary for CrossFire with that kind of limitation. With cards like the 7800 GTX out there, and more very interesting hardware from ATI coming soon, we are very inclined to recommend a single card upgrade. Especially to users who have 1280x1024 LCD panels or want larger than 1600x1200 resolutions from their graphics card.

Anandtech said:
Despite exceptional performance at its target resolutions, we have to strongly recommend against the purchase of an X800/X850 series CrossFire card. We have a hard time recommending all but the absolute top end NVIDIA 7800 GTX SLI as a viable solution. As an upgrade path, it makes generally much more sense to buy the next single card solution that comes out instead of spending money on older technology that won't scale as well, takes up a lot of space, eats up a lot of power, and likely incorporates fewer features. The only way we truly say that multi-GPU technology is a better solution than a similarly classed single card solution (even when upgrading from one card to two) is at the absolute highest end where there is no competition from a single card. And right now the king of the mountain is still a 7800 GTX SLI. But just how long will that last? Only time can tell.

deception``

deception`` · Sep 26, 2005

Here's some things from [H]ardOCP:

http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=ODE1LDE2

HardOCP Crossfire Review said:
We want to make some comparisons between CrossFire and SLI. We will start with installation. Simply put, CrossFire is more complex and harder to set up than SLI. With SLI, it does not matter what video card goes where. Since you simply buy two of the same GPUs, it doesn’t matter what graphics slot each one needs to go in. With CrossFire, you have to worry about the slave video card being in the secondary slot while the primary master card is in the primary slot. If you install them the wrong way, CrossFire will not work. Once you put them in the right slots, you may still have driver installation issues. We found it best to completely remove your drivers, then install both video cards, and then install the driver while both video cards are installed. With SLI, this is not needed. We’ve never had to uninstall drivers to get SLI working. With SLI, you can safely have just one video card installed, in any PCI-E slot, and then install the other one and let Windows search for the driver for the second card.

HardOCP Crossfire Review said:
Next is the dongle. Simply put, we dislike it. We find NVIDIA’s internal SLI connector easier to use and less cluttered. With the external dongle, you have to make sure you hook everything up correctly and make sure the monitor is connected to the cable, as it won’t work if it is connected to the video card. Once you have done that, you then have this extra mess of extra cables behind your case. Not only that, but you also have more adapters between your ports. For example, if you have a VGA monitor, you have to connect the DVI port to the cable, and then connect a DVI to VGA adapter for your monitor. With SLI, if you have a VGA card and only DVI ports on the video card, you just need a DVI to VGA adapter; there is no extra cable needed that can possibly cause loss of signal or interference. The second thing we are just not so happy about is the bandwidth provided by the dongle. We know that the internal SLI connector offers a lot of bandwidth between the video cards. However, the dongle causes the current resolution and refresh rate limit.

HardOCP said:
The bottom line is this: you do get a performance increase with two Radeon X850 XTs over a single Radeon X850 XT. The CrossFire platform can give you faster performance in games than your single ATI video card.

However, this faster performance is not cheap. You have to have a Radeon Xpress 200 CrossFire Edition motherboard chipset and you have to purchase a Radeon X800 or X850 XT CrossFire master card. Add to all of this a single Radeon X850 XT, or other card, if you don’t have one already. This is not an in-expensive venture, just like NVIDIA's SLI.

Alternatively, you can purchase just one single GeForce 7800 GTX, which is CHEAPER than the CrossFire needs mentioned above and it runs on all current PCI-Express motherboards. In our performance testing, the single GeForce 7800 GTX was able to match or beat the CrossFire platform in performance and image quality. The 7800 GTX also defeats the CrossFire platform in features for future game titles.

When it comes right down to it, CrossFire is really not a solid value with the current generation of ATI video cards. You get more for less money with the GeForce 7800 GTX.

HardOCP said:
With ATI’s next generation of video cards, CrossFire may actually be very appealing and great competition for the GeForce 7800 GTX SLI. We really hope ATI can overcome the resolution and refresh rate problem. If the problem remains, it could be the final determining factor that makes people choose SLI over CrossFire. Dual video cards running in tandem are all about higher resolutions and ATI is not delivering this.

deception``

chr0nicles · Sep 26, 2005

hmmm ati better sheell out the rest of the features :santa:

Mr.Guvernment · Sep 26, 2005

7800GTX beats out 2 6800 Ultras - wait until ATI has their r520's out - that will be a fair compairison to the 7800* line

But that does suck WHY is ATI limited @ 60mhz freshrate - that is pethetic! no way i would even CONSIDER crossfire with specs like that. - Unless you own an LCD.

deception`` · Sep 26, 2005

Mr.Guvernment said:
7800GTX beats out 2 6800 Ultras - wait until ATI has their r520's out - that will be a fair compairison to the 7800* line

But that does suck WHY is ATI limited @ 60mhz freshrate - that is pethetic! no way i would even CONSIDER crossfire with specs like that. - Unless you own an LCD.

I don't think anyone is doubting the performance - it's actually quite good. Unfortunately, X-Fire has several other issues which it needs to address to create mass appeal.

As some have said, I really think that X-Fire is too little, too late. Even people with current PCI-E x8xx cards will have to switch to a X-Fire compatible board in ADDITTION to a Master Card, which is much more expensive than just buying a plain 7800GT/GTX.

In the long run, I think that most people are much more interested in ATI's x1800x single-card solutions than this last minute attempt. The funny this is that, if anything, ATI's launch of X-Fire has actually improved SLI - it forced NVIDIA to introduce SLI AA and also allow the use of mixed cards in SLI.

deception``

situman · Sep 26, 2005

i think ATI implemented the limitation on purpose. The next gen cards will cost an arm and a leg. If current x-fire can match or beat a single r520 core, would people shell out to buy a 400-500 card when they can just add another 200 or 300 dollar card to their system to get similar or better performance? ATI threw this gen of x-fire out there just for the sake of fulfilling their promise of the product and to reap back some of its development costs. The true x-fire will be next gen products. This gen is for the adventurous and pioneers.

lowfat · Sep 26, 2005

Driverheaven did a preview as well here
they said the same things mostly. Its not worth it to get X850 series crossfire now, since a single 7800GTX beats it in price, and for performance for most parts. However for the X1800's it might be nice.

IWasHungry · Sep 26, 2005

Wow, all these reviews coming out at once. Too bad nobody's going to go Crossfire with the X800s or X850s. It's more cost effective to buy a single 7800GTX, and those willing to shell out large sums of money will go for the dual R520 setup.

deception`` · Sep 26, 2005

IWasHungry said:
Wow, all these reviews coming out at once. Too bad nobody's going to go Crossfire with the X800s or X850s. It's more cost effective to buy a single 7800GTX, and those willing to shell out large sums of money will go for the dual R520 setup.

^

X-Fire would have been MUCH more attractive had it launched around the same time as SLI, but with single card solutions from both NVIDIA AND ATI that are more cost-effective, this technologies really loses a lot of appeal.

deception``

RangerXLT8 · Sep 26, 2005

IWasHungry said:
Wow, all these reviews coming out at once. Too bad nobody's going to go Crossfire with the X800s or X850s. It's more cost effective to buy a single 7800GTX, and those willing to shell out large sums of money will go for the dual R520 setup.

Hmm I'm going with a CrossFire X800 mastercard when it comes out. I know there are a few people on the forums who are waiting for them. And it's not more cost effective if you already have a motherboard that supports Crossfire and an X800Pro. Some people don't like nvidia as much and would rather stay with ATI.

deception`` · Sep 26, 2005

RangerXLT8 said:
Hmm I'm going with a CrossFire X800 mastercard when it comes out. I know there are a few people on the forums who are waiting for them. And it's not more cost effective if you already have a motherboard that supports Crossfire and an X800Pro. Some people don't like nvidia as much and would rather stay with ATI.

Perhaps, but MOST people that would entertain SLI/X-Fire currently use SLI-capable motherboards even with ATI tech. So someone with an NF4 (such as the DFI) and a PCI-E x850XT would have to purchase (1) a Radeon Xpress 200 motherboard AND (2) a x850XT Master Card. When you factor this very relevant situation in the mix, X-Fire becomes less attractive for some (not all, of course).

deception``

Meathead · Sep 26, 2005

I don't know about everyone else but everyone I know that plays games competitively uses nowhere near 1600x1200 res. I still use 1024x768 ingame and on my desktop.

JigPu · Sep 27, 2005

deception`` said:
Perhaps, but MOST people that would entertain SLI/X-Fire currently use SLI-capable motherboards even with ATI tech. So someone with an NF4 (such as the DFI) and a PCI-E x850XT would have to purchase (1) a Radeon Xpress 200 motherboard AND (2) a x850XT Master Card. When you factor this very relevant situation in the mix, X-Fire becomes less attractive for some (not all, of course).

deception``

I'd say it becomes less attractive to many, though in the specific scenario you provide there's still a ~$200 price point (which may be sucked up by extra charge for a master card) in favor of Crossfire. For the hardcore who are actually spending this much I don't think it will make a difference (especially with the refresh rate limitations imposed by Crossfire), but it does exist.

/me now goes off wondering why in the world anybody would need to run a game at 2048x1536 with anti-aliasing...

JigPu

xTrEmEoVrClOcKr · Sep 27, 2005

Meathead said:
I don't know about everyone else but everyone I know that plays games competitively uses nowhere near 1600x1200 res. I still use 1024x768 ingame and on my desktop.

Couldn't have said it better. I play UT2004 at 1024 also, but have my desktop @ 1600x1200 @ 65hz. I only up the resolution for War games / racing games, competitive games isn't a must have for eye candy, IMO.

RangerXLT8 · Sep 27, 2005

xTrEmEoVrClOcKr said:
Couldn't have said it better. I play UT2004 at 1024 also, but have my desktop @ 1600x1200 @ 65hz. I only up the resolution for War games / racing games, competitive games isn't a must have for eye candy, IMO.

Yep Anything over 1152x960 or whatever you can't get decent FPS, I'm looking forward to Crossiffre because though it's not better then 7800GTX SLI, I will be ablt to play BF:2 on max AA, AF, high detail\lighting 1280x1024@75mhz vsync. I play with vsync on so I'm getting 75FPS max anyway. Anythig over that tare starts to occur. 75FPS is a great picture, there's no need to have more really unless you are benching.

RangerXLT8 · Sep 27, 2005

deception`` said:
Perhaps, but MOST people that would entertain SLI/X-Fire currently use SLI-capable motherboards even with ATI tech. So someone with an NF4 (such as the DFI) and a PCI-E x850XT would have to purchase (1) a Radeon Xpress 200 motherboard AND (2) a x850XT Master Card. When you factor this very relevant situation in the mix, X-Fire becomes less attractive for some (not all, of course).

deception``

True but if you in my case, and I know there are alot of people in the same boat as me, I have a P5WD2 Premium, it is capable of running Crossfire so All I need is a $300.00 Crossfire mastercard. Not a bad upgrade if you don't have a grand to drop on 2 R520.

IWasHungry · Sep 27, 2005

RangerXLT8 said:
True but if you in my case, and I know there are alot of people in the same boat as me, I have a P5WD2 Premium, it is capable of running Crossfire so All I need is a $300.00 Crossfire mastercard. Not a bad upgrade if you don't have a grand to drop on 2 R520.

You are in the extreme minority I'm afraid.

Vrykyl · Sep 27, 2005

i think x-fire is gonna have a hell of a time simply because ati took so darn long getting it out, I know from my point of view I already have a dfi sli capable board that overclocks well, and I already own both a 7800gtx and an x850xt....and in terms of £££ it'd be cheaper for me to get a 2nd gtx than sell up and buy a new ati based mobo (which are bound to have initial problems too) and a x-fire master card - which would give lower performance than 2 gtx's anyway....
even those with a single x8xx card would be better of just upgrading to a single gtx or gt card....

Too little too late as far as im concerned...and I used to be ati's biggest fan

Tho if ati ever extract a finger and release the x1k series at a decent price with gtx equivalent performance then x-fire may become viable.....but im sorry, as of 3 months ago the x8xx series became 'obsolete' as far as multi-card solutions go...

PottaCoola · Sep 27, 2005

Vrykyl said:
i think x-fire is gonna have a hell of a time simply because ati took so darn long getting it out, I know from my point of view I already have a dfi sli capable board that overclocks well, and I already own both a 7800gtx and an x850xt....and in terms of £££ it'd be cheaper for me to get a 2nd gtx than sell up and buy a new ati based mobo (which are bound to have initial problems too) and a x-fire master card - which would give lower performance than 2 gtx's anyway....
even those with a single x8xx card would be better of just upgrading to a single gtx or gt card....

Too little too late as far as im concerned...and I used to be ati's biggest fan

Tho if ati ever extract a finger and release the x1k series at a decent price with gtx equivalent performance then x-fire may become viable.....but im sorry, as of 3 months ago the x8xx series became 'obsolete' as far as multi-card solutions go...

Im in the same boat, there aint no point in me paying £300 for a mastercard then how much for a new proccessor and motherboard when i can get allmost the same performance from buying a 7800gtx and spending less money too.

BaconTheory · Sep 27, 2005

This just confirms that ATI is falling behind...again.

Real Crossfire Benchmarks

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Inactive Pokémon Moderator

member

Member

Member

Member

Tornado Guy

Member

Member

Similar threads