New card or crossfire

[MR PINK]

Hey Guys, I have a Saphire 5770 1gig DDR5 from ATI. I am thinking of an upgrade and unsure of which route to take.

Should I go for a new single card or follow the less expensive option and buy a second 5770? Anyone running two of these cards?

Any tips on the best card to go for at the moment, taking into account new releases at the top end, I was thinking that its a good time to do this upgrade. My exsisting system is AMD 1090T x6 , Crossfire Formula iv mobo, 8gig ram and an 850w psu

 

[Ciara]

Hi MR PINK ... nice name

Only my personal opinion but as your running two 22" Monitors I would invest in one high end GPU, looking at your spec you should have no problem.

Something for you to look at > PassMark Software - Video Card Benchmarks - High End Video Cards

 

[Corpsecrank]

I agree crossfire is currently a waste of money. You will almost certainly regret the idea if you do go forward with crossfire. I say this for a lot of reasons having had a crossfire setup.

The very first problem I noticed with crossfire is that you get no video until your in windows which means no bios unless you pull a card. So if your pc has trouble booting you will have to pull a card to diagnose the issue. This may not be true on all systems but this was one of the issues I had.

The second thing I think you should know about crossfire that I did not know when I decided to go with it is that you can only use a single display while in crossfire mode. If you rely on a second monitor for any reason this will quickly become a huge pain in the nuts.

The last thing I did not care for was the way multiple cards are used. You will not see any difference when gaming even in crossfire mode unless the game is coded to handle multiple GPUs. So about 98% of the time your only really using a single card.

If you want a real improvement in graphics and performance get a bigger single card. You will actually be able to utilize the full potential of your investment without any headaches.

Couple recommendations you can check out:

This card would pretty much double the performance of your current this may only seem like one step up but this is also a 256bit card and I am fairly sure the 5770s were all 128bit this also has double the memory for under 300.00 it's a steal:
Newegg.com - SAPPHIRE 100290SR Radeon HD 5870 (Cypress XT) 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Eyefinity 6 Edition Video Card

This is a pretty nice card for the cash as well:
Newegg.com - SAPPHIRE 100312SR Radeon HD 6950 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card with Eyefinity

If your budget is a little bigger you could check out this card from XFX which is pretty smokin for the cash:
Newegg.com - XFX HD-697A-CNDC Radeon HD 6970 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card with Eyefinity

 

[smarteyeball]

The very first problem I noticed with crossfire is that you get no video until your in windows which means no bios unless you pull a card. So if your pc has trouble booting you will have to pull a card to diagnose the issue. This may not be true on all systems but this was one of the issues I had.

Never had this issue across three crossfire setups spanning 2 generations :huh:

The second thing I think you should know about crossfire that I did not know when I decided to go with it is that you can only use a single display while in crossfire mode. If you rely on a second monitor for any reason this will quickly become a huge pain in the nuts.

Not quite.

There are some titles that don't like having a secondary monitor enabled, but for the most part it's no drama with two or more screens active.

The last thing I did not care for was the way multiple cards are used. You will not see any difference when gaming even in crossfire mode unless the game is coded to handle multiple GPUs. So about 98% of the time your only really using a single card.

True to a point, although 98% is a little exaggerated

But scaling isn't that great on 5xxx series cards.

If you want a real improvement in graphics and performance get a bigger single card. You will actually be able to utilize the full potential of your investment without any headaches.

As tempting as adding another cheaper 5770 is, it really would be better to go for a fast single GPU.

I would also avoid going for another 5xxx series card. The drivers were never really matured for it's lifetime and the focus is mostly on the 6xxx series now.

So yeah, a single 6950/70 or even a nvidia GTX 570 would be a better option.

 

[MR PINK]

Thanks for the response guys. Based on what I have learnt I will be going for either the 6970 or Nvideas gtx 570

 

[sygnus21]

@ smarteyeball - thanks for the clarification. +1