5850 Crossfire worth it?

[thesupermedium]

Hi, I currently run an Ati 5850, and I love it! I can run every game, most of which I can totally max out. However, I'm feeling the tug to go for crossfire and I was wondering if it is really worth it. I have around $200 saved up currently, and I'd expect to have the $300 by the middle of June. I have a 600 watt Power supply which meets the minimum requirements, but I was still thinking of buying another one. So will the performance I will get from Crossfire be worth $400? Thanks.

 

[XD_dued]

Hi, I currently run an Ati 5850, and I love it! I can run every game, most of which I can totally max out.

Isn't this ^^^^^^^ enough of an answer for you?

Honestly, I was considering the 5850 crossfire too, but I'm so happy with the performance now, and nothing is really stressing it at all (OH NO I CAN'T PLAY CRYSIS WITH MORE THAN 4X AA MAXED OUT) so i decided to wait. If you're fine with performance now, I'd at least wait until performance is notably bothering you. Remember, this is my opinion though, and its your money.

If you do want to squeeze more performance out of it, have you overclocked your card yet?

BTW, what resolution are you running at?

 

[thesupermedium]

Sorry for my tardy reply, times are pressing

I play at 1080p, which is right where this card is supposed to be. However, when I play games like Napoleon Total War or BFBC2, I notice it can get choppy, or in NTW's case, outright slow. Also, I was recently thinking of selling my 23" monitor and buying three 22", or cheaper 23" monitors for eyefinity. The possibilities are out there, but my real wonder is if anyone who has a Crossfire setup really feels it was worth it.

 

[deweycd]

I just upgraded to Crossfire with two 5850 and found that in some circumstances it was a large benefit but you have to be a bit more cautious when changing settings in games. Some games do not perform better in Crossfire. The other problem I am running into is that my setup is running a lot warmer then before and the fans on the 5850 are quite a bit louder then I expected. All in all, it has its ups and it has its downs.

 

[Rustyy117]

Crossfire HD5850's work great, Haven't come across a game that doesn't scale well (lowest I've seen was 60% in Dirt 2).

You'll need a good CPU so as to not bottleneck your cards, something like a mildly overclocked core i5/i7 would be great.

Got both my cards at 950/1200 and play BFBC2 at 1920 x 1080 All High/HBAO/16xAF/1xAA and rarely see FPS go below 120FPS

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey