I'm getting jealious of everyones performance with the 4870 and crysis. I'll jump on this card if i didn't have a problem:
My pci-e 16x lane is locked at 8x. Worth picking up the 4870 or just grab another 8800gt to SLI it?

If it's pcie1 at 8x, then it'll probably bottleneck 4870. Regardless, for you, it makes more sense to get get another 8800gt, since 8800gt sli outperforms a single 4870 by a large margin.

is 8800gt sli THAT good? you people make it sound like it's the best thing ever.

oh and just curious, how much of abottleneck you'd think it would be

We're comparing 2 cards in sli to one here. 2 4870 in cf will outperform 2 8800gt by a large amount, but it'll cost far more and you don't have a cf motherboard.

I'm not sure how much 4870 will bottleneck, since testers don't really have reason to run it at pcie1.0x8. But cf 4850 bottlenecks heavily at pcie2.0x8(x16 effective) compared to pcie2.0x16(x32 effective).
http://www.tweaktown.com/articles/ [...] index.html

Single card has lower overhead compared to cf, but it's still likely not enough, especially for a faster 4870.

8800sli is faster even if the 4870 isn't bottlenecked, so it's a nonissue.

Hm ok thank you!

2x8800GT in SLI beat every single card out there in almost every game(including the GTX 280,HD 4870.....)

comparing 2 8800gt to a single 4870 is rather childish.......it will outperform ati no doubt (provided the second gpu is working) but we are talking bout 2gpu with 1GB vs 1gpu with 512MB.

i would suggest geting a 4870 if u are not using a monster monitor(s).1 gpu requires less power and less heat. plus u hav to consider that a 8800gt dumps heat in ur chasing while 4870 will dump outside.

i think 8x a lane will bottleneck sli much more than a single gpu, coz it has to communicate with the other gpu as well as ur PC, so should require more bandwith...donno i may be wrong...

You don't need to start two different threads for the same query...

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/ [...] 00gt-worth

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341

hope it helps.

i would say picking up another 8800GT will be more cost effective for you. with another 8800GT (making it SLI) it will perform the same/better compare to the 4850CF and be like 2FPS short from 4870CF in crysis (look at the link). sure different games will result a single 4870 outperforming 8800GT (like quake territory) but when you're getting high FPS across most of the games, does it really matter?

it only costs $130-150 with rebates these days to get another 8800GT, i would just get another 8800GT and i think it will keep you in good shape for awhile.