[HookeyStreet]

Im running 2x 2900XT's in X-Fire, but Im not sure if I should sell them (while they are worth something) and get 2x 3870XT's to run in X-Fire?

What would you do?

[Rattle]

i would get a x38 mobo first so you have full 32 lane xfire

[Shell]

You have dual 2900's, I'm shure you have no need to upgrade for a long time to come.
The 3870 is not a lot more powerful, but you shure as hell can save on your power bill if you make the switich.

And you really need an X38 mainboard for CrossFire.

[HookeyStreet]

Originally Posted by Rattle

i would get a x38 mobo first so you have full 32 lane xfire

Agreed, the only reason I thought about doing the switch to 3870 is because it wont cost anything

[Neuromancer]

I also say keep the 2900s the 3870 are "mainstream" cards while the 2900 is a highend card. The 3870s might actually give a little more performance (I think they are actually a little lower) but not enough to bother upgrading for.

[HookeyStreet]

Originally Posted by Shell

You have dual 2900's, I'm shure you have no need to upgrade for a long time to come.
The 3870 is not a lot more powerful, but you shure as hell can save on your power bill if you make the switich.

And you really need an X38 mainboard for CrossFire.

Thanks for the info

[Rattle]

if its not gonna cost you anything then do it, at worse the cards are ONLY AS FAST as the 2900's but they will use half the power. If it was me and it cost me nothing i would be all over it. Get yourself a x38 sell the 965 while your at it. If your gonna do x-fire do it right.

[HookeyStreet]

Originally Posted by Rattle

if its not gonna cost you anything then do it, at worse the cards are ONLY AS FAST as the 2900's but they will use half the power. If it was me and it cost me nothing i would be all over it. Get yourself a x38 sell the 965 while your at it. If your gonna do x-fire do it right.

Cool, I will get to work on it lol

[White_Pawn]

Originally Posted by HookeyStreet

Agreed, the only reason I thought about doing the switch to 3870 is because it wont cost anything

if it isn't going to cost anything i'm thinking dual 3870 will be better. At the very least, only because the 2900xt lacks the AA ability.

[Rattle]

do the new cards have AA ability? I havnt seen anything that shows more/diff/better performance of the 2900 with AA

[jivetrky]

Originally Posted by Rattle

do the new cards have AA ability? I havnt seen anything that shows more/diff/better performance of the 2900 with AA

A review that I saw showed that the AA performance was pretty equal (meaning the scores were what they should be comparatively)

[HookeyStreet]

Does the lower memory bandwidth of 256Bit make any difference (compared to the 512Bit of the 2900XT) ?

[dominick32]

I own 2 X HD 2900 XT's in Crossfire and do not plan on upgrading until we get a new high end card from NV or ATI. My personal opinion, even on X38 it is not worth the simple swap to 3870, performance I have seen so far seems pretty much identical with an extra FPS here or there. Removing the cards, trying to sell them in the classifieds, ordering up new cards, re-installing them for a few extra FPS is not worth the headache IMO. These cards (with the exception of Crysis performance ) are more than sufficient for any game at the present time.

Just wait it out until Q1 2008, we shall see some new higher end cards being released. That is when me and Rattle will be re-purchasing. lol

[Rattle]

Hell i might step up to the new 65nm gts next month lmao

[HookeyStreet]

Originally Posted by dominick32

I own 2 X HD 2900 XT's in Crossfire and do not plan on upgrading until we get a new high end card from NV or ATI. My personal opinion, even on X38 it is not worth the simple swap to 3870, performance I have seen so far seems pretty much identical with an extra FPS here or there. Removing the cards, trying to sell them in the classifieds, ordering up new cards, re-installing them for a few extra FPS is not worth the headache IMO. These cards (with the exception of Crysis performance ) are more than sufficient for any game at the present time.

Just wait it out until Q1 2008, we shall see some new higher end cards being released. That is when me and Rattle will be re-purchasing. lol

I get what your saying m8 BTW are you able to play Crysis in CrossFire mode, I cant

[PhysX]

Originally Posted by Rattle

do the new cards have AA ability? I havnt seen anything that shows more/diff/better performance of the 2900 with AA

once dx10.1 comes out all cards that are dx10.1 have manditory 4xaa

[Rattle]

as far as I know it has nothing to do with the cards, if you have a dx 10 anything card vista is auto 4x AA after the 10.1 API update

this however has nothing to do with the AA issue of the 2900xt, whether or not the updated 10.1 api forces AA or not the 2900 wont have better AA performance, wether you set it yourself or let 10.1 force it.... because either way it still sucks with AA

[Oc1Kenube]

What i want to know is, will my e6600 at speed in sig bottleneck 2 3870'sin CF, should i go with 3850's or 1 faster card ie gtx? viperjohn i suspect may know the answer

[Rattle]

go with CF cuz those 2 cards in CF or 2x 8800gt's in SLI is faster than an 8800ultra

your cpu bottleneck isnt much of a concern if your at 1680x1050 or 1600x1200 and up on the res

[brakezone]

I can't speak with any specific experience other than using SLI, but I would imagine that you will see a benifit with 2X 3870's over 2X 3850's when dealing with higher resolutions simply because the greater memory bandwidth and core speeds. I have seen how my SLI would typically provide a 50% boost under older applications and a 90% boost under more GPU intensive 3d apps. If the CPU bottlenecks it or not would likely depend upon the settings and application, but there would most certainly be a significant benefit where no CPU bottleneck exists. I believe that you may start to see CPU bottlenecks with crossfire under most settings where crossfire is actually unnecessary to obtain playable rates, and at this point you will see that the performance is not scaling quite as effectively as it would at high resolutions.