Upgrade Options and Overclock Options (6970/6950 CF)

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adamdematteis

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Dec 5, 2017
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Long story short, I eventually plan on upgrading to a single GPU, but that is a little bit down the line for me. I run eyefinity for gaming at 5760x1080, and am currently using a Sapphire 6970 dual fan 2GB (that has the dual bios switch), and a Sapphire 6950 2GB (no dual bios, so I don't plan on flashing it to a 6970 as it doesn't really look like a sure thing) in Crossfire configuration.

I know these are old cards, but was wondering if I can overclock them a little bit until I can afford a better GPU. I know they both run at the 6950 speed since they are in Crossfire. How would you go about overclocking when running the configuration I currently am? Or is that even really feasible?

In the next few months I'll upgrade to a single gpu that performs better, what would a budget recommendation be for something that I would notice a difference in gaming over my dual gpu's? My budget won't be much, about $200-$250 probably, which limits what I can get. I'm not overly picky about framerates above 30fps, but these dual cards struggle with some older games while pushing 3x 1080 monitors.

I'm running an AMD FX 6350 OC'd to 4.5Ghz at the moment. I appreciate your input!
 
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If I understand it right, the crossfire setup uses the slowest clock speed of the two cards. So you'd want to overclock the slow card to match the faster card. Then test it. Assuming all is well, then you'd start overclocking both of them the same amount until you hit the limit of the slowest one, then stop there.

A 1060, which is in your budget range, is meant for 1920x1080 resolution. If you're gaming at 5760x1080 then you are pushing 3 times the pixels. It's not quite 4k gaming level but it's getting close. One thing that's limiting you is the 2gb vram of your cards. Even in crossfire you still only have 2gb vram for practical purposes. A 1060 with 6gb would help any vram related issues. As resolution goes up then the videocard...
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dontlistentome

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Sep 5, 2016
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If I understand it right, the crossfire setup uses the slowest clock speed of the two cards. So you'd want to overclock the slow card to match the faster card. Then test it. Assuming all is well, then you'd start overclocking both of them the same amount until you hit the limit of the slowest one, then stop there.

A 1060, which is in your budget range, is meant for 1920x1080 resolution. If you're gaming at 5760x1080 then you are pushing 3 times the pixels. It's not quite 4k gaming level but it's getting close. One thing that's limiting you is the 2gb vram of your cards. Even in crossfire you still only have 2gb vram for practical purposes. A 1060 with 6gb would help any vram related issues. As resolution goes up then the videocard becomes more important, so your 6350 shouldn't be a problem. The exceptions would be games that leverage the CPU a lot.

Minecraft is an example of this, City Skylines is another. Of newer games, something like PUBG or the new Assassin's Creed game would also be exceptions.

If I was you I'd look around for examples of people running triple monitor gaming on a 1060 and see if the performance is acceptable to you. An alternative is buying a used card, if you can find something substantially faster than a 1060 for around the same cost. You are willing to accept 30fps and presumably low settings, so that gives you some flexibility.
 
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