Custom-cooled Radeon HD 3870 X2 pictured

[Monkeywoman]

The ingenious idea of putting two RV670 chips on a single board and call it R680 or Radeon HD 3870 X2 seems to be moving alone nicely but not only for AMD. The card itself isn't even released yet and already one relatively unknown eastern manufacturer, Shuangmin, is already working on a model with a custom cooling solution. As you can see in the shots below it's still a dual-slot cooler with two fans resembling some of Zalman's products. The card boasts Hynix memory chips that sum up to 1GB of video memory, is as long as a GeForce 8800 GTX and, if everything goes well, it should be released early next month. Now let's just contemplate. Nvidia fans are advised to look away for safety reasons.

cores：RV670XT X 2(HD3870)
mem：1024M 0.8ns GDDR4
clock：775MHz/2250MHz
shaders：320 X 2
power：6PIN X 2
extras：DVI X 2+HDTV-OUT

More pics - http://www.pcpop.com/doc/0/261/261181_1.shtml

 

[Deleted member 24505]

Niice,weres the bga ram sinks tho'? should be a fsat card.

Whats the pricing gonna be on them cards anyway? Will it cost the same as the 88gtx?

 

[Ripper3]

GDDR4 runs cooler, and uses less power than GDDR3, while running at higher speeds, so I'd say that heatsinks are once again becoming unnecesarry, a bit like the SDR and DDR days, for acheiving high speeds. Still, would be nice to see a heatsink that covers both the RAM and the VRM all in one.

 

[Monkeywoman]

~400 so around 450 retail. cost the same as 2 3870s but with half the space. id say more performance cuz there wont be any bottleneck between the gpus. crysis at 1680x1050 anyone?

 

[erocker]

This card will be faster than an Ultra I have no doubt. At all!

 

[erocker]

This card will be faster than an Ultra I have no doubt. At all!

Wow, this is completely deja-vu for me. This feels like the Voodoo 5500 all over again!

 

[Deleted member 24505]

wont the vrm's get hot running 2 gpu's?

 

[Monkeywoman]

i highly doubt this is the final disgin for this card, its prolly just a prototype. id like to see what thermalright comes up with. or thermal take with a quad orb cooler

 

[erocker]

From what I gather this card is done and in driver development stages. I think the cooler sucks, but the board itself will look like that.

 

[Urbklr]

I only see one crossfire connector thingy....No 8x3870

 

[trog100]

it wont draw any more power than the 2900xt does.. cooling it shouldnt be a problem.. how well it goes comes down to driver and game support..

if it doesnt go better then two 3870 cards in crossfire i wont be buying one.. lets hope it does..

the pics i have seen look similar to the existing cards.. just longer and with a better or bigger piece of copper sat under the plastic cover.. the is plenty of spare room under the 3870s plastic cover..

trog

 

[Ripper3]

Driver support for Xfire might be better when the 3870 X2 is released, so hopefully, the performance will be equal to or slightly more than two 3870s.
Also, gotta remember that, if you're running two 3870s, some 'boards will be able to run them at 16x per slot, while the 3870 X2 in a PCI-E v1.1 board, will be splitting the 16x bandwidth between then two cores. Might make no difference, might make all the difference, who knows.

 

[strick94u]

I like the idea of 2 gpus on one card should be fast and dependable

 

[a111087]

you missed the most important:

 

[KainXS]

the card will definitely be faster than an ultra but not by much probably unless it runs like the new firegl that is

 

[ShadowFold]

I think a HD 3850X2 would be pretty cool... i'd buy that lol

 

[KainXS]

Im still disappointed with Nvidia's 9800GX2

I was expecting so much more

 

[phaser]

Well, don't be. It's purely designed to outperform the 3870X2 and it will do just that.

Note : I'm not a fan neither of nvidia nor ati, just stating facts.

 

[btarunr]

This looks a for more sensible card by design compared to the 9800 GX2. I still don't get it: why does this card have just one gold-finger? Doesn't it mean no Crossfire X for this? No passive cooling to the memory and the power conditioning circuit, use of electrolytic capacitors are my gripe.

 

[Xaser04]

it wont draw any more power than the 2900xt does.. cooling it shouldnt be a problem.. how well it goes comes down to driver and game support..

if it doesnt go better then two 3870 cards in crossfire i wont be buying one.. lets hope it does..

the pics i have seen look similar to the existing cards.. just longer and with a better or bigger piece of copper sat under the plastic cover.. the is plenty of spare room under the 3870s plastic cover..

trog

Its crossfire on a stick so *should* perform the same as the 3870's in crossfire.

Like you say though it will all come down to how good the drivers are.

 

[regan1985]

about time a card was out that really testest pcix16 after change from agpx8 all those years ago!

looks good but again its down to price/performance

i see the 2600xt x2 arround for £150 why would some1 pay that when they can buy a a single card that better, i think by the time it comes out the same thing will happen, they need to release a x2 card at the start and forget about single core cards

 

[Agility]

Crossfire X = 4 GPU. Doesn't mean 4 cards connecting together.
Thus the one connector only for 3870X2. 3870X2 is a crossfire itself so it's 2X2 for another 3870X2.

 

[devguy]

Well, don't be. It's purely designed to outperform the 3870X2 and it will do just that.

Note : I'm not a fan neither of nvidia nor ati, just stating facts.

What are you talking about? Neither card is on the market. Neither has public benches from a non-prototype. Saying it is fact that the 9800GX2 will outperform one of these at this point is just silly.

It doesn't work to say 8800gt > HD 3870 so 2x8800gt > 2x HD 3870 (look at Crossfire Xs recent track record).

 

[EastCoasthandle]

Well, don't be. It's purely designed to outperform the 3870X2 and it will do just that.

Note : I'm not a fan neither of nvidia nor ati, just stating facts.

Facts, what facts? Based on what? How can you not be a fanboy when you haven't provided one iota of information to accommodate the "facts" you post?

 

[snuif09]

the coolers look like a duorb together

i like nvidia and ati aswell and if this one is cheaper than the 9800GTS or GX2 then thisn one isd my new buddy