uncfan_2563

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Would a 4870 and a 4870 x2 run like 4870's in TriFire or would the 4870 x2's performance be scaled down?

If the first situation is the case, are there any benchmark showing the scaling?

Thanks again guys ;)
 
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I had a 4870 and a 4870x2 before I got my 3 5870s. I can honestly say that the biggest advantage for me seemed to be higher min FPS, and just a nice little boost in avg FPS.

Now to answer your real question, all 3 cards will run fine in trifire, as they are all at the same clock rate and memory (it will down clock the proc/memory speed, and amt of VRAM to the lowest amount) so assuming you have a 1GB 4870, you won't lose anything with the x2 and 4870 crossfired.

Resolution is what's really important though, as I game at 2560*1600, so for me it was worth it to pay the extra to help out with the min frames with AA enabled, but the lower the resolution, the more your performance will be minimal (and maybe adding the extra overhead...
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This is with very very old drivers, cat 8.7. Now we have 10.3b. Tri-Fire is more worth it than Quad fire. Perhaps, some1 should test 4870 Tri fire with Cat 10.3b.
 

microterf

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I had a 4870 and a 4870x2 before I got my 3 5870s. I can honestly say that the biggest advantage for me seemed to be higher min FPS, and just a nice little boost in avg FPS.

Now to answer your real question, all 3 cards will run fine in trifire, as they are all at the same clock rate and memory (it will down clock the proc/memory speed, and amt of VRAM to the lowest amount) so assuming you have a 1GB 4870, you won't lose anything with the x2 and 4870 crossfired.

Resolution is what's really important though, as I game at 2560*1600, so for me it was worth it to pay the extra to help out with the min frames with AA enabled, but the lower the resolution, the more your performance will be minimal (and maybe adding the extra overhead from the second card will actually give you less performance) like at 1680*1050 maybe? Not sure, but the lower you go, the less GPU dependant it will be, and the bigger waste of money the second card will be.

What resolution are you playing at? Oh, and btw, the reason I got a 4870 and not another x2 for my second card is that it performance was better accross the board at the time with trifire than quadfire. (as stated above, drivers might have improved perfomance dramatically since then though) can't really comment on that though, as I believe 9.8 or 9.9 were the last I used with my 4870s
 
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uncfan_2563

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BTW, while I opened the thread, what's the real value of a 4870x2 now? I see the prices on sites like ebay and all but without a solid source like newegg or tigerdirect selling the card, I have no idea.
 
i would get more then 700 watts

power_maximum-3.gif
 

uncfan_2563

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Wow. I didn't know that they used THAT much power. Well, upgrading the PSU isn't too much of a problem however, I don't think I'd want my pc drawing that much power. Would it be a better solution to just sell my 4870 and get a 5870?