Should i crossfire my card ?

[Durvelle27]

I'm wondering if i should crossfire or not to achieve better FPS in some of my games. I play Tomb Raider, Bioshock Infinite, Crysis 3, BF3, Far Cry 3,Assassins Creed III, Sleeping Dogs etc. And if so is it worth upgrading my mobo. I normally game at 1080p most game with eye candy and some without due to low FPS. My spec are in my sig

 

[EarthDog]

If its worth it or not is up to you... There are plenty of reviews around showing the scaling/performance of two at your resolution. Check those out and see if the wallet can make it happen.

 

[Mathragh]

I wouldn't do it, at least not with your current mobo. The 2nd card will only have PCI-E x 4(2.0) bandwidth, which is also shared with the chipset, so it wont perform nearly as good as you'll expect it to.

 

[erocker]

I think AMD admitted that CrossFire is currently broken and they will release an overhauled driver come July... I just need to find where I read that. Also, x8 +x4 CrossFire isn't ideal to begin with.

So, I'd say no. Sell your current card and buy a 7950/7970.

 

[Norton]

That mobo should be fine using the PCIEX4 slot for the 2nd card if you decide on crossfire... you may lose 5% or so from an optimal crossfire setup. Also, you can mix the 7870 with a 7850... again not optimal but it will bring you up to 7970 levels on the cheap.
*Note- you won't have the 3GB of vram like a 7970 but 2GB is still pretty god

Do a search for 7870 7850 crossfire for a few reviews (don't have the link(s) with me atm)

 

[EarthDog]

All good points above... though I wouldnt call CFx broken per say. Some people dont have the problems and its game specific I believe?

Note- you won't have the 3GB of vram like a 7970 but 2GB is still pretty god

2GB is still fine at 1080p so he is good there.

 

[Mathragh]

That mobo should be fine using the PCIEX4 slot for the 2nd card if you decide on crossfire... you may lose 5% or so from an optimal crossfire setup. Also, you can mix the 7870 with a 7850... again not optimal but it will bring you up to 7970 levels on the cheap.
*Note- you won't have the 3GB of vram like a 7970 but 2GB is still pretty god

Do a search for 7870 7850 crossfire for a few reviews (don't have the link(s) with me atm)

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/HD_5870_PCI-Express_Scaling/25.html
5% may seem like its doable, but in crossfire set-ups, it'll cause stalls in the frame delivery, which probably negate most of the performance increase gained by crossfiring. Furthermore, the performance was 5% lower for a 5870; the 7870 is quite a bit quicker, however, so the decrease in performance would arguable be higher.

Of course you can still buy another card and crossfire, and you'll probably see quite an increase in FPS in most games, but some things are bound to run worse than you expect them to.

 

[Durvelle27]

I think AMD admitted that CrossFire is currently broken and they will release an overhauled driver come July... I just need to find where I read that. Also, x8 +x4 CrossFire isn't ideal to begin with.

So, I'd say no. Sell your current card and buy a 7950/7970.

a HD 7970 won't fit my case

 

[Durvelle27]

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/HD_5870_PCI-Express_Scaling/25.html
5% may seem like its doable, but in crossfire set-ups, it'll cause stalls in the frame delivery, which probably negate most of the performance increase gained by crossfiring. Furthermore, the performance was 5% lower for a 5870; the 7870 is quite a bit quicker, however, so the decrease in performance would arguable be higher.

Of course you can still buy another card and crossfire, and you'll probably see quite an increase in FPS in most games, but some things are bound to run worse than you expect them to.

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Intel/Ivy_Bridge_PCI-Express_Scaling/23.html

 

[cadaveca]

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Intel/Ivy_Bridge_PCI-Express_Scaling/23.html

That's a single card, not Crossfire. Crossfire is different. Buy the card, get it, and you'll see. DX10 and DX11 apps seem to get the worst performance with x16/x4.


As erocker mentioned, 7-series Crossfire is a bit broken at times(A LOT), and a fix is not expected until around July. You can find this reported on Anandtech and PC Perspective if you need a source other than me.

 

[erocker]

a HD 7970 won't fit my case

I see this picture here.. Not sure if it's a modded case or not, but is seems simple enough.

 

[Norton]

There's some mixed crossfire results here:

http://www.kitguru.net/components/g...md-hd7870-and-hd7850-graphics-card-review/23/

I have the same board in one of my rigs and it seemed to do fine with crossfired 7770's. I only ran a few benches (not my thing) but there was no penalty with them or with gpu crunching with the card in the X4 slot compared to the X16 slot

 

[ThE_MaD_ShOt]

I am running crossfired 7850's on a Gigabyte 990FXA-ud3 and it seems fine. I am not having any issues .

 

[Durvelle27]

I see this picture here.. Not sure if it's a modded case or not, but is seems simple enough.

http://cdn.overclock.net/b/b3/900x9...96218096494_659761493_9076589_61154835_n.jpeg

i have tried an anything over 10.6" won't fit

 

[Durvelle27]

I am running crossfired 7850's on a Gigabyte 990FXA-ud3 and it seems fine. I am not having any issues .


http://img.techpowerup.org/130405/Untitled472.jpg

were talking 2.0x16 + 2.0x4

 

[ThE_MaD_ShOt]

were talking 2.0x16 + 2.0x4

I was just letting you know I wasn't having driver problems with my setup.

 

[Durvelle27]

I was just letting you know I wasn't having driver problems with my setup.

oh ok thx.

what drivers and caps

 

[ThE_MaD_ShOt]

using the 12.10 driver and 12.9 cap. I am going to update the cap when i move the rig to it's finale home.

 

[Durvelle27]

using the 12.10 driver and 12.9 cap. I am going to update the cap when i move the rig to it's finale home.

what about 13.2 Beta 3

 

[Durvelle27]

or 13.1

 

[ThE_MaD_ShOt]

I am going to leave the drivers where they are for right now. They work great and if it ain't broke I am not going to try and fix it.

 

[RCoon]

I am going to leave the drivers where they are for right now. They work great and if it ain't broke I am not going to try and fix it.

take it from me, don't touch anything below 13.3. Plus you won't need caps anymore. Those drivers fixed all my flickering issues in skyrim and dramatically improves my crossfire performance. Any drivers below that fucked it up aside from 12.10

 

[Durvelle27]

take it from me, don't touch anything below 13.3. Plus you won't need caps anymore. Those drivers fixed all my flickering issues in skyrim and dramatically improves my crossfire performance. Any drivers below that fucked it up aside from 12.10

nice so no microstutter

 

[GreiverBlade]

geh? not fitting in a Storm scout? my 6950 fit in my fractal design core 1000 thanks to the vertical HDD tray and my new 7950 (XFX 7950 are basically same length as their 7970) fits in my Thermaltake Element S and i dont recall a SScout being smaller than a Element S

anyway my 6950 (2gb) wasnt slow in FC3 or bf3 in my main rigs but i got a sweet deals over a 7950 (wich i currently run OC'ed like a Black Ed.) i have a "crappy" PH II X6 1035T until i find another sweet deals for a 6300/8320/8350

and a 970 ASRock ext3 (wiring x4 also on the 2nd x16 so i didnt thought even a bit about Xfiring the 6950 ) i rather say going for a 7950 3gb from a 6950 was the most logical since a good OC'ed 6950 is near a 7870 currently i gain between 10 and 20 fps reaching the vsync more often than the 6950, in useless benchies i get (once oc'ed) 50 to 60% more

final thought : if you can sell that 7870 and get a 7970 it will be a good upgrade till you change mobo and get Xfire for 7970 ooorr wait for 8xxx serie (end of 2013?) but i bet a 7970 (Ghz or not) would be really enough more if Xfired when 8xxx goes out (cheaper 2nd 7970 in that case )

i know my 2 rigs arent topclass but they do their work and both does it fine (well the X6+7950 better than the X4+6950 ofc. )

 

[Zubasa]

nice so no microstutter

If you can, just wait until AMD gets the Crossfire issues sorted out then decide.