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Are the Radeon 6990/6970/6950 Crossfire Compatible ???

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Hi, I've been doing some research lately and I would like to know if anyone knows if these 3 cards are crossfire compatible... I've been looking everywhere and I have a hard time finding out...

Also, what would you recommend for my rig in terms of graphic cards :

I have a i7 875k with 8gb of Ram 1600mhz... with one Radeon 6950 (unlocked)

I've been playing Dragon Age 2 recently... and I can't quite set the video settings to Very high on that game with everything maxed out. Well... I can, but it gets a little laggy. Which is why I keep it around "high" settings with 4x AA.

What should I do? Should I get another 6950, unlock it and crossfire it?

Or should I buy the 6990 alone and sell the 6950 I own (to get some money down on that 6990)

Or should I crossfire my actual 6950 with a new 6990? (If these 2 are compatible in any case...)
 
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Thx for your answer. But I would like to know if someone out there knows FOR SURE if they are Crossfire compatible...

Also, I forgot to ask whether you guys think I should upgrade my CCC software (which is version 10.11 right now to 11.2, which is the latest)

Do you think that could help the performance of my graphic card at all? I was wondering whether it would still be possible for me to unlock my 6950 after I update the CCC drivers and software...

I'm not sure about this, but sometimes it feels like my XFX radeon 6950 performs better when NOT unlocked... Obviously, I get more quality and unified shaders when it's unlocked but somehow it feels like the card doesn't like that so much lolzzz.

And my BIG question: How much of a performance boost would I get from crossfiring my actual 6950 with another? In terms of FPS and in terms of how high I could Raise my Game settings???
 

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I have 2 6950 unlocked in CF, 2 CF connectors on 6950/6970, so you can CF 2 or 3 or 4 cards if you wish in CF, on 6990 there is 1 connector, so you can "only" have 2 cards in CF.
 
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I still need insurance that I can Crossfire a 6990 with a 6950... I REALLY need precise answers for these questions (sorry for repeting myself) :

What should I do? Should I get another 6950, unlock it and crossfire it?

Or should I buy the 6990 alone and sell the 6950 I own (to get some money down on that 6990)

Or should I crossfire my actual 6950 with a new 6990? (If these 2 are compatible in any case...)


Should I upgrade my CCC software and drivers to version 11.2 (latest)? Is that possible considering I have a 6950 unlocked? or must I flash it back to its default version before upgrading CCC to 11.2?

I've done some research and I've stumbled on info about unlocking the 6950 and using the
ASUS bios with smart doctor allowing for a raise to 1.3v, which in turn unlocks CCC so you can get 1620/2500 speed... I'm not 100% certain that info is correct. It looked crazy when I read this. Here's the link btw : http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/.../t-265787.html

Can anyone tell me if I should go for it, and if you think it would help my PC performance in games...
 

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Yes the 6990 will CF with a 6950/70. What combination of cards you choose is up to your budget. A single 6990 will power through DA2 easily, as will 2 6950's. Basically any combination of 2 or more GPU's. And I'd say install the Catalyst 11.4 preview, seems to be much better than 11.2
 
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Thank you for that answer... Exactly what I was looking for. So there's a difference of performance between the CCC software 10.12 vs 11.4? In your opinion?

And do I need to undo my 6950 unlock before I update to 11.4?
 
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Thank you for that answer... Exactly what I was looking for. So there's a difference of performance between the CCC software 10.12 vs 11.4? In your opinion?

And do I need to undo my 6950 unlock before I update to 11.4?

Just about eveyone is having good luck with 11.4's. Better performance too.

You do not need to undo your unlock for updating drivers. The unlocked shaders are tied to the bios, not the drivers.
 

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Where can I download 11.4 ccc... Went to the AMD website, didn't find it...

Is this released yet? Where did you guys find 11.4??
 

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What the hell is the point of getting a 6990 if you're going to crossfire it with a 6950 (unlocked)?

You're going to spend $700 and it's going to underclock to match 6950 (unlocked) speeds, so there's absolutely no performance boost of getting 6950/6990 versus 2x 6950's...
 
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Yeah, I figured that (about 6990 and 6950)

I was wondering though... How much of a performance increase would I get with 2x 6950 (unlocked in crossfire) ??
 
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Just about eveyone is having good luck with 11.4's. Better performance too.

You do not need to undo your unlock for updating drivers. The unlocked shaders are tied to the bios, not the drivers.

Are you sure about not having to "undo my unlock to update drivers" sometimes Driver updates require a Vbios update...

Do YOU have 11.4 installed??
 
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Oh, and another quick question: Must I uninstall my current version of CCC (10.12) before installing 11.4?
 

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Benchmark Scores I should run some of these sometime...
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ok anyone know for sure, been thinking about picking one up if the GTX590 underperforms
 

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What the hell is the point of getting a 6990 if you're going to crossfire it with a 6950 (unlocked)?

You're going to spend $700 and it's going to underclock to match 6950 (unlocked) speeds, so there's absolutely no performance boost of getting 6950/6990 versus 2x 6950's...


don't the modern CAT's allow the cards to run at their own speeds without matching clocks like back in the day?
 

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What the hell is the point of getting a 6990 if you're going to crossfire it with a 6950 (unlocked)?

You're going to spend $700 and it's going to underclock to match 6950 (unlocked) speeds, so there's absolutely no performance boost of getting 6950/6990 versus 2x 6950's...


don't the modern CAT's allow the cards to run at their own speeds without matching clocks like back in the day? i know my 5970 (default 850/1200) didnt clock back to match my 5850 (default 765/1125) when i first fitted it
 

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don't the modern CAT's allow the cards to run at their own speeds without matching clocks like back in the day? i know my 5970 (default 850/1200) didnt clock back to match my 5850 (default 765/1125) when i first fitted it

Yea they do.

Also to the OP:

Why are you spending close to $1000 on Graphics cards when you dont seem to understand the basics of the actual cards and the drivers?

When crossfire goes wrong (it does some times .. same with SLI) Your going to be stuck as you wont know how to fix it... sure we are here to help but its kinda silly...

Just seems very odd to me thats all.
 

Iactus

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to satisfy the masses, can you clarify what u meant by

Yea..

Your correct, with the current drivers you can have say:

a 5870 at stock clocks
a 5850 at stock clocks

they will run there own clock speeds and run in crossfire perfectly happy.

If you want better performance you would raise the 5850's clocks to match the 5870's.


Same for the 6950 and the 6970 cards, they will work fine at there own respective clocks but would be better when clocked the same or the lower end card clocked slightly higher.

tried and tested by myself
 
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A quick Noobish quesiton: I noticed how I got more stability in Dragon Age 2 by lowering my radeon 6950 clock speeds.... And it brought me to a this question:

Shouldn't the graphic performance increase with increased clock speeds... Why does the Game seem to run just as good and even better when I lower my clock speeds ??... Now I know that my radeon 6950 is unlocked... which is why the fastest clock speeds are a No-No since it's not a 6970.

What is there to gain in raising clock speeds and what is there to lose?
 

Iactus

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A quick Noobish quesiton: I noticed how I got more stability in Dragon Age 2 by lowering my radeon 6950 clock speeds.... And it brought me to a this question:

Shouldn't the graphic performance increase with increased clock speeds... Why does the Game seem to run just as good and even better when I lower my clock speeds ??... Now I know that my radeon 6950 is unlocked... which is why the fastest clock speeds are a No-No since it's not a 6970.

What is there to gain in raising clock speeds and what is there to lose?

Sounds like you got a bad card and its a 6950 for a reason.

I would undo your shaders unlock and then try overclocking it.
 

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What the hell is the point of getting a 6990 if you're going to crossfire it with a 6950 (unlocked)?

You're going to spend $700 and it's going to underclock to match 6950 (unlocked) speeds, so there's absolutely no performance boost of getting 6950/6990 versus 2x 6950's...

crossfire doesnt slow down to match the weakest card. thats an nvidia thing.

The only thing crossfire does like that, is it matches the memory amounts.


A quick Noobish quesiton: I noticed how I got more stability in Dragon Age 2 by lowering my radeon 6950 clock speeds.... And it brought me to a this question:

Shouldn't the graphic performance increase with increased clock speeds... Why does the Game seem to run just as good and even better when I lower my clock speeds ??... Now I know that my radeon 6950 is unlocked... which is why the fastest clock speeds are a No-No since it's not a 6970.

What is there to gain in raising clock speeds and what is there to lose?

These cards have ECC (error check and correction). all it means is that your card is stable enough to not crash, but its wasting time re-doing certain calculations due to errors. try unlocked shaders at stock clocks, or just revert to stock shaders.
 
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ok thx for the info
 
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