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Cross firing 3 graphics cards

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  • Graphics Cards
  • Sapphire
  • Graphics
Last response: in Graphics & Displays
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April 29, 2014 8:44:59 AM

Is cross firing three graphics cards worth it? I currently have two 7850 sapphire 2 GB 256 bit cards crossfired and they are doing pretty well for me, but I was wondering if having three would be better? I do know that the memory does not add up overall, but that the spread of "duties" is spread more with more cards and therefore it might be better to have three cards! Any help on this issue would be appreciated!

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a c 333 U Graphics card
April 29, 2014 8:48:35 AM

Hi and welcome to the forums!

crossfiring three cards is not the best, stay to a max of two cards. Two cards offer the best increase at around 85-90%, whereas three GPU's only achieves around 75%. With three cards, micro-stutter is much worse and depending on your motherboard, your third GPU may be running in X4 mode, making it even worse. Anything above two graphics cards the scaling just gets worse, and so does micro-stutter as well as heat. Three cards isn't worth it for the added performance it gives.
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a b U Graphics card
April 29, 2014 8:58:51 AM

Yeah, a three card setup isn't advisable for anything other than benchmarking. Crossfire issues will escalate much more than your system's performance. Aside from that, you will be stuck with a 2GB buffer and a lot of GPU power. Not many scenarios where that last GPU will be useful.
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a c 333 U Graphics card
April 29, 2014 9:09:36 AM

on top of that, your CPU may even bottleneck such a setup.
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a b U Graphics card
April 29, 2014 9:36:29 AM

+1 for staying with 2 cards.

Most high end AMD boards, such as the 990FX chipset, can support 2 GPUs at x16. As soon as you add a 3rd it drops most or all of them to x8

Many Intel boards will have similar limitations.
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a c 333 U Graphics card
April 29, 2014 9:38:19 AM

maddogfargo said:
+1 for staying with 2 cards. Most high end AMD boards, such as the 990FX chipset, can support 2 GPUs at x16. As soon as you add a 3rd it drops most or all of them to x8


Most GPU configurations are at X8/X8 in SLI/Xfire (best it can be), which is the same as X16/X8, X4 is what you don't want.

Which Tri-Fire configuration mostly is X8/X8/X4 or X16/X16/X4. X8/X8/X8 or X16/X16/X8 is the best it can be
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April 30, 2014 10:32:38 AM

Cool! I have heard of this before, but was still just curious on the issue! Thanks for the help!
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a c 333 U Graphics card
April 30, 2014 9:40:44 PM

no problem, if you have any other questions just ask and we'll gladly help.
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a c 333 U Graphics card
April 30, 2014 10:50:20 PM

Invictus321 said:
Actually, adding a 3rd card has been seen to reduce micro-stutter dramatically.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-geforce-stut...

The performance gains are good at high res (1440p and up), but it would be useless at 1080p.


Adding a third card, though your review may support it slightly, only makes it worse. This is not the case when adding more cards.
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April 30, 2014 11:19:57 PM

If you want to go big then it could be cool. I dont know much about performance but if you do it then watch out for massive heat output. Dont want your cards to melt bro.
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a c 333 U Graphics card
May 1, 2014 2:36:11 AM

wlp3333 said:
If you want to go big then it could be cool. I dont know much about performance but if you do it then watch out for massive heat output. Dont want your cards to melt bro.


heat is a big issue, though it will not melt the cards, and usually if you have good enough airflow, they will be safely inside operating temperature.
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