ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 (R680) 1GB First Full Review Posted

malware · Jan 22, 2008

The guys over at PConline.com.cn have managed again to be the first to post a full review of a graphics card that should be available later next month, the ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 1GB (R680). First thing you'll notice is that the card beats NVIDIA's GeForce 8800 Ultra in every Futuremark benchmark and almost every game by quite a margin. Have a good time reading the full story here.

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snuif09 · Jan 22, 2008

i love that card already

Weer · Jan 22, 2008

It's hard to load the pages, but from the only one I saw so far, the 8800 Ultra beats the hell out of it in Lost Planet.

MikeJeng · Jan 22, 2008

This is better than the Ultra but it's also X2...

I still like Nvidia.

WildCat87 · Jan 22, 2008

Weak.

cmberry20 · Jan 22, 2008

wow! Very surprising. I wasn't expecting the performance to be as much as that. Well done ATI/AMD.

However, I worried about the price - I think they should sell it at < £250/€350 which would be the top end of most peoples (enthusiasts) budget. > £300/€400 (which it looks like it is) & your budgeting for the rich only & a niche market.

cmberry20 · Jan 22, 2008

btw, what board is that behind the X2 in the thrird picture - is that a 8800 ultra?

Wile E · Jan 22, 2008

WildCat87 said:
Weak.

This card is also much cheaper than an Ultra. It's supposed to retail around the price of a GTX.

cmberry20 · Jan 22, 2008

Wile E said:
This card is also much cheaper than an Ultra. It's supposed to retail around the price of a GTX.

Well, considering you can now pick up a 8000GTX for £240/€330 lets hope so!!

erocker · Jan 22, 2008

Also the HD3870 is new, while the Ultra has been around a while. A month or two and the 3870x2 beats the Ultra in Crysis.

WildCat87 · Jan 22, 2008

erocker said:
Also the HD3870 is new, while the Ultra has been around a while. A month or two and the 3870x2 beats the Ultra in Crysis.

All I see is a brand new high-end dual-GPU video card that barely cracks 40 FPS at a low resolution with NO AA.

Weak. lol

Wile E · Jan 22, 2008

WildCat87 said:
All I see is a brand new high-end dual-GPU video card that barely cracks 40 FPS at a low resolution with NO AA.

Weak. lol

Until you realize that the drivers aren't anywhere near mature, and it's still faster then the nVidia offering in the same price range.

erocker · Jan 22, 2008

WildCat87 said:
All I see is a brand new high-end dual-GPU video card that barely cracks 40 FPS at a low resolution with NO AA.

Weak. lol

I wouldn't be suprised if there is a 20 - 40% gain with a patch and/or new drivers. Give it a little time, the card isn't even in retail yet!

WildCat87 · Jan 22, 2008

Wile E said:
Until you realize that the drivers aren't anywhere near mature, and it's still faster then the nVidia offering in the same price range.

I won't argue about the drivers.

A brand new, high-end, dual-GPU video card, even if only $50, getting just 1 frame more than an old, single-GPU card is still weak. Excellent price/performance ratio, but I was truly expecting more as far as pure performance, even with launch drivers.

erocker · Jan 22, 2008

When a card beats out another card in everything else... it's drivers. I'm sure they are working on it.

Blacklash · Jan 22, 2008

I'd love a card that just works. It looks like with this one if the title doesn't traditionally do well with Crossfire you are going to be left with slightly worse than a single HD 3870 result. See; WiC, Crysis, and Lost Planet. I bet it blows in DiRT too. It will probably do fine in Crysis on the DX9 path. I know my 3850s do.

I am going to hold onto my money for now. Hopefully someone will deliver a single GPU that can beat my GTX well soon. It's 661|2040 with a 1600 shader clock.

Mussels · Jan 22, 2008

lets see how it goes. It seems fast in DX9 and weak in DX10.

erocker · Jan 22, 2008

Mussels said:
lets see how it goes. It seems fast in DX9 and weak in DX10.

Like everything else! We literally haven't seen a real high-end DX10 card from either side. I think this card has the greatest potential out of all of them though.

Xaser04 · Jan 22, 2008

Could someone possibly give a quick run down of the results as the website does not load at all here at work.

I am seriously interested in one of these as something new to play with.

Cheers

LiveOrDie · Jan 22, 2008

Benchmarks don't show how the card is really is goin to proform in really world gaming, this is ATI high end card, when nvidia 9800GTX is not far off, like the saying goes 2 is better than 1, i would guess this would beat the 8800Ultra because it has 2 GPU working on one thing with more memory, would be a good card if not priced to high, but i will fall behind Nvidia's 9800GX2 in muti GPU cards. my 8800GTS 512MB comes like 100Points off the Ultra in 3DMark 06 but sure does not proform like a Ultra lol.

Mussels · Jan 22, 2008

actually on the more memory thing... doesnt crossfire (and SLI) only share GPU power? wouldnt this really be a 512MB card for most purposes?

LiveOrDie · Jan 22, 2008

Mussels said:
actually on the more memory thing... doesnt crossfire (and SLI) only share GPU power? wouldnt this really be a 512MB card for most purposes?

Im not sure i think that is only when you uses 2 card not a single card with 2 GPU's, because think it work like 2 GPU's running off the same memory thats 1GB, does any one know if windows it picks the card up as one or two card, and do you have to turn crossfire/SLI on in the video cards control panel?

Darkmag · Jan 22, 2008

Xaser04 said:
Could someone possibly give a quick run down of the results as the website does not load at all here at work.

I am seriously interested in one of these as something new to play with.

Cheers

Hope this helps

Performance diffrence in terms of R680 to 8800Ultra
Bioshock 1280*1024 = 4% Slower
Bioshock 1920x1200 = 24% Faster
Bioshock 2560*1600 = 39% Faster

COJ 1280*1024 = 11% Faster
COJ 1920x1200 = 24% Faster
COJ 2560*1600 = 10% Faster

COJ 1280*1024 4AA 16AF = 13% Faster
COJ 1920x1200 4AA 16AF = 23% Faster

Lost Planet 1280*1024 = 27% Slower
Lost Planet 1920x1200 = 30% Slower
Lost Planet 2560*1600 = 37% Faster

Lost Planet 1280*1024 4AA 16AF = 18% Slower
Lost Planet 1920x1200 4AA 16AF = 18% Slower
Lost Planet 2560*1600 4AA 16AF = 10% Faster

Crysis 1280*1024 = 13% Slower
Crysis 1920x1200 = 2% Slower
Crysis 2560*1600 = 12% slower

COD4 1280*1024 = 42% Faster
COD4 1920x1200 = 32% Faster
COD4 2560*1600 = 26% Faster

COD4 1280*1024 4AA 16AF = 27% Faster
COD4 1920x1200 4AA 16AF = 20% Faster
COD4 2560*1600 4AA 16AF = 16% Faster

NFS

ro 1280*1024 = 32% Faster
NFS

ro 1920x1200 = 38% Faster

NFS

ro 1280*1024 4AA 16AF = 72% Slower
NFS

ro 1920x1200 4AA 16AF = 67% Slower

Serious Sam 2 1280*1024 HAA 16AF = 30% Faster
Serious Sam 2 1920x1200 HAA 16AF = 45% Faster
Serious Sam 2 2560*1600 HAA 16AF = 78% Faster

UT3 1280*1024 = 7% Faster
UT3 1920x1200 = 24% Faster
UT3 2560*1600 = 37% Faster

F.E.A.R. 1600*1200 = 20% Faster
F.E.A.R. 2048*1536 = 20% Faster

OnBoard · Jan 22, 2008

Must be a driver bug with ProStreet with AA/AF, it run nearly same 30FPS on my comp with 2xAA/8xAF =)

Mussels · Jan 22, 2008

summary: drivers are immature, people are expecting to be about 30-50% faster than an ultra, for about 75% the price of an ultra.

Processor	Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 G0 VID: 1.2125
Motherboard	GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3P rev.2.0
Cooling	Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme + Noctua NF-S12 Fan
Memory	4x1 GB PQI DDR2 PC2-6400
Video Card(s)	Colorful iGame Radeon HD 4890 1 GB GDDR5
Storage	2x 500 GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 32 MB RAID0
Display(s)	BenQ G2400W 24-inch WideScreen LCD
Case	Cooler Master COSMOS RC-1000 (sold), Cooler Master HAF-932 (delivered)
Audio Device(s)	Creative X-Fi XtremeMusic + Logitech Z-5500 Digital THX
Power Supply	Chieftec CFT-1000G-DF 1kW
Software	Laptop: Lenovo 3000 N200 C2DT2310/3GB/120GB/GF7300/15.4"/Razer

System Name	//////////////////////////////////////Crunching/Folding Builds\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\
Processor	Q8400@ 4.0Ghz \| Q6600 @ 3.6Ghz \| E7300 @ 3.8Ghz \| E5300 @ 4.3Ghz \| E5300 @ 3.9Ghz \| E2180 @ 2.0Ghz \|
Motherboard	ASUS P5Q-E \| Asus P5Q Pro \| Gigabyte EG45-DS2H \| Gigabyte EP35-DS3H \| Gigabyte NV73 \| E-Sonic P35-G
Cooling	TRUE [Lapped] \| TRUE \| Thermalright SI-128 \| Stock \| Stock \| Stock
Memory	G.Skill 8192MB @ 1066Mhz \| G.Skill 4096MB \| OCZ 2048MB \| G.Skill 2048MB \| PNY 2048MB \| OCZ 1024MB
Video Card(s)	GTX 280 + 8800 GTS 512 \| 9800 GX2 + 8800 GTS 512 \| 6600 GT \| 8800 GS \| 9600 GSO 512
Storage	G.Skill 64GB SSD (OS) \| Segate 750GB [Downloads] \| 5TB JBOD [Movies] \| 3TB JBOD [Else] \| 1.5TB [Ex]
Display(s)	QUAD Monitors: Dell 2007FP [20"] + Dell 3007WFP-HC [30"] + Dell 2007FP [20"] \| Dell 2407WFP-HC [24"]
Case	Antec P190 \| Antec Three-Hundred \| Antec NSK2400 \| Thermaltake Strike MX \| HEC 6T10 \| HEC 8K01
Audio Device(s)	Creative X-Fi XtremeGamer PCI + [Audiophile HD600] + [Creative G500 + Logitech X-530 = 10 speakers]
Power Supply	OCZ 750w [62A] \| OCZ 750w [62A] \| Antec 380w [31A] \| Antec 650w [54A] \| OCZ 400w [33A] \| GeN [20A]
Software	Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit + Windows XP 64-bit \| Windows Vista SP2 64-bit \| Windows 7 RTM 64-bit
Benchmark Scores	////////////////////////////////66,666 [Crunching] + 45,455 [Folding]\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

System Name	Nerd Command Center
Processor	i5-2500K 3.3Ghz
Motherboard	MSI P67A-GD55
Cooling	Corsair H70
Memory	Corsair DDR3 1600 (2x2GB)
Video Card(s)	EVGA GTX570
Storage	Ocz Vertex 2 60GB
Display(s)	Samsung 2343bwx 2048x1152
Case	CM Cosmos 1000: Matte black + window
Audio Device(s)	Onboard
Power Supply	Thermaltake 700W Modular PSU
Software	Windows 7 Ultimate

Processor	AMD Opteron 148 @ 2800MHz
Motherboard	DFI LanParty CFX3200-DR
Cooling	Zalman 9500 w Blue LED
Memory	OCZ 2GB 200MHz 3-3-3-5 1T
Video Card(s)	Radeon HD 4850 512MB
Storage	Western Digital Caviar 250GB
Display(s)	Hanns·G HG-216DPO 21.6" HDMI
Case	Cooler Master Ammo
Audio Device(s)	Sound Blaster X-Fi Fatal1ty
Power Supply	Enermax Liberty 500w
Software	Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 x64

System Name	The ClusterF**k
Processor	980X @ 4Ghz
Motherboard	Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD5 BIOS F12
Cooling	MCR-320, DDC-1 pump w/Bitspower res top (1/2" fittings), Koolance CPU-360
Memory	3x2GB Mushkin Redlines 1600Mhz 6-8-6-24 1T
Video Card(s)	Evga GTX 580
Storage	Corsair Neutron GTX 240GB, 2xSeagate 320GB RAID0; 2xSeagate 3TB; 2xSamsung 2TB; Samsung 1.5TB
Display(s)	HP LP2475w 24" 1920x1200 IPS
Case	Technofront Bench Station
Audio Device(s)	Auzentech X-Fi Forte into Onkyo SR606 and Polk TSi200's + RM6750
Power Supply	ENERMAX Galaxy EVO EGX1250EWT 1250W
Software	Win7 Ultimate N x64, OSX 10.8.4

Processor	AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D
Motherboard	ASUS TUF x670e
Cooling	EK AIO 360. Phantek T30 fans.
Memory	32GB G.Skill 6000Mhz
Video Card(s)	Asus RTX 4090
Storage	WD m.2
Display(s)	LG C2 Evo OLED 42"
Case	Lian Li PC 011 Dynamic Evo
Audio Device(s)	Topping E70 DAC, SMSL SP200 Headphone Amp.
Power Supply	FSP Hydro Ti PRO 1000W
Mouse	Razer Basilisk V3 Pro
Keyboard	Tester84
Software	Windows 11

System Name	The Thrashing Dragon
Processor	AMD Phenom II X6 1055T @ 4.0GHz (1.45v)
Motherboard	ASUS Crosshair IV (AMD 890FX)
Cooling	Xigmatek HDT-S1284EE
Memory	GeIL Black Dragon DDR3 1600 (4x2Gb)
Video Card(s)	Powercolor Radeon HD 5870 1Gb (x2)
Storage	WD VelociRaptor 150Gb HD (x2)
Display(s)	Acer GD235HZbid
Case	SilverStone TJ10-B
Power Supply	SILVERSTONE OP1000-E
Software	Vista HP x64 SP2

System Name	Rainbow Sparkles (Power efficient, <350W gaming load)
Processor	Ryzen R7 5800x3D (Undervolted, 4.45GHz all core)
Motherboard	Asus x570-F (BIOS Modded)
Cooling	Alphacool Apex UV - Alphacool Eisblock XPX Aurora + EK Quantum ARGB 3090 w/ active backplate
Memory	2x32GB DDR4 3600 Corsair Vengeance RGB @3866 C18-22-22-22-42 TRFC704 (1.4V Hynix MJR - SoC 1.15V)
Video Card(s)	Galax RTX 3090 SG 24GB: Underclocked to 1700Mhz 0.750v (375W down to 250W))
Storage	2TB WD SN850 NVME + 1TB Sasmsung 970 Pro NVME + 1TB Intel 6000P NVME USB 3.2
Display(s)	Phillips 32 32M1N5800A (4k144), LG 32" (4K60) \| Gigabyte G32QC (2k165) \| Phillips 328m6fjrmb (2K144)
Case	Fractal Design R6
Audio Device(s)	Logitech G560 \| Corsair Void pro RGB \|Blue Yeti mic
Power Supply	Fractal Ion+ 2 860W (Platinum) (This thing is God-tier. Silent and TINY)
Mouse	Logitech G Pro wireless + Steelseries Prisma XL
Keyboard	Razer Huntsman TE ( Sexy white keycaps)
VR HMD	Oculus Rift S + Quest 2
Software	Windows 11 pro x64 (Yes, it's genuinely a good OS) OpenRGB - ditch the branded bloatware!
Benchmark Scores	Nyooom.

System Name	Daedalus \| O'Neill \| ZPM Hive \|
Processor	M3 Pro (11/14) \| Epyc 7402p \| i5 12400F \|
Motherboard	Apple M3 Pro \| SM H11SSL-i \| TUF B660M-E D4 \|
Cooling	Pure Silence \| Noctua NH-U12S TR4 \| Noctua NH-D14 \|
Memory	18GB Unified \| 128GB DDR4 \| 16GB DDR4 \|
Video Card(s)	M3 Pro \| RTX 4070FE (VM) \| ARC A750 LE \|
Storage	512GB NVME \| ALOT of SSD's \| 1TB NVME \|
Display(s)	14" 3024x1964 \| IPMI \| 1440p UW \|
Case	Macbook Pro 14" \| NZXT H510 Flow\| BC1 Test Bench \|
Audio Device(s)	Onboard \| None \| Onboard \|
Power Supply	~ 77w Magsafe \| EVGA 750w G3 \| HX1000i \|
Mouse	Razer Basilisk
Keyboard	Logitech G915 TKL
Software	MacOS Sonoma \| Proxmox 8 \| Win 11 x64 \|

Processor	Intel Core i9 10980XE @ 4.7Ghz 1.2v
Motherboard	ASUS Rampage VI Extreme Omega
Cooling	EK-Velocity D-RGB, EK-CoolStream PE 360, XSPC TX240 Ultrathin, EK X-RES 140 Revo D5 RGB PWM
Memory	G.Skill Trident Z RGB F4-3000C14D 64GB
Video Card(s)	Asus ROG Strix GeForce RTX 4090 OC WC
Storage	M.2 990 Pro 1TB / 10TB WD RED Helium / 3x 860 2TB Evos
Display(s)	Samsung Odyssey G7 28"
Case	Corsair Obsidian 500D SE Modded
Power Supply	Cooler Master V Series 1300W
Software	Windows 11

Processor	Core i5-750 @ 3.6GHz 1.136V 24/7
Motherboard	Gigabyte P55A-UD3, SATA 6Gbit/s & USB3.0 baby!
Cooling	Alpenföhn Brocken HeatpipeDirectTouch
Memory	Geil Ultra Series 4GB 2133MHz DDR3 @ 1440MHz 7-7-7-24
Video Card(s)	Gigabyte GTX 460 1GB OC (mostly stock speeds)
Storage	OS: Samsung F3 500GB Games: Samsung F1 640GB
Display(s)	new! Samsung P2350 23" FullHD 2ms / Mirai DTL-632E500 32" LCD
Case	new! Xigmatek Midgard/Utgard side window with red cathodes, 1x140mm & 3x120mm fans
Audio Device(s)	new! ASUS Xonar DG & JVC HA-RX700 headphones
Power Supply	Cougar CM 700W Modular
Software	Windows 7 Home Premium x64
Benchmark Scores	Logitech UltraX Premium & G5 laser v2 + Ulti-mat Breathe X2 for fragging

ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 (R680) 1GB First Full Review Posted

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