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Sound card or TriFire?

What should I do?


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Im having some issues. I have recently installed an xtremegamer in my rig and its too close to my 4850 in my trifire setup. It is really overheating big time and causes BSOD from the heat. I have 2 options and trust me I tried everything else and dont have the cash for a pcie sound card. I can either ditch the sound card or ditch the 4850 and just settle for the 4850x2 which im sure is enough. I really dont want to ditch the sound card cause I just got it and it really makes gaming that much better for me. So what do you guys think? Ive also got an extra xtremegamer fatal1y sitting but its impossible to use do to it blocking off even more air then the xtremegamer(xtremegamer is low profile).

If I do ditch the 4850 I will hold on to it till I get enough fund to buy a auzentech forte. its low profile and will give my 4850 enough space to breath.

if you look at the pic you will see how much the sound card blocks the 4850.
 

ShadowFold

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I'd go with the tri-fire. But isn't there a slot below the sound card you could use?
 
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its a pci-e slot. you really think i will benifit that much from trifire to sacrifice amazing sound?
 

AltecV1

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i never got why peaple get audio card:confused:its audio you cant hear the differents!! anyway tri-fire for sure:)
 
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well enabling x-fi ultra high audio in bf2 and 2142 does make a difference. you can tell for sure.
 

troyrae360

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its hard to make a good call when yhou dont have the specs of you setup listed,
whats you on board sound chip? what mb are you using? what cpu are you running etc
 
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there is the system specs under my avatar and its also in my signature.

onboard sound is
Realtek ALC885 8-channel HD Audio Codec
High-performance DACs with 106dB dynamic range (A-Weight), ADCs with 101dB dynamic range
 

troyrae360

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there is the system specs under my avatar and its also in my signature.

LOL, sorry, i was just editing the other post, i uasley just check in the system specs bit where every one else puts them, and disregard whats written in the sig bit as its mostley rubbish, lol
opps
 
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np. to bad I couldnt find someone to trade the xtremegamer and fatal1y pro for a fatal1ty titanium
 

troyrae360

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but anyway, ive heard that DFI lanparty MB is a vrey high end board!! there for it should have very good sound on board it may just take a bit of configureing to get it perfect.

i know my MB has like 7.2 Full rate lossless HD sound on it
i would ditch the sound card
 
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I don't think that adding a 3rd card is going to help in any way other than maybe 1000 points in 3DMark.
 
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Dont do tri crossfire. Your third slot isn't fully pci-e 16x . If I remember correctly, your third slot is working on pci-e 4x.
 
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Dont do tri crossfire. Your third slot isn't fully pci-e 16x . If I remember correctly, your third slot is working on pci-e 4x.

not really, in fact it works at 8x at 2.0 speeds, so performance drop is null.

i would go with sound as anything over 2 cards or a dual gpu card is a waste

EDIT: in fact, i was wrong, the second slot work at full 16x
 
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Stick with the tri-fire and ditch the sound card. I never really could tell the difference between oboard and my old x-fi. Tri-fire is gonna keep your FPS high, which is all that matters.
 
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Ive tried those drivers, they dont enable eax 5.0. thats mainly what I want.
 

iandh

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i never got why peaple get audio card:confused:its audio you cant hear the differents!! anyway tri-fire for sure:)

It isn't really about that for me, in my case I wanted a true graphic equalizer instead of crappy presets like my onboard has.
 

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If you don't notice a difference in gaming (FPS/quality) with tri-fire, then dump the 4850 and keep the sound card. Scaling w/ multiple ATI GPUs is just now becoming worth it as demonstrated by the reviews on the 4890.
 

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i never got why peaple get audio card:confused:its audio you cant hear the differents!! anyway tri-fire for sure:)

say's the person with bad ears
 
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Last edited:

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its a pci-e slot. you really think i will benifit that much from trifire to sacrifice amazing sound?

One true way too find out is to do some benchmarks with that sound card and the onboard and see if you loose any FPS's due to it...

As for tri fire and games not worth it unless your bothered about benchmarks..
 

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i dislike tri card and u dont have the cpu to power it, and onboard audio is garbage unless u have a $20 headset/headphones
 

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i dislike tri card and u dont have the cpu to power it, and onboard audio is garbage unless u have a $20 headset/headphones

He doesn't have the CPU power for it? Are you kidding me?
 
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